Search - A Killer's Blues on DVD

Ti Lung with a good performance, but a terrible movie

morgoth | omaha, NE | 09/21/2008

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Ti Lung stars as a killer gangster with a really bad wig at the start of the movie. He is hunting down Alan Hsu, and happens to kill him right when Hsu had ran back to his house and put his daughter in his arms. The problems begin right away in this movie. There is one of those great scenes that I have seen in many HK movies where a child is pointing a gun (a toy gun in this movie) at the person who killed their parents. The story heads in a good direction, at least that's what I thought. Ti Lung is going to raise the girl, but then he goes to jail. He gets out after 14 years, and his older brother played by Lo Lieh is there to greet him. Ti Lung seems to be looking to get back in the business, but they don't really make this clear. And even more unclear is the relationship between Ti Lung and the girl. Is she mad at him, or does she not know that Ti Lung is the man who killed her father? But how could she not know? This really made me mad. A very bad directing job not letting the viewers know what is going on. It's sad to see good performances by guys like Ti Lung and Lo Lieh get wasted by the horrible story and directing job. They end up making it clear that she doesn't know Ti Lung killed her father, but not until halfway into the movie. They couldn't have made this clear 5 minutes into the movie? It bugged me a lot. OK sorry for the rant. When Ti Lung gets out of jail, a crime boss played by Wong Hap wants Ti Lung to work for him. But Ti Lung likes his old boss, and can't be persuaded to join Wong Hap's side. Wong Hap's son is played by Roy Cheung, and he is a real hothead. I have only seen Cheung in maybe 10-15 movies, but he seems to always play the same role.

There are some good moments in this movie (the final scene is very good), but overall there is not much to get interested in. I don't see any reason to further elaborate on such a bad movie. I was very disappointed with this, to say the least. It's gets a little bit better towards the end, but it's too little too late.

There is not much action, but what's there is definitely above average. Some nice stunts, and a nice brawl in a poolhall. Really brutal stuff in the poolhall brawl. Too bad it is so short of a fight. The other brawls are equally short, but have that brutality and realism that I like to see. There's also some well done shootouts, but nothing good enough to save this trainwreck of a movie.


1.5/5


The picture quality on the Deltamac DVD is fine, and the subtitles are decent.


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