By Landon Huneycutt
There are few directors I love as much as I love Johnnie To. He has embraced, recontextualized and redefined triad crime cinema, just as Jean-Pierre Melville did with hitmen, gangsters and heists or Takeshi Kitano with the yakuza. Like those filmmakers, To has gone beyond one genre. For To, romance, martial arts, detectives, cops, criminals, absurdism, the battle of masculine and feminine, crime and action all have their place in cinema.
His masterful wide compositions capture multiple people in the frame without cramming them into the shot or losing the distinct personalities of the characters. All are given purpose. The action can be vicious or balletic, often both, but is never without weight or consequence. To visualizes a poetic and cinematic violence, bound in code, coincidence and fate, while stripping genre and cinema down to its bare essentials — minimalism without affectation.
His approach to pacing and structure is similar to architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s principle of compression and release, in which one passes through small spaces to reach a larger space, giving a sense of freedom. Stillness gives way to constant motion, building to a grand release. Necessary images only. Excess is absent.
The Heroic Trio, which begins screening Tuesday, March 18, as part of the Once Upon a Time in Hong Kong series, is an odd one in To’s filmography. The film contains tighter compositions than one might expect from him. There’s still the fluid flow of images, yet much of the action is isolated from shot to shot, resulting in an action film that is borderline impressionistic. To often incorporates absurdity in his films, and here it is cranked to 11.
This is a superhero tale with three women in the lead. An evil master, who resides in the sewers, wants to kidnap babies to establish a new emperor of China. Ching, the Invisible Woman (Michelle Yeoh), kidnaps the babies using an invisible suit her husband is designing. Chat, the Thief Catcher (Maggie Cheung), roams around on a motorcycle while clad in leather and armed with a double-barrel shotgun. Tung, the Wonder Woman (Anita Mui), is married to a detective investigating the disappearances of the babies as she attempts to rescue them.
To and Ching Siu-tung, the film’s fight choreographer, capture the three women shooting, kicking and punching through a gory and unabashed superhero tale enshrouded in fog and loaded with squibs. The film’s goofy nature understands the world it portrays and never takes itself too seriously, while allowing the melodrama and pathos to flourish. The set pieces are varied in their design. The leading ladies (and Anthony Wong clearly having a blast as a maniacal assassin) battle by wire work, wuxia, guns and action that can border on horror. The Heroic Trio is a testament to To’s idiosyncratic approach. It’s a kinetic, nonstop action film that revels in absurdity and the bizarre yet retains the earnest and loving touch of Hong Kong’s greatest filmmaker.