Ten Statements About....THE BULLET VANISHES (2012)

Song may be Hong Kong's answer to the Robert Downey Jr.
Holmes, but his motivations and curiousity proves very, very
different...

1) It's obvious that this film in its look and feel is emulating the Robert Downey Jr. Sherlock Holmes film; the soundtrack in particular seems to be ripping whole pages out of that franchise. And yet, because this is a Hong Kong film set on mainland China in the 30's, there are subtle changes in tone, in characterization and in pace that makes this film feel unique.

2) And one of the more interesting variations lie in the presentation of our Holmes stand-in, Ching Wan Lau's Song. Right from from when we first see him--attempting to hang himself as an experiment to prove that an inmate was wrongly accused--we get the sense that he's motivated by curiousity and the need to know, but those qualities have redirected his attentions elsewhere. He's a very enigmatic figure, not as dynamic as Downey's Holmes but at times much more intriguing.

3) And while we're on the subject of Song, perhaps the most amazing aspect of his character is this strange relationship he has with a female prison inmate that we learned committed the perfect murder, then confessed after a few years. There might be this tendency to write the prisoner off as Irene Adler to Song's Holmes, but there's something that's not romantic, but loads more intimate about their relationship with each other...especially when they correspond during his investigation of this case.

"I ain't no Nigel Bruce, muthafucka!"

4) If Song is subdued and not as flashy as Downey, Nicholas Tse's Guo makes up for it. There are large stretches where Guo comes off less like a police detective and more like a gunslinger, shooting first and acting later. And that tendency to act first makes his ultimate fate all the more logical.

5) While the plot is flawed and suffers from a degree of OCD, I find it fascinating that as Song and Guo unravel this mystery, each level of the solution reflects a different subgenre in detective fiction. Through the film's hour and forty-five minute running time, the plot transforms from a deductive film to a locked room mystery to a police procedural....and on and on until you realize finally that what we've been watching is a hardboiled detective thriller that Sherlock Holmes somehow wandered into.

6) I very much appreciated how Song's confrontation with the ultimate culprit is not clear cut. Since Director Chi-Leung Lo refuses to give us a concrete indication as to who did what, we can make our own decisions. And also, I suspect that Lo isn't interested in giving us simple answers, just more questions.

7) And I also appreciate how most everything Lo lays out in the first act pays off in the third--especially the hanging experiment in Song's first scene. And the moments where we see how far in advance Song has figured so much of this case out throws his intelligence and deductive reasoning into sharper relief.

I wish I knew who the actress was who played the character
between our two protaganists, because she's the closest
Song has to a girlfriend...and is loads of fun!

8) While I realize that we're suppose to respond to Yang Mi's Little Lark, who is Guo's love interest, I was rather more taken with the pathologist friend of Song (If you're wondering why I can't identify the actress, it's because trying to find a complete cast list for this film with the character names has proven to be damn near impossible) who examines the body and discovers a key clue to the solution. This is what a 'character actor' is supposed to do--advance the plot while also giving us some flavoring to the proceedings....and some of the flavor she adds, like the ostrich she keeps in her lab, is loads of fun.

9) I'll admit--while some of the aspects of the solution are cool (the revelation of what the 'phantom bullet' is, for example), it's frustrating that those aspects are brought up, then forgotton. Part of the fun of a mystery is the demystification of the crime, and I needed a little more elaboration for these revelations to be truly satisfying.

10) Even though there's an element of 'is the crime supernatural or not' in Sherlock Holmes, in this film there's a little bit more verisimilitude to the angle thanks to the culture in which it takes place. Because the culture of China at that time accepted the presence of ghosts, the idea this is revenge being enacted upon the boss of a munitions factory by a wrongfully accused woman is a plausible angle even if we know it can't be true.

Overall...Even with its derivative nature, a film that may not be 100% successful but has enough differences in tone, plotting and characterization from its American inspiration to be watchable.

Ten Statements About....THE MALTESE FALCON (1941)

One of the greatest movie P.I.'s of all time...

"When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something about it. It doesn't make any difference what you thought of him. He was your partner and you're supposed to do something about it. And it happens we're in the detective business. Well, when one of your organization gets killed, it's-it's bad business to let the killer get away with it, bad all around, bad for every detective everywhere."
 

1) Humphrey Bogart could not have done this film with anywhere near the effectiveness that he shows here without climbing his way up through Warner Brothers' ranks as a heavy. Since John Huston's script maintains Sam Spade's rather fluid attitude towards morality, Bogart needed to be able to show a shadier side to make his manipulation of events believable.

2) I really enjoy how Mary Astor's Brigid never, ever says she kind and good and pure--hell, even when she's 'playing schoolgirl,' she is always telling Sam that she's Very Bad News. And you know what? She's Very Right.

3) You know one little touch that I thought was genius? The working relationship between Lee Patrick's Effie and Sam. Huston's script makes it rather clear that Effie is one Damn Smart Customer, and Sam relies on her intelligence and intuition--Hell, it's almost as if Effie is an unofficial partner in the firm.

Two of these people are supposed to be dangerous...
the other one is.

4) Another brilliant touch--when you come down to it, Sydney Greenstreet's Caspar Guttman and Peter Lorre's Joel Cairo are children in men's bodies; if we didn't know it by the third act, the way their interactions disintegrate into schoolyard accusations when they realize they've been had makes it clear. But the fact that they're distinctive and 'scary' individuals, it further obscures the fact that we met real villain in the very first scene.

5) Of all the 'villains,' the one I was taken the most by in this viewing was Peter Lorre. Remember, this was Lorre before he became a parody of himself, and he's actually pretty scary for all his feigned civility. There's something unnerving about how reasonably he orders Sam around while waving his gun, and his body language is strange and off-putting in all the right ways.

6) One of the reasons I bemoan the death of black and white is how being deprived of a color pallete allowed good directors to find other ways to convey emotion and characterization. Some of Huston's choices, like showing Sam and his partner separated by their name plate, or choosing to only show the phone when Sam receives news of Archer's death, are more engaging because they're unusual.

7) You know, I don't think this film could have been made now simply because we never, ever get a sense of whether Sam is on the up and up or not. If made now, the script would make Sam much more heroic and wouldn't mince words on how virtuous he is. Huston is able to get away with a moral ambiguity--Hell, the reason Sam gives up Brigid is because, if we're to believe him, it's bad for business to let Archer's death go unpunished--because the audience is willing to accept shades of grey.

"Look, Guttman...I'll bet you the Falcon isn't filled
with peanut butter creme!"

8) But what we do get is that Sam, whether heroic or villainous, is very good at his job. Simple things like sending Brigid into the next room to get him money long enough for him to check the labels on her clothes and try to confirm her story makes it clear how clever he is.

9) Compare Sam's instincts to Archer, who comes off in his one brief scene as, well, a bit of a goof. It's clear that Sam's partner is motivated for taking the case because he likes Brigid's look (and her money). It's his behavior that makes me wonder if Sam lets him take on the case on purpose--not because he wanted him dead, but because Sam doesn't trust her even at this early point in the story.

10) And The Falcon of the title is the ultimate MacGuffin. Even though we're told this is the item around which the story revolves, it's nothing but a feint. The story is about Archer's murder, not a hunt for a statue. And the only statue we do find is a replica; we never learn if the original even exists except in the mind of these two children in adult's bodies.

Overall...a key, essential film that drives home what a movie star is thanks to Bogart's performance. It may not be the first film noir, but it certainly is one of the movies that laid down much of the blueprint for this wonderful genre.