★ 7 / 10
Dominic" (Dayo Wong) is struggling to make ends
CinemaSerf
"Dominic" (Dayo Wong) is struggling to make ends meet, post COVID, with his business in tatters and his repayment bills at almost $13,000 per month. He's not…
"Dominic" (Dayo Wong) is struggling to make ends meet, post COVID, with his business in tatters and his repayment bills at almost $13,000 per month. He's not afraid of hard work, though, so when his "Uncle Ming" (Paul Chun) offers him his share in a funeral parlour he jumps at the chance. His partner - rather sarcastically referred to as "Hello Man" (Michael Hui) comes across as a rather curmudgeonly fellow - a traditionalist Taoist priest who lives with his ambulance-driving daughter "Yuet" (Michelle Wai) and his favourite son "Ben" (Pak Hon Chu) who is attempting to follow in his father's footsteps. Thing is, in his excitement to get the job done and to make enough money to clear his debts, he makes quite a few schoolboy errors at the start that are way more lively to offend the ancestors than send them peaceably on their way to the next life, and that just irks the older man who feels his new pal is disrespectful. As the story unfolds, we follow a young man who learns a little more about a business that is really anything but. At times this is quite a funny story, with a special appearance by a full-sized, papier-mâché, yellow Maserati rather summing up the ineptness of "Dominic" as he strives for success, but that humour rather quickly evaporates leaving us with a familial drama the can be quite poignant at times as it looks at the restricting roles for women and the hereditary responsibility of sons. Given the professions of the characters, grief is never far away and we focus quiet tenderly at times at just how people come to terms with that - or not, whilst we also try to reconcile just how families themselves change from generation to generation, with some tough decisions having to be made that centre around "Ben" and his need to look forward and not back. The acting is engaging and the dialogue well written, allowing the action to do plenty of the work without subjecting us to a constant surfeit of chatter, and it handles the topic of death and the provisions we make to deal with it and it's aftermath sensitively.
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★ 9 / 10
My first time writing a review
HKRiku
This one is that kind of movies that linger in your mind, that make you think about life, that give you certain positive impacts.The casting is great and the…
This one is that kind of movies that linger in your mind, that make you think about life, that give you certain positive impacts.The casting is great and the acting of the individuals is near perfect.The movie is good for audience of any religious background, for audience who believe or not the last dance is meaningful for the death, for audience who has good/bad bonding with the family, for audience who is struggling for life, and even for audience who doesn't like going to cinemas.Hong Kong movie industries have been relying too much on kungfu/gangster stories for the last 10 or even 20 years. This movie is a major break-through while in Asia Korean/Japanese movies have been dominating.Good job!!
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★ 8 / 10
One of the best hk film. Incredible in this genre.
ferris_cheong
You can never compare this film with other title that shoot for a far bigger picture or genre.But this film is a lead example of masterpiece, doing everything…
You can never compare this film with other title that shoot for a far bigger picture or genre.But this film is a lead example of masterpiece, doing everything well within its lane, especially with such a non-mainstream topic about some Chinese funeral ceremony. It is absolutely amazing how the director and team able to tell a story/paint a beautiful picture around this topic.It has great acting, although the pace at the first part of the film might be a little slow for some audience, but it was just interesting enough to keep my attention. With that, the film has great introduction to all the major characters in this story in order to move into act 2 and 3.Beautiful film that send great message without shoving it down your throat. None of the actors' performance or the scripts were written over the top that it became unrealistic or forcing a emotional reaction. But rather a natural state of flow that takes the audience emotion for a ride.The best film from HK so far.
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Lovely film.