Review of A Better Tomorrow II (1987) by Art S — 23 Feb 2015

John Woo's sequel to his breakthrough hit feels very schematic - as if he tried to extract just the elements of the first film that he thought made it a success and then string them together loosely with bits of plot he found in the corner of the garage.

Unfortunately for him, Chow Yun Fat's iconic Mark Gor died at the end of the first film and Lung Ti's central character was in jail. So, here we find that Mark actually had a twin brother (Ken) and Lung Ti is released from prison to go undercover working with his cop brother Leslie Cheung.

But forget the plot (easily done). Let's focus on Woo's style - it is here in full flourish, but feeling very abstract. Grand emotional gestures triggered by melodramatic moments, bullets flying and blood spurting in slow motion, macho hearts broken and central characters killed.

Rumor has it that Woo and producer Tsui Hark had a falling out and this is the explanation for the problems here. Tsui would go on to direct the final sequel himself.