Dubbed the first Chinese remake of a Hollywood blockbuster, Connected (保持通話) takes its story from David R. Ellis’ Cellular, and was shot by Hong Kong’s foremost action flick director, Benny Chan (陳木勝).
With a top-notch cast led by Nick Cheung (張家輝), Louis Koo (古天樂) and Liu Ye (劉燁), Chan proves that movies translated from West to East can be attractive to local audiences brought up on the fine tradition of Hong Kong action cinema.
Fast-paced and dynamic, the film wastes no time in introducing its female protagonist Grace (played by Taiwan’s Barbie Hsu, 徐熙媛). A widowed electronic engineer, and mother to a daughter, Grace finds herself in a car crash, then kidnapped by some gangsters involved in a murder that her younger brother had witnessed and recorded on camera, and locked up in a hut.
Cut to Bob (played by Louis Koo, 古天樂), a single dad who works a dead-end job as a debt collector and can barely keep his family together. On his way to see his son off at the airport, Bob receives a phone call from Grace, who drew on her engineering know-how managed to put a smashed phone back together but could only dial a random number.
Believing Grace and her family are in mortal danger, Bob takes the information to the police only to be told the call was as a phone prank. He then takes matters into his own hands.
Enter detective Fai (played by Cheung), a former rising star of the force who fell from grace and was demoted, who launches a one-man investigation.
The Hollywood transplant has been renovated in a quintessentially Hong Kong style. The elements are all there: well-executed fight choreography; adrenalin-stimulating car chase sequences; the timeworn plot of good guys versus corrupt cops; and of course, a dash of Hong Kong-esque humor. The film’s production values are unquestionably high and slick, exemplified in the scene where a crane shot swoops down on Koo who is trapped in a car that dangles on the edge of a cliff.
Though not without a few far-fetched plot devices, the action thriller coaxes viewers to suspend disbelief with a bevy of characters that have well-developed motivations and personalities. Liu makes a charming and slightly psychotic villain. Cheung, a favorite supporting actor in Hong Kong, shines as a family-man police officer who clings to virtues that no longer apply to the contemporary world. Koo turns in a convincing performance as an unlikely hero who struggles to be a good father and helps to soften the film’s hard edge with a father-and-son subplot drama.
As with most action movies in which the female lead serves as an eye-pleasing prop, Hsu is easily overlooked amid the strong male cast. Apparently, the star needed more practice and training to master her craft than her costars. Perhaps she should seriously consider shedding the pretty-faced pop idol look next time she plays a character who is kidnapped and tortured.
The Taipei Times last week reported that the rising share of seniors in the population is reshaping the nation’s housing markets. According to data from the Ministry of the Interior, about 850,000 residences were occupied by elderly people in the first quarter, including 655,000 that housed only one resident. H&B Realty chief researcher Jessica Hsu (徐佳馨), quoted in the article, said that there is rising demand for elderly-friendly housing, including units with elevators, barrier-free layouts and proximity to healthcare services. Hsu and others cited in the article highlighted the changing family residential dynamics, as children no longer live with parents,
It is jarring how differently Taiwan’s politics is portrayed in the international press compared to the local Chinese-language press. Viewed from abroad, Taiwan is seen as a geopolitical hotspot, or “The Most Dangerous Place on Earth,” as the Economist once blazoned across their cover. Meanwhile, tasked with facing down those existential threats, Taiwan’s leaders are dying their hair pink. These include former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) and Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁), among others. They are demonstrating what big fans they are of South Korean K-pop sensations Blackpink ahead of their concerts this weekend in Kaohsiung.
Taiwan is one of the world’s greatest per-capita consumers of seafood. Whereas the average human is thought to eat around 20kg of seafood per year, each Taiwanese gets through 27kg to 35kg of ocean delicacies annually, depending on which source you find most credible. Given the ubiquity of dishes like oyster omelet (蚵仔煎) and milkfish soup (虱目魚湯), the higher estimate may well be correct. By global standards, let alone local consumption patterns, I’m not much of a seafood fan. It’s not just a matter of taste, although that’s part of it. What I’ve read about the environmental impact of the
Oct 20 to Oct 26 After a day of fighting, the Japanese Army’s Second Division was resting when a curious delegation of two Scotsmen and 19 Taiwanese approached their camp. It was Oct. 20, 1895, and the troops had reached Taiye Village (太爺庄) in today’s Hunei District (湖內), Kaohsiung, just 10km away from their final target of Tainan. Led by Presbyterian missionaries Thomas Barclay and Duncan Ferguson, the group informed the Japanese that resistance leader Liu Yung-fu (劉永福) had fled to China the previous night, leaving his Black Flag Army fighters behind and the city in chaos. On behalf of the
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