This movie is probably best compared with Avatar because if the latter is considered the pinnacle of graphics excellence, the former is considered to be the pinnacle of acting for Hongkong movies for 2009. Boasting a formidable array of actors and actresses, the movie storyline is about how a group of ordinary (well, some of them do possess extraordinary martial arts skills) people do their utmost to protect Dr. Sun Yat-sen, a revolutionary leader who is on an hour's trip to organize some revolutions in Hongkong.
The problem is that The Chinese government of the Qing Dynasty has ordered imperial assassins to kill Dr. Sun in the British controlled colony of Hongkong and both sides clashed valiantly in their respective attempts to fulfill their mission objectives. I am not going to spoil the movie by revealing too much here but you can get a glimpse from the general description of the main characters here:
- A Hongkong policeman who is a gambling and a secret mercenary for crime.
- A street beggar who punished himself after falling for his mother and watching her die.
- A rickshaw puller who is a loyal servant to a generous merchant.
- A merchant who lives a secret life as a revolutionary but refuses his son to participate.
- A merchant's son who believes that a revolution is more important than carrying on the bloodline.
- A concubine who did not wish to see the death of her husband.
- An escaped Shaolin monk who wishes to regain his honor to return back to the temple.
- A Hongkong police chief who is squashed between British interests and Chinese revolutionaries.
- A newspaper editor who is prepared to die everyday in order to print revolutionary news.
- A daughter of an exiled Chinese general who wants to repay her father by living his dream.
- An imperial assassin who believes that western imperialism has given nothing to the Chinese.
Now...watch the movie to see how their lives, beliefs, fears and honour are all intertwined to clash into a climax along the busy streets of Hongkong for a deadly 60 minutes visit by Dr. Sun Yat-sen.
Photos from Memorable Moments in 2009:
The Hokkaido chocolate ice-cream dessert from Ministry of Food for me.
My lunch outing with Sushi Rabbit consists of a salmon set which tasted quite delicious but the salmon is a little over-fried till it charred on the underside. The Ministry of Food at Bugis Junction can be quite expensive so be prepared to fork out at least $50+ for a decent meal for two.
Some Hokkaido green tea ice-cream dessert for Sushi Rabbit, one of my VIP friends who is always flying around the world.
Sushi Rabbit ordered some egg-like soup with chicken in it. The portion was so big that she insisted that I helped her finish the food. As mischievous as I was that afternoon, I re-insisted her to finish up all the food before we leave. Hahaha.
The spaghetti with sausage was just passable because the sausages were way undersized compared to the picture on the menu and there was little ingredients besides to really make the dish as flavorful as I would have wanted. Still, after a 4 hour KTV session, I am too hungry to care that much that night.
The KTV.sg Club people decided to have dinner after the four hour session and we headed out to this Japanese foodcourt somewhere behind The Cathay. I did not know such a place existed so the outing yielded another location for me.
This was taken during my first outing with the KTV.sg Club people on an undisclosed date and location. I was most intrigued by the efforts of such an interest club, which is exceedingly rare in Singapore, and it turned out to be a memorable experience because there were really incredibly skilful members who could easily belt out difficult songs and it really livened up the outing.
This was the dinner at Marche at VivoCity when I met Da Niu and his wife after so many years apart. Da Niu is doing well with his own company and we had a jolly good evening talking and reminiscing about the old times during our secondary school years.
The map of Ferelden in Dragon Age: Origins. It sure looks plain but during my gameplay, I remembered crossing the game continent no less than twenty times and almost every trip entailed some random encounters which was both fun to watch and overcome. Imagine an encounter where wolves actually laid hunter traps for my adventuring party members??
This is a screenshot that I took from the game Dragon Age: Origins. I think this was about the quest to try and resolve some armed/clawed conflict between the werewolves and the elves in the forest. Eventually, I managed to persuade the leaders of both sides to commit suicide to end the conflict since neither of them wished to forgive the other whilst trying to avoid implicating their peoples/beasts to more bloodshed.
This was my last lunch for 2009 - Chicken Chop. It's been quite some time since I ate authentic Western food and I wanted to give myself a nice treat before the year ends. 2009 had been a terrible year in so many aspects.
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