Dennis Law - Old School Auteur or Talentless Hack?

[One Armed Boxer]

Much like Wong Jing, when a new movie gets released by Dennis Law it's normally subjected to a critical panning and calls for him to quit being a director for the greater good. However, despite his movies many flaws, I have to admit I have a soft spot for Dennis Law.

He said that he wanted to make old school Hong Kong action movies, and for me, I truly believe he does. 'Fatal Contact', 'Fatal Move (Triad Wars)', 'Bad Blood (King of Triads)', 'Vampire Warriors', & the soon to be released 'The Constable' could all, in my opinion, sit comfortably next to the likes of 'Angry Ranger' & 'A Bloody Fight' from over twenty years ago.

Yes his movies are wildly uneven and don't always make a lot of sense, but take a look at any HK made action movie from back in the day and most of them could fall into the same category. The only difference is the internet wasn't around to dissect each & every one of their faults. Law's movies may not be masterpieces, but when the action comes, it usually delivers, and it delivers in a completely unpretentious and irony free way.

We now live in a world in which the HK action movie industry places more focus on the production values than the action itself, so for me Law's movies offer a refreshing throwback to the days when instead of story and gloss being the most important things, it's about fights and stunt scenes.

Throw in the fact that he usually fills his movies with faces from the HK golden era, not for any sake of irony but for the fact that he seems to think he's making a movie in that era, and I for one am looking forward to seeing Simon Yam armed and dangerous in 'The Constable'. I was interested to hear what are your opinions on Dennis Law?

d1vp6anNdvA

TMgGE8sULAc

_xo5zD_lOtE

brY25_h_Mjo

4A_GRpZLNS8

[ShaOW!linDude]

Of the 4 you posted, the only one I haven't seen is is VAMPIRE WARRIORS. I was pleased enough with the MA action in the others (though I wish there'd been a tad more in FATAL MOVE/TRIAD WARS but the end fight certainly ranks). If that sort of fare is his goal, I say bring it! I could certainly go for more of that.

Don't know anything about THE CONSTABLE starring Simon Yam. Is this to be more of a gun ballet with another of his seething performances? If so, pass.

[One Armed Boxer]

Hey ShaOW!linDude...trailer for 'The Constable' is now included. Curious to know though, what movies do you class as Simon Yam giving a seething performance? I find he usually plays quite reserved cool characters, at least in his output over the past decade.

[DiP]

I always found his style of filmmaking to be plain boring and so predictable. I don't mind simple stories/little depth in acting but at least do some effort of putting intentions in the stories for the action to kick in logically. A good example would be The Raid where the action scenes plays along with the story nicely and building suspense and intensity as the characters and events progresses.

It's a difference when you shoot different scenes together to build a story for a purpose from shooting non-action scenes and action scenes separately all for the sake of emphasizing the action the most and leaving out the overall focus on constructing them together with the stories appropriately. I feel Law's movies fall into the latter group.

[TibetanWhiteCrane]

I've only really liked Fatal Contact, from his directorial output, and have only seen a few others. I would definitely not classify him as an auteur.... a hack? well, 50 to 60% of all film directors world wide could be accused of this in one way or another, but im not getting an overly hacky vibe from Law in particular.

Is he a great director so far? No... but he may still prove himself. Def checking out The Constable.

Oh, and Sdude, you wan't a seething Yam performance, how about Full Contact? A gay magician gangster... now that's seething:smile:

[ShaOW!linDude]

I don't know that I can give specific examples. It just seems whatever I've watched him in, Yam has always come across as sort of tight-faced to me; smoldering seething. Not sure if that's his intention or what. It's not meant as a slam. More of a "I really don't care about seeing that".

[blue_skies]

I've got mixed opinions about Denis Law as I enjoyed Fatal Contact and Bad Blood. Whereas I disliked/hated Fatal Move and Vampire Warriors respectively.

I can definitely look past the flaws in storytelling especially if you can deliver on the martial arts action, in quality and quantity. Which is something I felt was completely lacking in Vampire Warriors, failing completely for me. Fatal Move had a great final fight with Sammo but that was about it IMHO.

The Constable to be honest looks like something I would pass on.Simon Yam isn't someone that draws me to a movie. Nothing particularly wrong with him but I don't think of him as a action star and definitely not martial arts one. Having said that when Denis Law returns to martial arts action movies I will certainly be more interested.

[blue_skies]

http://twitchfilm.com/2013/11/review-the-constable-is-pedestrian-crime-fighting.html

I only skimmed the review and it doesn't sound good.

[DrNgor]

I've only seen Bad Blood, which was diverting enough. I never got around to this movies, although the fight scenes certainly were entertaining (watched them on YouTube). I wouldn't call him a hack, since he seems to understand, at least from an action perspective, what fans want. The fights in Bad Blood are certainly better than anything Jet Li has done since Fearless.

[D1 Ma]

Well, at least the man is trying. Bad Blood, probably, was his best effort action-wise, but the rest of his movies aren't terribly bad. They have their flaws, but HK filmmakers rarely create ideally perfect product. Almost always there's something missing, something undeveloped, but it doesn't stop fans from watching HK movies. I actually wish there were more people like Dennis Law

[Sheng]

The man might be what y'all call a "hack", but surely one with a deep-rooted love for vintage HK Cinema tropes!

I thought FATAL CONTACT was way better than a lotta crits made it, no masterpiece, but definitely a competently scriped, acted and executed action drama. And not only because of the Nicky Li-choreographed tournament fight scenes with the likes of Andy On and Xing Yu.

Many, particularly Western viewers complained about a totally jarring, ambush-style, nonsensical ending, but I always thought the tonality of the final scenes did make some sense. The guilt-ridden girl's suicide did not come entirely out of the blue and Wu Jing played his part as a humble, lovelorn but woefully inarticulate Mainland Country boy quite convincingly. Anybody with an intimate knowledge of thought patterns and mentalities in the Chinese countryside would be familiar with doggedly straight, pig-headed folks like Ko Kong (Wu Jing) and wouldn't be all that surprised about the total derailment of his character. Yes, Dennis Law could have spliced in a few more dramatic scenes that illustrate the nature of their relationship better and, truth be told, the final stabbing orgy could have been staged much, much more effectively. Still a film that made quite some impact on me when I first saw it.