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A Better Tomorrow III:
Love & Death in Saigon
|     review    |     awards     |     availability     |     also see      |
Anita Mui, Tony Leung and Chow Yun-Fat
Chinese: 英雄本色III
Year: 1989
Director: Tsui Hark
Cast: Chow Yun-Fat, Anita Mui Yim-Fong, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Shih Kien, Tokito Saburo, Maggie Cheung Ho-Yi, Nam Yin
The Skinny: Was this necessary? Interesting prequel to the classic Hong Kong films arrives without John Woo or any real reason for happening.
 
Review
by Kozo:

Tsui Hark brings us this prequel to A Better Tomorrow, which is noticeably without original director John Woo. Tsui had a falling out with Woo, so Tsui himself directs Chow Yun-Fat as his Mark character from Better Tomorrow 1. Mark heads to Saigon 1974 and hooks up with his cousin Mun (Tony Leung Ka-Fai). Together, he and Tony run into tough-as-nails gangster Anita Mui, who takes a shine to the two boys. She teaches Chow his gun moves and begins to fall for him, but Chow is oblivious. Meanwhile, Mun gets the idea that Anita fancies him.

This love triangle creates most of the drama for a good two-thirds of the film before the darkness of their world crashes in on them. It seems Anita’s last lover was a gang boss, so he doesn’t take kindly to the idea of Mark romancing his former flame. Even worse, the VC are taking Saigon, so it isn’t the best time to be hanging around Vietnam. The film is not bad, with decent gunfights and a generous helping of slo-mo. Still, what’s the point? Unfortunately, this film has very little to do with A Better Tomorrow (or its flawed sequel), so it pretty much comes down to this: is Mark so fascinating that he needs his own movie? Not really. Still, Chow is great and his pairing with Mui is a natural one. (Kozo 1995)

 
Awards:

The 9th Annual Hong Kong Film Awards
Nomination - Best Art Direction (Luk Chi-Fung)
Nomination - Best Original Film Score (Lowell Lo Koon-Ting)
 
Availability: DVD (Hong Kong)
Region 0 NTSC
Intercontinental Video
16x9 Anamorphic Widescreen
Original Cantonese Language Track
Remixed Cantonese Dolby Digital 5.1
Remixed Cantonese DTS 5.1
Remixed Mandarin Dolby Digital 5.1
Removable English and Chinese Subtitles
featurette, trailers, photos
*Also Available on Blu-ray Disc
Also see:

A Better Tomorrow (1986)
A Better Tomorrow II (1987)

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image courtesy of Mega Star Video Distribution, Ltd.

   
 
 
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