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濠江風雲 (1998)
Casino


Reviewed by: Sydneyguy
Date: 04/25/2008

I found it a little funny with the disclaimer at the end saying something along the lines of these are fictional chracters and if they are related to real life people its just a coincidence!!

I didnt find this very engaging though i guess you always wonder how much of this movie is really based in real life events.

I feel like nothing much happens and the build up is for the twists that happen at the end. There seems be a lot of fighting scenes and the budget of the movie must be a little more than the average budget with lots of extra's and car's being driven around, or maybe they were on loan?

And the ending, where broken tooth says at least im a reasonable guy, hmmm...........what a statement!!

The movie will make you scared of going to casino's in macau

Reviewer Score: 5

Reviewed by: mrblue
Date: 09/19/2003

Like Danny Lee for cop movies, Simon Yam is perhaps the ultimate Hong Kong crime movie star. He looks the part -- suave but tough -- and his acting skills make even the sleaziest dai lo seem sympathetic, and he's certainly been in some of the classics of the genre. Unfortunately, Casino isn't one of them. It's a good Triad movie, but it's nothing you haven't seen many times over, both from the US and HK.

The plot (which is based on real events and was funded by gangsters, even though there's a big disclaimer at the end of the film) has Simon and his friend Alex Fong as two upstarts in the Macau gambling scene. They're tired of being small potatoes, and after enlisting the help of a dirty cop (Kent Cheng), they manage to topple their boss and seem poised to take over all of Macau until a new rival (Ben Ng) rears his head. As his power grows, Simon must also deal with his estranged wife and a deadly illness that threatens to take his friend's life.

Most of the story is told in flashback as Simon and his associates are being interviewed by a reporter played by Kenix Kwok. This results in overuse of the tired "talking into the camera" device, which really started to annoy me after a while. Besides that, the story is just old hat. Director "Bloody" Billy Tang (the guy behind such sleaze classics such as Red to Kill) tries to liven things up with lots of Triad battles, but there's nothing behind them. It's just violence for the sake of violence, and that's boring. Besides, it's not even that bloody -- I suspect the Category III rating came more for Triad references (it's a big no-no in HK movies to refer to specific gangsters or gangs) rather than brawls.

It's kind of a shame that Casino didn't turn out better than it did. The movie has a solid cast, a talented director, and a fairly large budget (especially in this day and age of straight-to-video quickies). But the script is totally by-the-numbers, and hold little interest for the viewer. This isn't a bad film by any means, but Hong Kong has certainly turned out many other crime movies which are more deserving of your time than this one.


Reviewed by: jasonlau128
Date: 06/04/2002
Summary: Mint film

I first thought that the title made the film out to be like the American title Casino which starred sharon stone and robert de niro. However, it is no a cheap imatation. The name is just a coincidence.

Simon Yam plays the role real well. He is always good. However, the character he plays (broken tooth) is very different looks wise.

i liked this movie a lot. However the ending was confusing.

This film encompasses everything a chinese ganster film should be. Don;t waste your time with "young and dangerous" - this is the real deal. Fact based story, trendy gansters, nice cars and honor.


Reviewed by: Inner Strength
Date: 01/12/2002
Summary: Macau Triad

Casino is a story based on the man known as 'Broken Tooth', who became one of the most ruthless and feared Triad bosses in both Macau and mainland Hong Kong.

The story is not a biography of the man, and a lot of the plot is not based on any facts that happened, but I think Simon Yam plays the character very well. I have read a lot about Triads, from recent years, all the way back hundreds of years ago. It is a subject I know a lot about, and therefore knowing a lot about the real man, has given me an advantage when comparing him to the movie.

The story is really only about rival triads having plenty of fights, and does not really go into his life at all, like I had hoped it would. I think the English name 'Casino' is a good one though, after all, what would Macau be these days without gambling!

Other reviewers have already written up about the story, so I won't bother to enhance.

I would recommend seeing it though, especially as it is based on real life. I don't think it's worth buying though, because it's the kind of movie you're likely to see once or twice only.

Rating (of 5): 3

(This rating is based on the year & genre, so don't think it's based as a comparison on new releases etc.)


Reviewed by: Rab99bit
Date: 07/10/2001
Summary: It's worth a gamble

A sick movie about 2 buddy gangsters who trash and kill their way to become leaders of the Macau underworld and claim their share of protection money from casinos and whore joints. It is not about casinos - make no mistake about this. As far as bloodletting is concerned, probably the bloodiest scene was from "Liu Chye"s (Alex Fong)nosebleeds. Simon Yam, as Broken Tooth, was slick but void of emotion, like a programmed fighting machine. Alex Fong performed well as the partner, dying from nose (not lung!) cancer, his facial expressions conveying the despair, depression and finally surrender stages of cancer sufferers. But the scriptwriters should know that nose cancer patients do not die within 6 months ! and certainly not while they are still fit to travel, walk out of cars and stare at departing boats ! If you have a penchant for breaking glass, this is the movie for you, for the entire movie is littered with the sound & sights of glass shattering.


Reviewed by: PAUL MARTINEZ
Date: 07/04/2001
Summary: Don' Bet On It

Mark did a fine job on telling the plot so I will just give my opinions. Simon Yam who at times is brilliant gives a very flat performance here. The only consistent thing about Mr. Lam is his inconsistency from project to project. There were many bad things here but I'll just talk about the worst. The melodramatic scene of his wife leaving him and his reaction made no sense. Mainly because I had forgotten he was even married. She was nowhere to be found anwhere in the film. I thought Alex Fong did an ok job. Although his character had nothing to do except act sick and every once in awhile spout words of wisdom to the lead character. The other problem I had was the title. Yes the characters owned a Casino but there was probaly no more than 90 seconds ever shown of it. Very misleading.

Reviewer Score: 3

Reviewed by: Mark
Date: 12/30/1999
Summary: Funded by the man himself

This biopic of Macau gangster Broken Tooth was funded by the man himself. Apparently, he's a non-smoking, non-drinking philosophy-spouting man whose only vices are a twin passion for dancing and for singing the Once Upon a Time in China theme in karaoke nightclubs. As you can guess, this is a very silly movie, but an entertaining one. Simon Yam is incorrigible as Broken Tooth, who will do anything for his buddies (especially the one with the incurable lung disorder) but is a sworn enemy to his foes. His greatest sin is that he fails to visit his wife in hospital after the birth of their son. (She leaves him, but we're hard pressed to notice, as she was barely in the film to begin with.) We follow the rise of our saintly gangster from a small potato to the leader of a faction hundreds strong. This is just as well, as the other faction is hundreds strong too, leading to many scenes of motorcades of hire cars and scooters with their hazard lights flashing on their way en masse to rough up the other guys' turf. The fighting is in the style of modern HK cinema, with not much martial arts but with a whole lot of baseball bats, crowbars, sledgehammers, and the odd garotting with a shower curtain. The framing device for all of this history is a spurious interview with a trendy HK reporter, who treats Broken Tooth as a sort of pop star, which you probably would if he was a real life Triad who was funding the production. That's the key to the film; much of the enjoyment comes from the outrageous and spurious blending of fact and fiction. It's dumb fun, but don't tell Broken Tooth I wrote that. His buddies swing a mean sledgehammer.