Desirous Express (2000)

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慾望號列車 (2000)

Desirous Express

Reviewed by: White Dragon
Date: 11/16/2005
Summary: Soap opera thriller trivialises its domestic violence themes

Poor rural housewife Yin (Emily Kwan); she fled the Mainland and the drudgery of her old life as a massage parlour girl and factory worker, trading sexual favours for safe passage only to end up married to violently abusive rural-prig Keung (Wayne Lai). Kept a prisoner in her own home under locked handcuffs, and beaten regularly her life is one of misery. However, when sister-in-law Hong (Sherming Yiu) returns home post boyfriend troubles she makes a new friend and starts to see some freedoms of life outside her village. Hong’s errant boyfriend Lan (Joe Ma Tak-Chung) adds spice to her life. But Keung takes less than favourably to his wife's newfound freedoms...

NOT a film I’d recommend – though the story engages at a soap opera level, scenes of brutal domestic violence make it an exceedingly difficult viewing experience. A subplot concerning a family inheritance and deceptions and deceit therein eventually end up negating much that has gone before, virtually trivialising the violence and adding a coda of depressing futility. Meandering, with some fair performances (especially from Emily Kwan, as the brutalised wife), but ultimately quite forgettable as well as squirmily unpleasant.

Reviewer Score: 4

Reviewed by: ryan
Date: 03/23/2000
Summary: Desire cannot last for more than a second

Love and marriage seem to be the topics of choice for Director Li Yuk-Chun to film (see "Midnight Zone" & "Hanky Panky" for evidence). With this is mind you'd expect that she would do a good job with her latest film "Desirous Express". Unfortunately this optimism isn't justified.

Yin is a lonely woman whose husband Keung treats her as his sex slave, she wants to kill him but never has the courage. He is always travelling to Shenzhen for whoring and once raped her friend Hong. Hong's partner Long threw her out of their apartment. One night after karaoke Long and Yin begin a sexual affair. Long decides to kill Keung. Hong and Yin share their tragic past with Yin confessing about her fling with Long. Then Long turns up at Keung's apartment having hatched a murderous plot with Yin.....

From the cast to the promotional material it hardly draws a potential audiences attention to the movie. A poster with Emily Kwan at the centre of it will scare an audience away (her horrible film "Love In The River" is hard to forget). However what bothers me most is the whole approach of the film.

The main problem is that there are too many unnecessary very slow sub-plots. If you think having unconstructive quarrels between Hong and Long is annoying enough I would advise you to stop watching the movie from the theatre as you will see another time-burning nonsense of a scene with Emily Kwan.

Emily Kwan is the lead actress in the film however she is not a suitable choice for a role in a film that revolves around love / sex. Audiences don't have any desire to watch her make love on the big screen!

The role of Lai Yiu-Cheung is too much of a stereotype. It's a typical model of a selfish husband who always looks for prostitutes to satisfy his sexual needs. In the movie he treats everyone badly however you'd like to see there be something more to "justify" Long's decision to kill him. I'd have liked Keung to be the worst kind of man - the lowest of the low. Lai has the potential for such roles but the role here is not strong enough for him.

Sherming Yiu is in relation to Emily Kwan much more desirable. In the story there should be a place for her to be erotic especially after the break up with Long however neither director nor scriptwriter make good use of her. If they had the movie may have proved more fruitful.

Besides the issues of love relating to the two couples there should have been more on the relationship between Long and Keung. In the movie it is too simple a device to present this through the mouth of Hong's mom.

"Desirous Express" is a movie that is supposed to be about desire but judging from the cast as well as the plot I am afraid that such desire cannot last for more than a second.