66. Bullet in the Head

Director John Woo is primarily known for redefining action cinema through the use of double-fisted gunplay made popular by his perennial star Chow Yun Fat. Woo’s Hong Kong action offerings made that country’s film scene a viable one (and one that Hollywood continues to pillage for ideas and talent), but they aren’t indicative of everything the director was capable of. To see Woo at a deeper level, one should seek out a copy of his film Bullet in the Head.

An interesting melding of three plots (a coming of age film in the 1960s, a Vietnam war movie, and a revenge flick), Bullet in the Head is Woo at his most poignant. The three leads (Tony Leung Chiu wai, Jacky Cheung, and Waise Lee) turn in performances of varying quality (Waise Lee is particularly over-the-top), but the whole of the performances are greater than the sum of their parts. All of the traditional Woo elements are present and accounted for (bonds of brotherhood, betrayal, facing one’s destiny, and a penchant for some of the most amazingly beautiful violence ever committed to celluloid), yet there’s more going on beneath the surface here than in some of his more famous works.

Woo’s stated that he made this film in response to the events at Tianneman Square, and it shows -- the film is almost personal in spots. If nothing else, the film is worth seeing for Simon Yam’s fantastic set-piece wherein he carries out an assassination while The Monkees “I’m a Believer” plays on the soundtrack -- it’s classic stuff that highlights how wonderful and exuberant Hong Kong action cinema could be in the 1980s and ‘90s. (Mike Bracken)