Sit ting fung wan 3 (2014)

Sit ting fung wan 3: Directed by Felix Chong, Alan Mak. With Ching Wan Lau, Louis Koo, Daniel Wu, Xun Zhou. In the 1970s, the Hong Kong government enacted a policy that granted each male heir of New Territories villagers the privilege to build a house without paying any dues to the government. Since then, those grants have become a commodity that village leaders can profit from.

“Like its predecessor u0026#39;Overheard 2u0026#39;, this trilogy capper to writer- directors Alan Mak and Felix Chongu0026#39;s surveillance crime thriller franchise employs the same trio of actors – Sean Lau, Louis Koo and Daniel Wu – albeit in different roles and a different story. This time, Mak and Chong employs the format to dish out some dirt on Hong Kongu0026#39;s property syndicates, essentially sham companies run by local thugs who had set themselves up to take advantage of the Governmentu0026#39;s redevelopment of the New Territories.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe subject is timely – like Singapore, many ordinary Hong Kong citizens have found themselves increasingly out of reach of a place to call home, no thanks to speculators and investors who have caused prices to skyrocket in the property market – and as veteran screenwriters who are best known for conceptualising the u0026#39;Infernal Affairsu0026#39; trilogy, Mak and Chong demonstrate a firm grasp and understanding of the subject matter. In the prologue, they lay out the precursor to their premise, i.e. the gifting of land rights by the British colonial rulers in the 1970s to the male heir of each indigenous family living within the New Territories, and over the course of the next two hours, chart just how greedy profit-driven businessmen try to outdo each other in securing these rights from their landowners.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSean Lau plays one such businessman, Keung, who gets his start as the right-hand man of Uncle To (Kenneth Tsang), one of the pioneers if you will of such a criminal enterprise. Keung is assisted by his three brothers, Fu (Alex Fong), Paul (Gordon Lam) and Chuck (Dominic Lam), who find themselves aligned against Mainland investor Wan (Huang Lei) and Uncle Tou0026#39;s daughter Yu (Michelle Ye) when the latter two take their company public without giving the former quartet any share of the shareholdings. Their business rivalry gets more complicated as Keungu0026#39;s former buddy Jau (Louis Koo) is released from prison five years after taking the fall for killing another rival (Chin Kar Lok) in a staged DUI accident.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eTurns out Jau isnu0026#39;t quite as loyal to the Luk brothers after spending that time in the slammer; instead, he teams up with Joe (Daniel Wu) to spy on the Luks, his motive wholly personal – not only were Jau and Yu lovers, Jau remains bitter for having received scant compensation from the Luks for taking their fall. Instead of law enforcement, it is a computer hacker who happens to possess the high-tech equipment necessary for the comprehensive surveillance in order for Jau to plot and plan his game of revenge against the Luks. Admittedly, that is a stretch, even more so considering the range of equipment in his possession that seems engineered for narrative convenience than for anything else – and Mak and Chong do themselves no favours by inserting Vincent Kok in a bit role as an equally tech-savvy expert whom Keung visits late into the movie after suspecting that he might be tapped.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eMore so than in the earlier movies, the concept of surveillance appears contrived, in equal parts lacking in both realism and significance. Indeed, Mak and Chong want their audience to believe that Joe is able to install hidden cameras in Keung, Fu, Paul and Chucku0026#39;s offices, turn the counter-surveillance devices they carry on them into listening devices, and tap on their phones to rely on both the front and back cameras to spy on them. It requires a significant suspension of disbelief to think that Yu is able to pull off something on that scale, especially how he operates as a lone outfit. Yes, it suffices to say that Mak and Chong have taken the omnipresence of being watched a little too liberally – and nowhere is that more evident than in a dues-ex-machina where Yu finds the tables have turned on her and Wan.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eCompared to its predecessors too, the storytelling goes bogged down in way too much exposition particularly in the middle segment. As Uncle To makes an unannounced return halfway into the movie, Mak and Chong make the proceedings unnecessarily convoluted with talk of double-crossings, shifting loyalties and even triple-crossings. What also proves lacking is character development, and besides Joe who stays pretty much a blank slate throughout the film, the rest of the characters whether Keung or Jau remain the one-note villain they begin the movie as. The fact that Mak and Chong are better writers than directors only exacerbates the faults of their screenplay, so much so that the film lacks the narrative momentum to keep you engaged from scene to scene.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eNot even an ensemble cast can quite redeem this lethargic exercise. Lau is believably conniving, but thatu0026#39;s as far as his character goes throughout the movie. Koo fails to convey the scorn his character must possess in order to turn against his sworn brothers, and thereby comes off a weak counterpoint against the Luks. Joe comes off even more humdrum, his rationale for assisting Jau in the first place never even discussed. Fong and the other two Lams add some colour as scoundrels, but the only character that manages to be anywhere near appealing is Zhou Xunu0026#39;s widow Moon, whom both Keung and Joe happen to have a crush on. Xun underplays her characteru0026#39;s grief nicely, and is a welcome contrast to the overacting of many of the other characters.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eStill, compared to the earlier two instalments, u0026#39;Overheard 3u0026#39; ends the franchise on a tepid note. The themes of brotherhood, loyalty, greed, betrayal and corruption are intact, the premise fitting and prescient, but the execution this time round both in the scriptwriting and directing department unfortunately falling short of its predecessors. As a drama, it isnu0026#39;t quite as engaging or as compelling as it needs to; and as a thriller, letu0026#39;s just say it doesnu0026#39;t fit the description.”