User:FrostFairBlade/sandbox/Long Arm of the Law (film)

Long Arm of the Law is a 1984 Hong Kong crime film directed by Johnny Mak.

Plot

 * Ho Yiu-tung, a former Red Guard who illegally crossed the border into Hong Kong in February 1979, is traveling back home to Guangzhou to meet his former Red Guard friends
 * Nicknamed Big Tung, he is named by the Royal Hong Kong Police Force as a top 10 most wanted criminal for multiple crimes, including kidnapping, armed robberies, and assaults
 * With his friends, Ho schemes a jewelry store heist in order to fund their retirement:
 * They plan to sneak in on 19 October to take advantage of lax security on Buddha's Birthday the following day
 * After climbing a mountain to get into Shenzhen, and then travel onward to Hong Kong, where they will rendezvous with Tung, who will travel separately and wait at a hotel
 * They estimate that a successful heist will net each person $250,000 HKD, an extravagant sum far surpassing their meager salaries on the mainland
 * Ho reminds the crew that to limit the chance of their plan failing, they must agree to only spend two days in Hong Kong
 * Using fake IDs, the gangsters plan to sneak across the border into Hong Kong to rob a jewelry store in order to fund their retirement
 * Bull's Eye gets shot by the border guards while trying to climb the chain-link fence and is mauled to death by guard dogs
 * The next day, they successfully pretend to be a lion dance troupe while being questioned at a police checkpoint
 * The gangsters plan their heist; however, they find out when they get to their targeted jewelry store that a lone robber had already unsuccessfully attempted to rob it earlier, resulting in the store being closed and an increased police presence
 * When a policeman becomes suspicious of the gangsters, they flee their car and cause a shootout, resulting in them killing a police officer and hijacking a taxi
 * Ho Yiu-tung reiterates that they will try to rob the store again after three days, surmising that the store's security will be more lax after catching a criminal

Cast
Lau Sun-lun plays Fatso : a police informant killed by Ho Yiu-tung's gang
 * Lam Wai as Ho Yiu-tung, nicknamed Big Tung : a former Red Guard turned career criminal who plans a jewellery store heist in Hong Kong
 * Wong Kin as Sik Koo
 * Kong Lung as Ah Chung
 * Chan Ging as Rooster
 * Lam Seung-sam as Bull's Eye (Cantonese slang for a useless kid): a Mainland gangster who dies trying to illegally cross the border into Hong Kong
 * Lee Ying-git as Blockhead
 * Shum Wai as Tai
 * Ng Hoi-tin as Inspector Li

Conception

 * Johnny Mak, who had previously directed and produced several realistic and gritty television series at Rediffusion Television, had left the station in 1981 to form his own production company
 * Under Johnny Mak Productions, he produced several films, such as Lonely Fifteen (1982)
 * With the backing of Sammo Hung's Bo Ho Films, Long Arm of the Law was Mak's directorial debut film

Writing

 * Long Arm of the Law was made to emulate the violent and gritty aesthetic of Mak's earlier television series like Ten Sensational Cases (, 1975)
 * The script was written by Philip Chan, a former Royal Hong Kong Police Force superintendent who had starred in one of Mak's television series called Operation Manhunt (, 1977)

Development and pre-production

 * The stunts were choreographed by Chan Wui-ngai and the stunt team of Sammo Hung
 * Art direction was handled by Cheung King-hung, Fung Yuen-chi , and Yank Wong

Casting

 * The vast majority of the cast was made up of amateur actors with the exception of Lam Wai, who had appeared in multiple Shaw Brothers films

Filming

 * Long Arm of the Law was shot throughout Hong Kong, including the Kowloon Walled City as part of the film's final shootout
 * Intentionally shot in a documentary-like style, relying on natural lighting to illuminate the scene
 * Mak: "I don't understand why others have to use lighting in making a realistic film. It really is a waste, and detrimental to the film too. It ruins the realistic feeling."
 * Mak utilised guerrilla filmmaking throughout production, shooting with both a handheld camera and a hidden camera
 * According to film expert Frank Djeng, the exterior shots of Lam Wai at the beginning were allegedly shot in secret in mainland China
 * Other film locations include Mody Road for the jewelry store getaway sequence, and Cityplaza for the ice skating shooting
 * The jewelry store sequence was shot in a vacant store, with six cameras placed along the shooting route
 * This sequence was rehearsed for two days, with unknowing passersby believing it was a real robbery
 * For the scene where a car containing a tied-up Tai is set on fire, Mak did not tell Wai beforehand that the vehicle would be doused in gasoline and lit on fire; this nearly suffocated Wai and led to a genuinely fearful reaction from the actor that was captured on film
 * This incident would severely strain the relationship between the two; when he ended up winning Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film, Wai did not thank Mak in his speech
 * Mak got permission to shoot the final fight scene in the Kowloon Walled City after spending eight months negotiating, and more than ten scouting trips

Design

 * Mak's orders to Hung were to keep the stunts grounded in realistic street fighting
 * Yuen Mo, a member of Sammo Hung's stunt team, blacked out after performing a stunt where he fell from the fifth floor of a shopping mall onto an ice rink; he recalled that he knew he would suffer serious injuries from landing on the ice on his back, and would not have performed the stunt if Hung had not personally invested in the film

Context

 * During the 1970s, Hong Kong public had acquired an appetite for socially conscious programming; seeing the success of public broadcaster RTHK's Below the Lion Rock (1972), which tackled a myriad of social issues, commercial stations like TVB and Rediffusion began broadcasting more realistic crime dramas
 * During his time at Rediffusion, Mak produced multiple popular crime dramas that offered a more violent depiction of the Triads

Box office

 * Long Arm of the Law was released on 11 July 1984, and ran for two weeks until 25 July
 * The film was never shown in mainland China

Awards and accolades

 * At the 4th Hong Kong Film Awards, the film received two awards for Best Supporting Actor (Wai) and Best Editing (Cheung)
 * It also was nominated for seven other awards: Best Film, Best Director (Mak), Best Screenplay (Chan), Best New Performer (Lin Wei), Best Cinematography (Johnny Koo), Best Action Choreography (Chan Wui-ngai), and Best Original Film Score (Lam Mo-tak)
 * For the 21st Golden Horse Awards, Long Arm of the Law won Best Director (Mak) and Best Film Editing (Cheung)
 * It also picked up four other nominations for Best Feature Film, Best Original Screenplay (Chan), Best Cinematography (Koo), and Best Recording (Chou Shao-long)

Home media

 * 88 Films will be releasing the film and its sequel on Blu-ray in 2023

Themes notes
Sek Kei, "Achievement and Crisis: Hong Kong Cinema in the '80s, Bright Lights Film Journal #13 (1994)


 * Compares the film to Yim Ho's Homecoming (1984) by noting it casts its mainland protagonists unfavourably
 * However, Sek Kei notes that the film "indirectly recognizes that Hong Kong people have discriminated against immigrants from the Mainland"

'Li Cheuk-to, "The Return of the Father: Hong Kong New Wave and its Chinese Context in the 1980s", New Chinese Cinemas: Forms, Identities, Politics'' - ed. Nick Browne, Paul G. Pickowicz, VIvian Sobchack, Esther Yau'''

'Steve Fore, "Long Arm of the Law (1984): The Kowloon Walled City (now Kowloon Walled City Park)", World Film Locations: Hong Kong'' - ed. Linda Chiu-Han Lai, Kimburley Wing-yee Choi'''
 * Long Arm of the Law examines the Big Circle gangs, whose members are mainland immigrants
 * Li compares the movie to the Yim Ho film Homecoming (1984), which was released the same year
 * According to Li, the setting of the final gunfight, the Kowloon Walled City, represents "a Chinese island in the heart of British-ruled Hong Kong", and thus sets the scene in pitting past versus present


 * The Kowloon Walled City was a densely-populated six-and-a-half acre space containing a "ramshackle labyrinth" of businesses and living quarters housing many mainland immigrants
 * According to Fore, the film is "one of the most significant pre-1997 ruminations on the stakes of [Hong Kong's] return to Chinese sovereignty"
 * The film portrays the mainland gangsters as "violent invaders", while also simultaneously treating the Hong Kong police and local gangsters equally cynically
 * Despite the film's depiction of the Walled City as a "dangerous and claustrophobic trap", in reality most of its residents were regular people living under tough circumstances

Legacy

 * Despite the film's success, Long Arm of the Law would be Mak's only film that he would direct
 * He would still continue to act as a producer for several other movies, many of them gangster films

Cultural impact

 * Long Arm of the Law helped pave the way for the success of future Hong Kong gangster films like John Woo's A Better Tomorrow (1986)
 * Frank Djeng notes that the film was considerably darker in tone than the heroic bloodshed movies that would follow

Critical reassessment

 * The Hong Kong Film Awards Association ranked the film #6 in its 100 Best Chinese Motion Pictures in 2005
 * In 2011, the Hong Kong Film Archive listed Long Arm of the Law at #74 in its "100 Top Must-See Hong Kong Movies" programme
 * Hong Kong museum M+ screened the film for one of its inaugural programmes for the newly-constructed M+ Cinema in 2022
 * The programme, titled "Hong Kong: The Establishing Shot", was intended as a celebration of the city's rich cinematic history and how its films are interconnected with its urban architecture