The Killer (1989)
"Dip huet seung hung" (original title)

Chow Yun Fat and John Woo teams up together with strong commitment to this highly melodramatic action film. The Killer was so ahead of its time especially with its signature shootout scenes and fast paced action sequences in its time of production in Hong-Kong. Without any special, visual or sound effects; it's a high achievement on both sound and vision. It's high on thematic values, but low on production values.

Woo benefited a lot from a team of action-coordinators as part of the production crew he assigned with. 20 years from its screen release, today still there are not many action films in which the sequences are coordinated as good as in The Killer. The rest of the production was standing by its plot, which becomes unbearable due to extremely melodramatic events. Woo tries to hurt our feelings as much as he can by killing and injuring innocents so ruthlessly: Passengers on a train, children on a beach, singers at a night club etc.

Lowell Lo's heart-wrenching theme and background music was one of the finest of the thematic values. Story development is also very effective that everything seems going fine at the beginning of Jong(the hit-man)'s last mission, then for he wasn't paid for his successful assassination he decides to show up back from underground with his alias: "Jeffrey". When he did, a stage singer ends up losing her sight and becomes blind from shot blasting. Jong helps her get well; she falls in love with him. He introduces himself as Jeffrey to her. No matter what romance they share together, no matter how close they are to each other; there is absolutely no accordance no chemistry between Sally Yeh and Chow Yun-Fat. Sally Yeh acts so poorly, especially while she keeps screaming needlessly every other scene.

For whoever likes this film, I strongly advise Léon to them. The same idea also works in Luc Besson's film, too: In a hit-man's life; there is no certain way to go, there is nobody to trust, there is no repentance. In Luc Besson's film of 1994, Jean Reno and Natalie Portman builds up a better harmony using emotions but not melodrama.

Additionally in John Woo's film, even though Chow Yun-Fat is not fast enough he just stands by the bullets by running, or guards himself with armchairs and seats of the cathedral which are vulnerable to bullets with the gaps between backrests. So many bullets are used... Were they shot by children or blind hitmans? How could you explain not getting shot while 4 hitmans are aiming at you running inside the cathedral and running on the beach? On the other hand, every single bullet that's used in Léon, hurts one person or another; or leaves marks, tracks and holes on walls, and in the texture of the floor. It's not an acquirement to waste 10 thousand bullets in a movie; but it's really an achievement when you configure a sub-production plan just to preview and review the bullets in both pre-production and production.