Michael (Daniel Wu) is a Hong Kong singer/songwriter arriving in China to avoid his legal problems for the time being. Through his rich and influential father (Richard Ng) some of his music have been produced but right now he's also under the pressure to deliver more. He meets up with a local Beijing rockband, headed by their singer Road (Geng Le). They go from village to village performing and trying to make people understand their message in music. Michael joins them on their journeys and hope to gather inspiration and him becoming friends with Road's girlfriend Yang Yin (Shu Qi) is perhaps one step towards that...

Starting with Mabel Cheung's narrative, it has much difficult getting off the ground. Some movies can take as much as 30 minute before their true plot is revealed but for Beijing Rocks it takes a full hour. We just follow the band and it's characters around for a long while but nothing seems to happen. It's almost like a really tedious documentary. When it eventually finds its plot it becomes more compelling but basically the movie is nothing more than a watchable love triangle drama. Mabel showed in An Autumn's Tale that you don't need to complicate the proceedings if you have good writing and actors but what is required of you though is making sure to maintain interest throughout, especially from the top. Beijing Rocks does therefore drag but the remaining 50 minutes makes the experience worthwhile.

Alex Law's script finds it's flow and it's characters from this point on. They may not have huge depth (each gets a CGI enhanced intro though) but from the hour mark they become more interesting to follow at least. The love story has nothing new to offer but seeing as I think Beijing Rocks is more aimed at younger audiences, the characters consciously aren't overly complex as written. It's a story of fighting, fighting to be heard and fighting to make the outsiders understand. That's certainly a theme that young people can relate to more and maybe, just maybe, they aren't that critical of the film. They might catch some subtext those of us past childhood are missing.

Maybe in an effort to reach the kids even more, Mabel and DP Peter Pau have created a very stylized look to the film. In certain moments there's almost a hyper kinetic feel to the way scenes are shot, which I didn't like but I guess a movie about music sometimes have to look like an MTV video. Sad really. I did like some of the slow motion used but even that got taken a few notches too far. The calm and minimalistic direction seen later in the film and in previous Mabel Cheung movies works so much better and I wish they had dared to do that from the beginning to end. Peter Pau's cinematography is gorgeous to look at though when it's calm though.

The actors also find their flow at the same time as director Cheung and Shu Qi almost single handedly saves the movie on an acting level. She plays the girl clinging one to the one she thinks is forever right for her but befriends another one, hence the triangle drama. Not that Shu takes the character to new undiscovered levels but her smile is enough to charm us. Sweet, adorable and displaying a good amount of emotions and, again, she is a very big reason why Beijing Rocks becomes a worthwhile experience.

Daniel Wu displayed pretty good acting chops in the 1999 movie Purple Storm but has not been part of that many good projects since then. This movie, despite its flaws, is probably the best I've seen him do after Purple Storm. As you may know, Daniel was born and raised in America so Cantonese is not his first language. With Beijing Rocks he had to challenge himself even more because this is largely a Mandarin speaking role. I can't really tell you how good or bad he speaks the dialect but thankfully he doesn't flip flop between his Chinese and English like he did in Gen-X Cops. In terms of acting he pulls off the character decently and one thing to remember is that Daniel is still learning. He's not there yet but there's undeniable talent in that boy, just have to found more good roles on a regular basis. Mainland actor Geng Le has a few nice scenes, especially in the section where he leaves his band and in a rare drama performance we see Richard Ng.

Mabel Cheung's Beijing Rocks has a basic structure that sadly blooms very late. It becomes a decent film in the end but there's no denying the weaknesses present. Have patience and you'll see that you get into this romance, mostly because of Shu Qi, eventually.

The story is conventional and yet flouts convention by the common acceptance of the rock adventure and tragedy of youth plotline. It makes no attempt to trick the viewer; that would be too much given the dressing and filling of the bread. It's an extravagant sandwich. The dialogue is rich but comes at such a happy and spirited pace that the subtitles have difficulty keeping up with it, though this could have been improved upon and most of it is the misjudgement of the subtitlers; when it is not the subtitlers in the wrong it is the viewer who needs his or her eyes to keep up with the busy activities, colours and beautiful people on screen. The three leads and the bass guitarist Mr Sun (Shun Hai-bo) are each granted an address to the camera to an experimentally animated background. Their personal essays are witty and warm, the images that back and assault them insane. Michael goes first and his introduction concludes with a paper bag with eye and mouth holes falling across his face, his mouth within literally zipping up, a toilet chain falling and dangling from inside and a tiny mouse jumping onto it and dragging the chain, Michael and sequence down out of view. It's crazy and original, as individual as a Terry Gilliam job.

It is a frivolous mini-adventure that never lets up like a University film student project of a commercial feature-length adventure with everyone adding there only technical talent and flavour to it (as was the case with Zombie High, The Forgotten One and Alone In The T-Shirt Zone, each of which struggle to jam in their respective campus' animation students efforts) but here with so fascinating and frenetic a mix tacked to an ordinary enough body of plot it works charmingly. Dialogue frequently throws up some gems and in a pre-video and DVD age this would become a cult building midnight movie on the quotable alone. "I know there are 100 ways to kill yourself, one of which is to marry a rocker," Yang Yin tells us. On his latest dog, the animal loving Road is a little more positive when talking of his pet that he is not going to be stolen by hungry villagers, the suspected fate of his previous tour canines. "He's a bit dumb and he's so afraid so I named him Black Hurricane. I don't know what'll happen to him eventually but at least he's got a hot shit name." When Michael enquires at a market stall of a disc by his own defunct early band, the Mexican Jumping Beans, the elderly stallholder (Yan Guan-ying) insults him, "You're not big just because you say you're big, when my people's store carries your pirated CDs... then you're big!"

Visually it hurries up then will slow down, unusual shots are hunted down and casually inset, collage editing excites and colours go on parade, while in another sequence a slow terrible happening is intercut with dream images, the first in sunny orange glows with the latter's cold lavender winter chase scene. Images don't get much richer than a gentle hand combing a bead of sweetcorn from a dead man's hair. And the closing jumping bean sequence with the young adult left to believe in the magic in it when the secret squirming life of the bean could so easily be revealed to him is heart-warming. A world is opened to us that might not be real but at times certainly have elements of the real as we see them live off congee and 56 percent proof Tequila pop. It is an attractive and fun life... yet still the Chinese government would have a difficult time seeing the bright side to its release.

Most importantly it is a rock journey and music is of important consideration. The soundtrack is blessed with the works, a cross-section that includes an indigenous breakneck intro and slow jazz trawls, while the fake band is provided with songs by half-a-dozen different clearly different sounding bands (though to most ears, vocally similar). The best of the volunteer artistes are Sperm Bank (with the tracks 'Porcelain Brothers' and 'So You've Also Come') who's wild and classic funk rock exercises remind one of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Several other bands, included a fox-core girl outfit (Fall Insects) of some value, pop up at other points in the film. Dogs in Space this is not, thank fuck. Think Breaking Glass fought over by Richard Lester and Tsui Hark and you might come nearer. Better still simply catch up with this splendid film.

I've never quite seen a Chinese film like Beijing Rocks before. The closest comparison I can think of is the American film Almost Famous. Both films involve an outcast (in Almost Famous, the outcast was a young Rolling Stone magazine correspondent, here the outcast is a songwriter from Hong Kong) who hooks up with a band and learns a thing or two about life in the process. The similarities end there, however, and excuse me if my comparison is a little off, but it's the closest I can think of. Also, Beijing Rocks is a better film.

Beijing Rocks succeeds as a drama because it has two things great dramas need: a compelling storyline and endearing characters. The storyline may seem fairly basic, but the execution is what makes it so great. The acting helps the story along and I have to admit, I was fairly surprised at how good it was, coming from both the main cast and the supporting actors.

Daniel Wu is someone I always enjoy seeing in movies and here he puts on a great show as the songwriter from Hong Kong who hooks up with a Chinese rock band. The best part about Daniel in this film is that he is playing a very sympathetic character who we grow to care about more and more as the film progresses. His character, Michael, has been pampered by his rich father his whole life and all he wants to do is to make it on his own (the theme of honor to one's family is present throughout the film as well). The romance between Michael and Yin is really touching and believable.

Shu Qi is usually on-hand to provide the audience with some gorgeous eye candy and Beijing Rocks is no different. However, much like Daniel, Shu gives us a surprisingly versatile performance, ranging from strip-teasing to acting goofy to some really heavy dramatic scenes. Like Michael, Yin is trying to find her place in the world ,and Shu Qi expresses that amazingly well.

OK, the Hong Kong stars are great in the film, but Chinese actor Geng Le really steals the show here as Road, the tortured rock singer. His character is really complex and has a lot of problems he's dealing with (some more of that family stuff I mentioned). He also has issues with commitment and is a very wild individual (displayed towards the end of the film by juxtaposing scenes of Road with scenes of his dog running away). In saying that, Geng Le handles everything perfectly. He goes through the film as a real jerk, but by the end, we can really sympathize with Road. Truly an accomplishment for an actor when his character is a bastard, yet we eventually learn to sympathize with him in the end.

The supporting cast is very good as well and can hold their own against the main cast. All of Road's fellow band mates are likeable and seem to be played by actual musicians (it could be true since I've never seen or heard of them before). The real surprise was seeing Richard Ng play Daniel's father in the film. I haven't seen him in a movie in years and it's refreshing to see an older, established Hong Kong actor appear in a film mostly dominated by a young cast.

The directing by Mabel Cheung is good enough, with many thanks going to cinematographer Peter Pau and editor Danny Pang. Peter Pau certainly knows how to make a movie look beautiful, no matter what it is, and Danny Pang (along with his brother) have really made names for themselves recently with their hugely popular The Eye (being remade in the US this year with Tom Cruise's company backing it). I especially enjoyed the monologue scenes where the characters talk directly to the audience as colors and images move about behind them.

DVD Specs:
Megastar
Region 0
Anamorphic Widescreen
Languages: Mandarin Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles: Chinese Traditional/Simplified, English
Extras: Alternate Ending, Making Of, Teaser, Trailer, Music Video, Cast & Crew filmographies/biographies

Transfer:
Surprise, surprise...it's anamorphic! It could definitely be better, but this sure is a very nice transfer to look at. The film is beautiful and, while the transfer could have used slightly stronger colors, it's nearly perfect with very minor specs that appear very infrequently. Peter Pau's cinematography is really justified by this transfer. Sometimes, when they show us what Daniel Wu's character is filming, it's a little choppy, but I won't fault the transfer for that as that's usually how homemade movies look when blown up.

Sound:

It's nothing special (as with most HK DVD's Dolby Digital tracks), but it gets the job done. Everything's clear, the music sounds good in surround sound, and the dialogue is never muffled.

Extras:
A decent selection of extras here. There's a Making Of (with no English subtitles of course), the alternate ending (which I'm glad was left out as it doesn't fit the movie at all), a music video for the song Daniel Wu's character writes in the movie, two trailers, and the usual cast and crew nonsense.

Overall:
A definite gem that I'm glad I saw because if I didn't go for it now, I probably never would have. There's some really incredible stuff here in terms of drama, acting, and the beautiful cinematography by the master of the craft, Peter Pau. I'll also be the first to admit that this film brought a tear to my eye on more than one occasion. That right there is my seal of approval.