“Just Heroes” Chinese Theatrical Poster
Director: John Woo
Co-director: Ng Ma
Cast: David Chiang, Danny Lee, Chen Kuan Tai, Stephen Chow, Lo Lieh, Cally Kwong, Wu Ma, Shing Fui On, Zhao Lei, Tien Niu, Alan Chan, Fung Hak On, Philip Ko Fei
Running Time: 97 min.
By Numskull
This is the John Woo “gun fu” movie that nobody has seen. It’s listed on the filmographies, but nothing much is ever said about it. It simply gets nestled between A Better Tomorrow 2 and The Killer.
So I watched it hoping I’d be able to write a rave review of it, saying how criminally unfair it is that it doesn’t get more attention and how it deserves to be ranked right up there with Woo’s best.
Sorry, folks. No can do.
Just Heroes is just so-so. John Woo turned out a chain of seven films during his HK golden era: A Better Tomorrow, A Better Tomorrow 2, Just Heroes, The Killer, Bullet in the Head, Once A Thief, and Hard Boiled. This, friends, is the weak link.
One might say that the absence of Chow Yun-fat (who appeared in five of the seven films listed above) harms this movie and keeps it from attaining the brilliance of A Better Tomorrow or The Killer. And one would be wrong, because there’s no shortage of talent among the cast here, and not even an actor as good as Chow Yun-fat can single-handedly save a movie from totally sucking (Replacement Killers, anyone?). I’m not saying that Just Heroes sucks, but it doesn’t mesmerize you like other Woo flicks do.
The story concerns the murder of a mob leader by an unidentified assassin and the subsequent chaos among his underlings as his chosen successor has doubts about his ability to fill his boss’s shoes and the search for the killer indicates an inside job. The gang splits into factions. Some guys are honorable, others are pricks. Violence ensues.
Don’t expect a thrill a minute. Just Heroes is no more story driven than any other John Woo film since the mid 1980s, but it’s definitely less adrenaline-charged. After the initial shootout, the better part of an hour passes before we see anything that resembles an action sequence again. What’s there is good, but more would have been nice since the plot and characters aren’t exceptionally interesting.
Ng Ma is credited as co-director and I’m given cause to wonder if he directed more of this movie than “they” would have us believe. At times it really does seem more like a John Woo imitation than a John Woo film. There’s one character who repeatedly makes references to A Better Tommorrow, reciting Chow Yun-fat’s urine-drinking speech and planting handguns in potted plants (get it? PLANTING handguns? Potted PLANTS? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA… ha… heh… um… never mind).
Seriously… Just Heroes is worth watching once, but it’s hardly touched by greatness. If you’re a Woo completist, it is, of course, required viewing; if not, don’t beat yourself up for skipping over it. To my knowledge it is not available on DVD. Tai Seng has released full-frame and (barely) letterboxed videos. Both have blurry white subs burned onto the print; in the full-frame version, which sould be avoided at all costs, the text constantly runs off the edges of the screen and gets chopped off at the bottom. Nothing new there. Watch it letterboxed or not at all.
Oh yeah, and the ending is very abrupt.
Numskull’s Rating: 5/10
I’ve waited a long time to see this one (almost as long as I’ve been into HK cinema – over 20 years!) and finally was able to do so thanks to the recently released Blu-ray (that’s catching a lot of heat for its poor picture quality, but is at least uncut, which for my low standards make it a worthwhile trade off).
Numskull hits the nail on the head with his review – when the action hits, it’s classic 80’s Woo heroic bloodshed style, and doesn’t disappoint. Plus, it’s also all of our favorite Shaw Brothers stars partaking in the action, so the novelty of seeing David Chiang brandish double pistols definitely shouldn’t be undervalued. The fact that this was made on the quick purely to raise funds to allow Woo’s mentor Chang Cheh to retire (non-spoiler – he didn’t, and in fact would go on to make his own heroic bloodshed flick a couple of years later with ‘Slaughter in Xian’) does show through though, with the non-action scenes likely helmed by co-director Wu Ma, which feel sluggish and can make the pace feel particularly plodding.
What also sticks out like a sore thumb is flash-in-the-pan actor Ngai Jan’s role, who’s the character mentioned in the review that continuously makes references to ‘A Better Tomorrow’. I’ve read from several sources that ‘A Better Tomorrow’ inspired a number of HK youths to join triad gangs, and here it really feels like Woo is using Jan’s character to show that wanting to be a triad isn’t cool. His scenes are brief, but never less than cringe inducing, especially as he spends the bullet riddled finale running around attempting to copy Chow Yun Fat’s famous gun-planting scene and narrating it as he does.
Special mention should also go to one of the most bizarre (and blatantly unexplained) “Oh, you faked your own death!” scenes I’ve seen in quite a while. Despite all of these issues with ‘Just Heroes’ though, the fact that Woo’s style of action during this period was so unique and adrenaline inducing makes it impossible to not recommend, just don’t go in expecting it to be anything close to his collaborations with Chow Yun Fat.
Recently managed to watch this and definitely agree, I felt like quite a lot of the entertainment value came from watching actors who aren’t Chow Yun Fat take part in Woo style shoot-outs. Not perfect but certainly glad I watched it.
Could not understand the Ngai Jan character at all, if you’re going to include a serious statement about the romanticization of joining triad gangs why would you play so much of it comedically? Felt like the more of a heads up that if you’re going to join the triads it’s worth taking it seriously. Like a training video you’d watch at a new job where people perform all the required tasks comically wrong.