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A Better Tomorrow II

A Better Tomorrow II

List Price: $24.98
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A MUST OWN
Review: The Hong Kong Godfather. Without a doubt this movie proves that John Woo is the best action director of all time, the vision, style, and the sher genious that he (Woo) uses in the direction of this movie is what sets it apart from and american action movie ever made. The action in this movie plays out like a ballet, a dance with bullets and blood. So put down those typical american action movies and pick up the movie that they want to be. You will not be dissaponted by this movie, one of if not the best hong kong action movie.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A MUST OWN
Review: The Hong Kong Godfather. Without a doubt this movie proves that John Woo is the best action director of all time, the vision, style, and the sher genious that he (Woo) uses in the direction of this movie is what sets it apart from and american action movie ever made. The action in this movie plays out like a ballet, a dance with bullets and blood. So put down those typical american action movies and pick up the movie that they want to be. You will not be dissaponted by this movie, one of if not the best hong kong action movie.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: OK gangster movie
Review: The movie gives the impression of various parts being put together that don`t have much in common. The action sequences praised by some did not have the explosive quality of the action sequences of A Better Tomorrow I, nor the emotional content. There are only two major shoot-outs in the movie: the first one has chow yun-fat gunning down american gangsters in a hotel with a shotgun (a sequence that is a bit too similar to the sequence in The Getaway where Steve McQueen guns down cops with a shotgun in a hotel (Peckinpah is one of the major influences on Woo); the second one is the final shoot-out and it comes close to self-parody (the baddies are mowed down in groups à la Commando) (Watching it, I even woundered if Woo directed most of this shoot-out - I know there were problems between Woo and Hark during the making of the movie.) The actors have more or less no intensity during the whole movie: they hardly seem to be playing the same characters as in the first one. The first third seems to be a rip-off of the Godfather, then the story is chucked out the window with Chow appearing as the twin brother: the first in a series of cheesy moments. The hit-man that kills Leslie Cheung is an obvious rip-off of Melville`s hitman: Le Samourai (A stoic silent hitman that waits for the other guy to draw before shooting). The movie seems like a waste of the talent of everyone involved.

Overall watchable B gangster movie but is no comparison with the original A Better Tomorrow, a mythic melodrama masterpiece.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Mismatched
Review: This DVD distributed by Anchor Bay Entertainment has flaws. First understand that the film's language is Chinese. DVD settings default to Chinese language and English subtitles. Fair enough. However, when playing English language with English subtitles, the spoken word and the written word are often so mismatched they have completely different meanings. My DVD showed a splice in the flim which ran diagonally for several frames, which is not a show stopper but just another indication of the poor DVD quality.

The Talent Bios on John Woo and Yun-Fat Chow are very enlightening. The film is a different story. The story line was often hard to follow because of such choppy scene changes. People just magically appeared, or the location would completely change, without any warning. Too many bad effects. The film was greatly disappointing for me, considering the director is John Woo and has Yun-Fat Chow in it. I purchased the DVD based on those two criteria, unseen, and it was a good lesson. That's the last time I shall purchase an unpreviewed movie based on the talent.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Classic John Woo and Chow Yun-Fat
Review: This film is a sequal in every sense of the word. It begins with our 'hero' from the first film in prison, and his CID brother undercover with a Triad. Then we learn that Yun-Fat's character Mark from the first film has a twin brother named Ken, who was the top tough guy where he grew up, but he moved to New York to lead a normal life on the straight and narrow. When an old friend is set up, and goes into hiding, he comes across Ken who decides it's best to help the old friend, and eventually they return to Hong Kong to set things right. The shootout at the mansion in the last 30 minutes is all you expect from the Woo/Chow duo, big explosions through the house, Yun-Fat going around two pistols blazing. A Better Tomorrow II is definitely better than it's predecesor. If you're a John Woo, or Chow Yun-Fat fan, I highly recommend it to you.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: John Woo's best volume 2!!!
Review: This is another one of John Woo's finest films!!! This is the second volume of the Better Tommorrow series and it's action packed!!! Will make a great companion to volume 1!!! Anchor Bay's DVD of this clasic Hong Kong film is awesome!!! 16:9 widescreen,2 trailers,multiple language tracks,great subtitles and production notes round out this grea DVD!!! A+

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The best John Woo movie to date.
Review: This movie is awesome. Much better than the first one and also much bloodier. The last 20 minutes are filled with blood, guns,grenades,a sword, an axe and tons of action. Don't miss this classic. don't listen to the revies that say it isn't a classic because it is, it's a bloody one too. John Woo is better than steven Spielberg.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Great Movie, Disappointing DVD
Review: This movie is the best of the "Better Tomorrow" trilogy and one of John Woo's best Hong Kong releases after "Hard Boiled" and "The Killer". It takes off right after "A Better Tomorrow" with Chow Yun Fat returning as Mark's twin brother Ken. It starts off a little slow, but it's essential to character development (which most action films of this genre lack). The ending has one of the best and bloodiest shootout sequences in the series. Some of the scenes in this end sequence you may remeber being shown in Tarentino's "True Romance".

The two stars keeping this movie from getting a five star rating was due to the quality of the DVD. Although the packaging of the DVD was nice, the booklet inside was merely an advertisement and had no information for this movie. To my disappointment there was NO EXTRA FOOTAGE or BEHIND THE SCENES FOOTAGE as advertised and it left me feeling ripped off. The DVD just merely contained actor's and director's files which looked like it was taken directly from the IMDB (www.imdb.com). The subtitles were poorly translated with constant grammatical, spelling and timing errors, which made most the dialogue confusing. The colors were muted and in some of the dark scenes, what was supposed to be black turned a bright blue - yuck!. The only real difference between the DVD and the VHS version was the remastered Dolby Digital sound and widescreen letterboxed aspect ratio (1.85:1).

The only reason that I didn't return this version of the DVD is that the only other version is on VHS and it's $13 more than the DVD. So if you are planning on purchasing this, I'd wait, there are plans for a superior version to be released in the fall.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Great Movie, Disappointing DVD
Review: This movie is the best of the "Better Tomorrow" trilogy and one of John Woo's best Hong Kong releases after "Hard Boiled" and "The Killer". It takes off right after "A Better Tomorrow" with Chow Yun Fat returning as Mark's twin brother Ken. It starts off a little slow, but it's essential to character development (which most action films of this genre lack). The ending has one of the best and bloodiest shootout sequences in the series. Some of the scenes in this end sequence you may remeber being shown in Tarentino's "True Romance".

The two stars keeping this movie from getting a five star rating was due to the quality of the DVD. Although the packaging of the DVD was nice, the booklet inside was merely an advertisement and had no information for this movie. To my disappointment there was NO EXTRA FOOTAGE or BEHIND THE SCENES FOOTAGE as advertised and it left me feeling ripped off. The DVD just merely contained actor's and director's files which looked like it was taken directly from the IMDB (www.imdb.com). The subtitles were poorly translated with constant grammatical, spelling and timing errors, which made most the dialogue confusing. The colors were muted and in some of the dark scenes, what was supposed to be black turned a bright blue - yuck!. The only real difference between the DVD and the VHS version was the remastered Dolby Digital sound and widescreen letterboxed aspect ratio (1.85:1).

The only reason that I didn't return this version of the DVD is that the only other version is on VHS and it's $13 more than the DVD. So if you are planning on purchasing this, I'd wait, there are plans for a superior version to be released in the fall.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: great gunfights and great movie
Review: This movies is cool. I like the scence when chow yun fat is about to shoot a man in the head if he does not eat the rice.The last 40 or 30 minutes is when it start to get good. If you love voilence as much as I do buy this movie. The one I brought is not in english but it has subtitles. There is to parts where chow yun fat speakes in english in this movie. I like when he take the shotgun and start blow the men all away. then he takes the pistols slides down the stairs shooting a man. There are two good action scence but they last for 3o minutes. The last 15 minutes will have you supised it is the best part of the movie.That about all.


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