Cannes 2009: "Vengeance."
We're far enough away from the golden age of Hong Kong John Woo action excess that a little nostalgia is warranted, and Johnnie To's "Vengeance" is meant to fondly recall every operatic slow-mo shoot-em-up of the era, though until that sinks in, it just looks ungainly. Singer Johnny Hallyday, who's often shorthand summed-up as France's Elvis equivalent, plays Francois Costello, a Parisian restaurant owner with a dark past and real talent for wearing a Burberry trench coat with the collar popped. He comes to Macao to avenge his daughter (played by Sylvie Testud, who despite top billing has maybe five minutes of screen time), who was severely injured in a hit on her Chinese husband that also resulted in the death of their children. "It's a miracle she survived," the doctor tells him, and it really is, as in the flashback we see her getting four shotgun blasts to the...
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