Sylvia Chang Movies

Future action spectacular maestro Johnny To spins this melodrama based loosely on divorce drama Kramer vs. Kramer. Former motorcycle racer Long (Chow Yun-fat) supports his young son Porky (Wong Kwan-yuen) working as a lowly construction worker. Though they struggle to get by, Long and his son live happily. One day, Sylvia (Sylvia Chang) -- the kid's mother -- shows up after an extended stint in America. A successful ad exec, she casts her son in a television commercial she is producing. Soon Sylvia's long-dormant maternal feelings come rushing to the fore. A flashback shows that Sylvia dumped Long when she discovered Long with another woman. Her mother told Sylvia that her child was born dead before her mom fobbed him off onto Long. Deciding that Long with his crude ways and blue-collar income would be a poor influence on her son, Sylvia tries to get Porky to come back with her to the States. Porky resists and vows to help his dad try to restart his racing career. Chow Yun-fat won a Golden Horse for his acting performance in this movie. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Force Z is a crack Australian military corps during World War II. When a plane carrying a high-profile Japanese defector crash-lands somewhere in the South Pacific, it's up to Force Z to find it. Complicating matters is a traitor in the good guys' midst. John Philip Law heads the cast of Attack Force Z, but some video companies have bestowed top billing upon Mel Gibson, originally listed 3rd in the cast. The film also features an early leading peformance by Sam Neill. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A gay romantic mystery, Bishonen is roughly based on an incident that was the biggest scandal to hit the Hong Kong Police force. A cache of photographs was discovered in the home of a wealthy playboy, which all featured handsome young men in police uniforms, some of them half nude, others holding law enforcement paraphernalia such as clubs in suggestive poses. An investigation by the Police Department revealed that some of the men were indeed policemen, whereas others were hustlers and gigolos. The focus of Bishonen is not this scandal, but rather the highly unusual meeting of two different worlds, illustrated in the romantic entanglement involving a policeman, two male prostitutes and a gay pop singer. The film starts with a simple love story and a series of emotional knots, some of which are impossible to untangle. Tragedy is inevitable. Jet is the star of a group of male hustlers in the steaming city of Hong Kong. He is arrogant and sexy; everyone is in love with him but he loves no one, until one day he meets Sam, the best looking policeman around. After meeting Sam, Jet tries to change into someone he is not: innocent, sweet, clean and pure. This is his way of setting a trap to catch Sam, but he falls into a trap himself. In the process, he discovers that the righteous young cop has a darker side. Things go out of control when Sam's past and Jet's present become intermingled -- not unlike Hong Kong itself, a cauldron of traditional Chinese ethics and modern Western values. Happiness will be achieved only in the harmony of the discordant elements. All four leading actors are newcomers to the big screen; Steven Fung who plays Jet, has become one of the biggest teen idols in Asia. The film begins on a good premise; however, it slowly slides into comfortable melodrama with a predictable ending. Bishonen was screened in the Panorama section of the 49th International Berlin Film Festival. ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide

In this Hong Kong melodrama, two sisters are part of a cabaret act that is rapidly declining in attendance, and although the older sister (Chang Shio-yen) is constantly trying to push her younger sister to the forefront in a solo act, the younger sibling is less than enthusiastic. She sees little future in show business, whether in the chorus line or up front -- and so when her older sister finally pulls off a deal for the two to go to Taipei and possibly make some "real money," the younger sister must say yes or no, and either way, one of the two will not be happy. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Director Ang Lee's follow-up to his surprise box-office hit The Wedding Banquet is another look at ethnic and sexual conflicts in a Chinese family, with meals as a centerpiece of the film. Master chef Chu (Sihung Lung) is a long-time widower who lovingly cooks large Sunday dinners for his three daughters, who view the meals as too traditional. Secretly, however, successful airline executive Jia-Chien (Chien-Lien Wu) loves traditional cooking and would like to be a chef like her father, if women were permitted to do so. Her older sister Jia-Jen (Kuei-Mei Yang) is unmarried and cynical about men, but she becomes attracted to a volleyball coach and eventually pursues him vigorously. The youngest daughter, Jia-Ning (Yu-Wen Wang), is a college student who becomes pregnant from her frequent sexual escapades. As the film progresses, the personal relationships between the daughters and their significant others change unexpectedly. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide

(Eddie Chan) plays a murderous salesman in this Hong Kong suspense-thriller about a mind gone haywire. When he discovers his wife has been seeing a lover in their own house, he kills both of them and then goes to jail for the crime. After he serves his prison term, the salesman looks like an ordinary person but he goes berserk when he sees any woman wearing the nylons that his wife used to prefer -- and rage takes over, leading to a killing spree. Although he cannot get away with his crimes forever, in the meantime, his activities provide enough fear to keep a viewer's attention from drifting to the bag of popcorn. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

It is the 1960s in Hong Kong, and a pair of friends who are nightclub performers are managing quite well until one of them falls in love with a female singer who happens to be the objective of a gangster's roving eye. The two recklessly get on the bad side of the mobster who has them so badly beaten up that the love-struck performer suffers brain damage, cured only by a trip to medical specialists in Malaysia. Once the two friends return to Hong Kong and a normal life, they meet and fall in love with two different women -- and everything seems to finally be going well until the old mobster and his cronies catch up with them again, intent on more mayhem. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A traditional Chinese legend comes in for lavish treatment in this (relatively) big-budget Hong Kong film. In the story, Ho is a scholar in Sung Dynasty (11th century) China. He has been given the task of making a finished copy of a religious text. It is a tantric sutra, and he is warned that evil spirits will attempt to steal the finished copy from him. One day, he encounters Lady Chuan and his lively daughter Cloud, and has a delightful love affair. In the end, he is appalled to discover that he has been consorting with ghosts. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Prolific Hong Kong director Lau Kar-wing helmed this first of four official sequels to the 1982 hit Aces Go Places (there was an abortive 1997 follow-up feature as well). An assassin called Filthy Harry is hired by a shady figure (clearly meant to represent Henry Kissinger) and charged with killing the series' unlikely pair of heroes, bald detective Albert Au (Karl Maka) and reformed criminal King Kong (Sam Hui). The film is quite lively, as Albert's relationship with the fiery Superintendent Ho (Sylvia Chang) has hit the skids. The men are framed twice for different robberies by King Kong's new girlfriend, nearly committed to a mental hospital by their devious boss, and forced to battle Filthy Harry's weaponry-laden robot while covered with time bombs. As in the previous film, action scenes are tempered with a great deal of broad slapstick, mostly centering on the heroes' combative interpersonal relationships. Viewers should be cautioned that one English-dubbed version in video circulation is missing nearly 15 minutes of footage from the 102-minute original. Eric Tsang, who directed the first film, co-stars with Raymond Wong, Billy Lau, and Tsui Hark, who appears in a cameo as an insane man who believes himself to be an FBI agent. Hark would direct the next sequel, Aces Go Places III: Our Man From Bond Street, in 1984. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

Popular Hong Kong action filmmaker Ringo Lam (City on Fire and Replicant) reputedly directed this third of four official sequels to 1982's Aces Go Places only as a favor to star Karl Maka, and it shows. King Kong (Sam Hui) once again joins bald detective Albert Au (Maka) and his son Baldy Jr. as they fly to New Zealand to save Albert's wife (Sylvia Chang) from a gang of crooks who have kidnapped her. The crooks, led by Ronald Lacey in a send-up of his role in Raiders of the Lost Ark, are trying to get control of an experimental prism which they need for a machine which turns men into indestructible super-beings. The film is dark, violent, and not quite as funny as previous installments, and the goofy subtitles call Sylvia Chang's character "Sylvia" instead of "Nancy." Still, there is a good supporting cast of genre veterans like Sally Yeh, Kwan Tak-hing, and Cho Tat-wah to please Asian film buffs and Lam keeps the film moving at a speedy clip. The official series ended with the next installment, 1989's Aces Go Places V: The Terracotta Hit, but was revived eight years later with a new cast in the subpar 97 Aces Go Places. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

Melodramatic and maudlin by Western standards, this movie is about a poor bottle collector who finds an abandoned baby one morning and decides to raise her as his own child. While she is growing up, it becomes clear that she has an excellent singing voice and by the time she is an adult, her talent is discovered and she is on her way to stardom. Her new lifestyle precludes visits to her adopted father and her friends, and as a series of tragedies occur, everyone suffers. Meanwhile, the father is getting older and rightly feels abandoned by his successful daughter - with no apparent remedy to his unhappy situation. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this unorthodox family drama, Big Sis Wah (Sylvia Chang) is the no-nonsense madam of a brothel in Kowloon. Aside from the nature of her business, she is a down-to-earth, thoroughly traditional mother of a teen-aged daughter. She and her daughter are going through a difficult period, but her love and common sense prevail in this situation over extraordinary odds. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide