Tag Archives: Chinese

Wolf Pack (狼群, 2022)

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Wolf Pack (狼群, 2022)

Director (and writer): Michael Chiang

Cast: Max Zhang, Aarif Lee, Luxia Jiang, Ye Liu, Yi Zhang, Gianluca Zoppa

While seeking answers about his father’s suspicious death, a tactically trained physician infiltrates a mercenary group and soon uncovers a dangerous international conspiracy that could threaten the lives of millions of civilians. – Well Go USA

Wolf Pack is the directorial debut of Singaporean screenwriter-playwright Michael Chiang while also penning the script of this action thriller which follows a young physician that gets caught up in a mercenary group as he tries to learn about his father’s death which gets thrown into an international conspiracy.

When we look at the script of Wolf Pack, its not necessarily the most original idea about mercenaries and international conspiracies, not even how the whole issue pans out. However, what does stand out is the little moments that add together to create a lot of variety and maybe a little unintended comedy to lighten up the mood in an increasingly tense plot. Despite that, the film does keep a steady tone and keeps things focused on a different view of mercenaries and focuses a lot on having good and bad guys in any spectrum whether its political or solely in the mercenary world.

As we follow the main character Ke Tong (Aarif Rahman) and learns more about this mercenary group which he basically got kidnapped into by one of the members called Monster (Luxia Jiang), he realizes that there’s a strong sense of belonging, loyalty and righteousness in this group that extends further than simply making money under the leadership of Lao Diao (Max Zhang). Loyalty and righteousness, good and evil are usually common themes in Chinese films which root from classic Chinese stories and the fact that its implemented here fairly subtly does work well. What doesn’t work as well is the melodramatic bits which is a normal staple in Chinese cinema but loses a little bit of its momentum when not executed well.

Wolf Pack does hit a lot of good elements where it counts. The casting here is pretty solid. Max Zhang has been in the business for a long time starting out as a stunt actor and eventually getting his own films. He has been part of some Hollywood films in minor roles like Pacific Rim Uprising. His wushu training from when he was an athlete lends well to his action sequences. While this film leans heavily on the firearms elements, there were a few close combat moments which was able to show off some of his skills.

The same applies for Luxia Jiang who is also trained in martial arts and wushu. However, her role of Monster has a lot more room to play around as the character brings in a little charisma to the group of men in this mercenary crew. Both Max Zhang and Luxia Jiang deliver pretty decent roles here. The mercenary crew as a whole work well while the other members have less screen time outside of the action scenes, they each do represent their role in the crew well. The cast on the whole is pretty decent especially since this involves an international plot and the English dialogue all lands pretty well.

For fans of mercenary films with lots of shootouts and infiltration, Wolf Pack is a fun choice. Of course, for those less familiar with Chinese films, perhaps there might be a little bit of dramatic moments that might feel more than what the film needs. However, Wolf Pack is a surprisingly satisfying and entertaining action film. While its a little thin on the hand to hand combat which is what Max Zhang and Luxia Jiang is trained in, there’s still enough action to keep this a thrilling film experience.

*Wolf Pack is currently available digitally on Well Go USA*

Reality TV Roundup – October & November 2023

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Michelle Wolf: It’s Great To Be Here (2023)

Follows comedian Michelle Wolf as she covers a wide range of subjects, including relationships, sexual harassment, racial issues, and adjusting to a new culture. – IMDB

I’m not sure how many people still remember The Break with Michelle Wolf but I was a big fan of it so I’m always there when Michelle Wolf gets a stand-up comedy gig. The latest one released a few months ago was a three episode show which basically angled around a few sets as she tours which covers a wide variety of social issues.

Much like any form of comedy, its pretty subjective. This show was overall pretty good where a lot of the jokes landed well for me as she does address a lot of funny observations. The first episode works the best as she talks about her life in Barcelona but there are a lot of other relevant issues that she tackles here which does have a nice effect.

Michelle Wolf is a rather unique comedian. Her voice is very distinctive but at the same time, the material she talks about also has a sharp edge to it that works well.

American Ninja Warrior (Season 13, 2021)

Netflix acquired one season of American Ninja Warrior. I’m not exactly why its one season and specifically this season but as someone who doesn’t have cable and I never used to watch American Ninja Warrior but I do love shows like Ultimate Beastmaster, its a pretty fun outing to watch all these different athletes from different walks of life challenging themselves to the many obstacles. The structure of these shows are pretty basic but its nice to see all the stories and this one specifically started featuring a lot of younger ninja warriors. The obstacle courses were pretty fun in each stage and had enough variation between the different groups at the start to stay refreshing and fun.

There’s not a lot to say about these shows. I’m sure that they have their own audience since its been going on for so long. For myself, while I can’t do any of this but I always find it motivating to watch these and get myself back into training.

Call Me By Fire 披荆斩棘 (Season 3, 2023)

“Call Me by Fire Season 3” takes “overcoming obstacles and striving for China” as the core, through the stories of 32 male guests who are constantly challenging, exploring, and striving to forge ahead, showing the fighting spirit of men. The program still adopts the panoramic competition variety show mode similar to the previous seasons. After the first stage, 5 song competitions and the cooperation and competition of the family birth night, the third generation of the hot singing family was finally established. – MyDramaList

I’m a big fan of Call Me By Fire. I finished pretty much all the previous two seasons. While I think that the first two seasons really had some heavy hitters with the renowned household names from the 90s and 2000s in Asia, this season fell a little bit short. Some of them were celebrities that I personally liked but felt like they had a bit of the one hit wonder or even just had more success in smaller TV series or did their thing and stayed in recent years out of the spotlight so it made it more challenging for them to garner audience interest right from the start. But, the great things about these shows are that they dig up some unseen potential from what we already know or even introduce some other unfamiliar faces.

This season, I learned about Thai singer Jeff Satur who has a fantastic voice and talent. At the same time, seeing as I just finished Hidden Love, I really continue to enjoy watching Victor Ma because he always seems so down to earth and hilarious. One of the actors I like watching also joined the show who was Zhe Ming Wei and while he didn’t seem to have a ton of popularity, it was a lot of fun to learn a bit about his background and see the different performances. Of course, there’s always some fun people who join making this season probably the one filled with the most laughs as you gather Tiger Hu, Jimmy Lin, Nicholas Teo, GEM, Nicky Lee and most importantly, David Wang.

I honestly don’t really care too much who ends up at the big finale but this season was hands down one of the most fun. Previous seasons dug deep into the nostalgia but this season had less of that and just a lot of laughter and creativity.

Let’s Fall In Love (Season 5, 2023)

Hosts: Annie Yi, Victor Qin, Yang Qing Zhou, Cici Wang, Zhen Yu Jiang, Hua Sen Chang

There’s probably one romance dating variety show on each popular streaming channels in China like Heart Signal in WeTV/Tencent or Yes I Do on IQiyi. Youku produces two of these. The first one is for its youthful romance set as a university graduation trip which I’ve talked about before HERE called Twinkle Love. Let’s Fall In Love or RelationShip is the normal romance dating one featuring people who have already established their career to a certain level. They always set different parameters of similarities in the group. This time its for people who are a little older nearing their 30s. Its interesting because this show started up right before the pandemic and was called Relation Ship because it was set on a cruise ship in two different legs where halfway through the contestants could choose to stay or leave for the second part where they’d get new contestants in. Post-pandemic, its no longer on a cruise ship but feels more normal but still structures around a trip and experience in a new location.

Season 5 actually starts with a pre-reunion which has the ladies having to choose who they invite to the house and after their initial meeting, they can all decide whether they decide to continue or not. Its an interesting twist on it. Let’s Fall In Love has become one of my favorite types of these kind of shows because they try hard to add in a refreshing twist to change things up from the previous season. While some people do say that these things could be scripted, I choose to view this as normal people interacting. There has to be a certain of control here seeing as your life is surrounded by cameras at every angle and at times cameramen following you on dates and such even if you are in control and are free to make a good part of your own decisions on how you react. This season was mainly dramatic because of two of the contestants which created most of the debate on how guys and girls should react and such.

In the end, these shows are sold not only for their contestants finding romance but also as a means of observation for those watching to learn a little something through the hosts’ discussions. This season’s hosts are great. I’m honestly becoming a big fan of Victor Qin because he is absolutely hilarious but the banter between him and Yang Qing Zhou is another level of funny. Either way, it achieved what I was looking for in some good entertainment.

Sakra (天龍八部之喬峯傳， 2023）

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Sakra (2023)

Directors: Donnie Yen & Ka-Wai Kam

Cast: Donnie Yen, Yuqi Chen, Cya Liu, Yase Liu, Yue Wu, Kara Wai, Eddie Cheung, Yuming Du, Ray Lui, Cheung-Yan Yuen

When a respected martial artist is accused of killing, he goes around in search of answers about his own mysterious origin story and the unknown enemies working to destroy him. – IMDB

Co-directed with Big Brother (review) director Ka-Wai Kam and starring Donnie Yen, Sakra is adapted from the wuxia novel Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils written by Jin Yong, a reknowned Chinese wuxia novelist who has penned a lot of the adapted wuxia TV series and films. Sakra focuses on the story of Qiao Feng who is one of the three main characters of the book series set in 11th century China when Khitan-born baby is left for a Song empire couple to raise without knowing their consequences and eventually becomes the chief of the Beggars’ Sect because of his loyalty and exceptional martial arts skills. However, when the secret of his Khitan background is revealed timed with the accusation for the murder of a few substantial characters in the wulin (aka martial arts community), he renounces his chief title and sets out to find the answers to his origin story and ends up meeting A-Zhu, a girl with exceptional imposter capabilities and ends up saving her life.

To put an entire segment of a character’s life into a 2 hour movie is a tall order, mostly because Jin Yong’s stories are exceptional because of all the details which is very obvious if not originally familiar with the origin story itself. Despite the 2 hour length, the adapted screenplay delivered a mostly disjointed story. Its not hard to follow if the characters knowledge is well-comprehended especially in the ending when Donnie Yen plays both himself and an older character who is is father for example. On a good note, the wuxia novel themes are portrayed very well from its brotherhood code to its resistance to bullies and helping the unfortunate and ruthless governments, it all comes into play in this story.

With Donnie Yen films, its hard to not discuss the action element. Unlike most Donnie Yen films, this one has a lot more apparent computer effects to create some bigger moments and grander scenes. Its not a particularly bad thing but with the addition of effects also brings in more camera cuts and makes it feel less naturally flowing. The action scenes despite its greatness sometimes feel lengthy perhaps because the scene does warrant it because of the immense amount of people involved like one of the bigger scenes in the middle when he breaks the brotherhood with everyone and they all become his enemy but also right from the start when it was just a few against him that crafted his character from the get-go on where his values lie.

As with any period piece, Chinese films with wuxia and/or historical elements excel in two elements and this film is no exception. The first is great sets, whether its computer animated or actual scenery, its able to deliver some visually appealing environments. Paired with this are some beautiful costumes that match the empires they are portraying and in this case, both the Khitan and Song Empire clothing of the time matching to their sects. The colors are mostly subtle because of the general serious tone of revenge and betrayal but at the same time, Azhu has some of the brighter color clothing especially when her danger has subsided and the little moments of subtle romance happens.

Overall, Sakra is an average film in the Donnie Yen filmography. However, its not to say that the film itself is completely a bust. In reality, there are a lot of elements that work here on a visual level and even a nice introduction for those who aren’t familiar with the fictional martial arts community from the wuxia novels. Semi-Gods and Demi-Devils is a great starting point and probably one that Donnie Yen connects with a lot for him to choose to get back into the director’s chair. With how this film ends, it does feel like there is a good possibility of a sequel especially since they ended with a cameo of Ray Lui.

Sakra is currently available on digital, DVD and Blu-ray via Well Go USA.

**Screener provided by Well Go USA**

Music Obsessions – May 2023

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Welcome to (a slightly delayed) Music Obsessions! We continue on with our focused look at Cantopop as this time we turn over to a female singer, Miriam Yeung that I actually watched her step into fame when she came in as first runner-up at the 1995 Hong Kong New Talent Singing Awards. While her career started out with its share of issues, over the many years, she has garnered a certain level of professional attached to her work both as a singer and as an actress. Of course, we’re looking at the singer elements as I dive into a few songs that I’m a big fan of mostly from the start of her career but also looking up some newer songs that have caught my eye.

抬起我的頭來 Lift Up My Head- 楊千嬅 Miriam Yeung

We’re going through Miriam Yeung’s discography in order of release this time to see the growth that she’s had as well as how I’ve been introduced to her music through certain songs. The first song that hit my radar was this one which was not part of her debut album but in the Summer Story album launched four years after the singing contest. You can hear the potential in her voice and the youthfulness but there still lacks a certain polish. This song is very optimistic and encouraging in its lyrics and its one of the reasons why I liked it a lot when it was first released.

姊妹 Sisters – 楊千嬅 Miriam Yeung

To me, my favorite album that solidified Miriam Yeung as a singer to keep an eye out for was her album Miriam in 2001 which I personally own and has a lot of good songs. While there’s no doubt that the hit of the album was Wild Child and I do love that song a lot, I’m a big fan of this song, Sisters. It seems to be mentioned much less but its such a great song both in the music elements but also the lyrics.

假如讓我說下去 If You Let Me Finish Talking- Miriam Yeung 楊千嬅

Much like this song which I translated roughly but this is by far my absolute favorite song of Miriam Yeung’s. I’m not quite sure why but it might have to do a lot with teenage angst back in the day. I do come back to this song every so often and still feel like its rather underrated and do believe that it still holds up with how good it is. Especially the build-up part for the final verse, it gets me every time.

勇Courage- Miriam Yeung 楊千嬅

Released in 2002 as the theme song of a action comedy that she was a female lead, marking something of a debut to her acting career in Love Undercover, Courage is probably one of Miriam Yeung’s most popular songs and rightfully so as it delivers a positive message about courage in life reflecting the film really well but also to young women at the time it was released. Its one of the songs that has stuck around with the general public, probably only two or three other songs really meet that same level of familiarity like Kisses Everywhere and Too Bad I’m Not An Aquarius.

滾 Get Out!- 梁漢文 Edmond Leung/ 楊千嬅 Miriam Yeung

A big fan of this song which I believe is part of Edmond Leung’s discography BUT this song really leaves a strong impression since its the rare song where the song itself is a conversation and argument between a couple of a husband suspecting his wife of cheating on him. The suspicions and the doubts in a relationship all gets put to the forefront in their argument throughout the song. It has such a nice pacing to the whole song. The play on words of the title of the song is always a little tricky since it can be interpreted as “Get Out!” or “F**k Off” but is also the word for Cheating in Cantonese. I’m not quite sure how long this focused discography of Music Obsessions will last but if it lasts for a while, we will definitely get to Edmond Leung eventually.

還有事情可慶祝 There Are Still Things Worth Celebrating- 楊千嬅 Miriam Yeung

Every time I choose these singers, I always choose the last song as their latest release or a newer song that I’ve discovered recently. Despite the many love ballads about heartbreak and such, Miriam Yeung’s discography has been relatively cute and positive. Its obvious this was released during the pandemic or as the tail end of it as an encouraging song that even in the hard times, there’s always something to celebrate. Its also a nice showcase of the start of her singing career to now, she’s really polished and refined her voice into such a powerful and soothing one.

That’s it for this Music Obsessions!
What have you been listening to?

Hidden Blade (無名, 2023)

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Hidden Blade (無名, 2023)

Director (and writer): Er Cheng

Cast: Tony Leung, Yibo Wang, Chengpeng Dong, Zhou Xun, Eric Wang, Huang Lei, Mori Hiroyuki, Shuying Jiang, Jingyi Zhang

Follows the story of underground workers who risked their lives to send intelligence and defend the motherland, set after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor when the Wang Jingwei regime declared war on Britain and the U.S. – IMDB

The last chapter of Bona Film Group’s China Victory Trilogy (which feature separate stories), Hidden Blade is a World War II espionage thriller. The film is structured from scattered events throughout the Japan-China War of Resistance from the bombings of Guangzhou to Japan’s surrender. Structured in a scrambled timeline of events, the espionage thriller right away implicates that there will the unknown elements of which character is secretly working for their own forces while on the service the characters all work for Japanese espionage agencies performing at times some brutal moments. Between the director’s intricate script and the outstanding cast selected for this film, Hidden Blade delivers a great thriller and will keep the audience keeping its detective hat on to spot who is not who they appear to be.

Hidden Blade is a visually stunning film. Er Cheng crafts a film where every scene is set up beautifully. There is a wonderful and atmospheric use of lighting and the cinematographic grasp of each scene from where the characters of placed all add to the suspense. The artistic element sets its tone right from its first scene with darkened space and Tony Leung’s character sitting on a chair with nothing much around and he just turns to the camera. With that said, the structure of the scrambled storyline is one that relies on having a decent knowledge of what happened between Japan and China with the Chinese Communist Party and Japan’s invasion. While that’s the case, it does give common knowledge like the attack on Pearl Harbor for wider known events which gives a good point of reference for that timeframe.

The script does touch a few details to give it the basic foundation but knowing more does help with grasping how the timeline moves back and forth through different events and scenes. It does help that the film makes the effort to add in the necessary timestamps to make it easier to grasp. Once the different scenes are set up at the beginning, it does become easier to figure out the sequence and follow the story. While the scrambled storyline takes a little bit of time to adjust to, it does help to create the suspense for the characters and their actions. There are certain hints like drops of blood and a newspaper on the table to help hint towards certain events but a lot of the reveals are cleverly written to give its twist in the final act. Another great element of the film is the language it uses and even for Chinese audience, it will still require subtitle reading as it moves between Mandarin, Japanese, Shanghainese and Cantonese.

The cast is a highlight with Hong Kong veteran actor Tony Leung, most notable to the Western audience from In The Mood of Love and more recently, in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. For those familiar with his filmography, this is right up his alley as he has done films before from this era as well like Lust, Caution but also excels in a variety of genres, much like his work in Infernal Affairs. There is no doubt that Tony Leung is the headliner for this film. However, China’s rising young celebrity Yibo Wang is one that does a fantastic job as well. Multitalented musically as his boyband debut in South Korean band Uniq as their rapper and dancer, his recent years of acting has opened up a lot of opportunities, most notable for popular TV series The Untamed (which is currently available on Netflix Canada and Youtube). Hidden Blade is probably the most sophisticated role he has taken on and proved that he is capable of delivering both a subtle character but also not afraid for the action scenes. While his role as Mr. Ye is mostly paired with his partner Mr. Wang, played by Eric Wang, there are some pivotal plot points that deliver some well-choreographed action scenes. The leading cast between these two are very deceptive for the majority of the film.

The supporting actors are also pretty big names. Eric Wang, Huang Lei and Chengpeng Dong are all renowned actors in China. These three all have rather significant roles in Hidden Blade and each has their own twists and reveals. Its as much as praise again to the intricate script and in turn, the character design as none of the characters are what they seem. Its a strong male cast in this film and reasonably so due to the decade and era that its set. However, the limited female cast also gets very little screen time which is most surprising with Zhou Xun as Ms. Chen who is one of the biggest female actresses in China. While Ms. Chen doesn’t have a big role, her character is embedded in a few plot points in Hidden Blade. Unlike her, actress Shuying Jiang mostly known for TV series like The King’s Avatar (currently on Netflix Canada) and Nothing But Thirty who has one scene in Hidden Blade as an alluring character called Ms. Jiang who we can only wish had a bigger role as that one scene was very memorable.

Hidden Blade is a well-executed espionage thriller. It has all the pieces to put together a thoughtful and clever story set in a significant part of history especially for China as they were oppressed by foreign powers. It focuses heavily on the Japanese espionage agencies inner working with its various characters and spends the film making the audience wonder who is not what they seem. Packed with an exceptional cast, visually stunning cinematography and a well-constructed non-linear thriller, Hidden Blade is definitely a great addition to Chinese cinema.

*Screener provided by Well Go USA*

Music Obsessions – August 2022

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Welcome to this month’s Music Obsessions! The last month was pretty fun as a lot of new music videos landed and others popped up on my list from various shows and whatnot. All Chinese music from different spaces and styles but all very fun stuff! Let’s check it out!

最偉大的作品 Greatest Works of Art – 周杰倫 Jay Chou

Jay Chou is basically my youth seeing as he got famous in the prime of my post-secondary days around 2003 and he became the center of a lot of conversations and his songs became the focus of karaoke days back then as well making him an musician that I’ve been following for a long time (with some gaps in the middle) and I’ve shared quite a few songs of his. I should really considering doing a focus post on him when we get a slower month. This month, he dropped this one which the song itself is nice but the video is one that is even better, especially for those who watched his J-Style Trip on Netflix where you see some of his best friends pop up in this music video as well as he travels through time, performs a few magic tricks while recreating the art masterpieces.

一格格 Frames – 衛蘭 Janice Vidal

There’s a chunk of Janice Vidal’s discography which is an empty space for me when I stopped listening to Cantopop for a while (or at least the new stuff over a decade as I lost a little faith in what was coming out) and now its a lot of catch-up. This popped up mostly because of the Chinese singing variety show and their really good rendition but the original very nice. The whole chill vibe really suits the song and is such a feel good song in general.

賽勒斯的愛 Cherlas – 張敬軒 Hins Cheung

Its been a long time since I have looked up Hins Cheung’s new music. Funny enough he is rather underrated since he went onto the music scene fairly quietly and had a few hits but no one really knows him that well (at least in my circle of friends). This one oddly popped up my recommended videos recently. Somehow I found it rather catchy. The story is well portrayed in the music video as well. The lyrics are decent as well.

隆里电丝 Lonely Dance – KEY.L刘聪/ICE杨长青/盛宇DamnShine/Ricky

My latest variety watch is the latest season of The Rap of China Season 4 or something. I’m not an avid watcher of this variety show but this season is a competition of the best of the best or something so some pretty cool competitors in competition show. While I don’t really share a ton of variety show stuff, this one did get released as a single by one of the performers here but I still prefer the performance version more, mostly because I really do like ICE as a rapper and the whole guitarist Ricky is a super nice addition. Its a fun funky rap song which is kind of how I like hip hop music or just the fact that rap itself can be incorporated into so many different styles of music. This is a great example of it.

最後一堂課 Graduation – Eric Chou 周興哲
(“Mom, Don’t Do That!” End Theme)

I’m not sure if people actually watch Taiwanese series, even if they are Netflix series but I’ve had my eyes on them for a while and slowly catching up with it. The recent release of Mom, Don’t Do That! Is where this song is from. I do like Eric Chou quite a bit as well and he is diving into acting as he takes a cameo role in the series. The song does match certain parts of the series pretty well.

That’s it for this Music Obsessions!

Music Obsessions – May 2022

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Welcome to this month’s Music Obsessions! I think the big takeaway from April is that I survived yet another year of it! This year was especially challenging. Luckily, there was two newly added TV show on Netflix for a fun Chinese Drama with a decent soundtrack and a martial arts world newly released Tencent one and a new singing variety show that launched very recently which provided me lots of music to share plus bringing back a lot of nostalgia for Cantopop classics.

Facade 被人 – Joker Xue 薛之谦

For a modern series based on the esports world, Falling Into Your Smile isn’t exactly the best of its recent batch using this setting but the soundtrack for this one still is pretty fun. Of course, I’ve shared a bunch of Joker Xue songs in these Music Obsessions. Its rare to see him doing songs for a TV series OST but this song really blends well with the series. I love his voice and the song itself is pretty good.

Soulmate 第一默契 – Xu Kai 许凯 & Cheng Xiao 程潇
(“Falling Into Your Smile” Ending Theme)

Continuing on with the soundtrack for Falling Into Your Smile, it seems suitable to add in at least one of the theme songs especially since it includes a duet from the two main leads which had pretty good chemistry. It brings me back to when I was talking about Cheng Xiao earlier this year when I shared the duet for The World of Fantasy. This music video also captures the TV series pretty well especially the romantic chemistry element. This time, Xu Kai is a much more seasoned actor so probably in terms of singing its not quite as good but it still captures the vibe of the show.

无双 Wu Shuang – Liu Yuning

The latest Chinese series to land on Netflix is Who Rules The World which actually is getting some pretty impressive ratings as its airing in China right now. It probably has to do with the main leads Yang Yang and Lusi Zhao who are in a lot of TV series which has pretty high profile. However, its nice to see them in this sort of martial arts/fantasy world where they do fit so very well together. The script itself is done really well and the chemistry behind them including the world building is so far is good. Plus, the main theme here is by one of my fave up and coming singers, Yuning Liu. I mean, I share a ton of his music here already.

Infinity and Beyond 声生不息 – Performance Favorites

One of my favorite music variety shows to land this while is Infinity and Beyond. In commemoration of the 25 years of Hong Kong Handover, the show invites both Mainland China and Hong Kong singers to group together in men and women team in a competition format ranging from new to veteran singers to battle against each other. Every competition evening includes 2 top choices along with the winning team and audience performance which will eventually be compiled to a soundtrack for the show at the end. Its a pretty neat idea especially since it takes a lot of the Hong Kong classics and gives it a new life for the newer generation. Plus, most of the show doesn’t feel like a competition and just a bunch of good and great singers gathered together to share some good performances. It was pretty hard to narrow down what I liked since there’s quite a few but I didn’t want to overload everyone since a lot of this has to do with nostalgia.

初恋 First Love – Mike Tsang 曾比特

卡拉永远ok Forever Karaoke – 魔动闪霸

海阔天空 Boundless Oceans Vast Skies – Women Team With Audience

That’s it for this month’s Music Obsessions!
What have you been listening to lately?

Schemes in Antiques (古董局中局, 2021)

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Schemes in Antiques (古董局中局, 2021)

Director: Derek Kwok

Cast: Jiayin Lei, Xian Li, Zhilei Xin, You Ge, Tao Guo, Mei Yong

Adapted from Ma Boyong’s novel of the same name, the film tells the story of a series of adventures that occurred when the descendants of the five veins made a wish to find out the truth about the Buddha head of Wu Zetian Mingtang in the Tang Dynasty. – IMDB

It’s always nice to have a film that delivers exactly what it says. Literally. Schemes in Antiques is exactly a plot revolving schemes in antiques. This Chinese film is a treasure hunt adventure which touches on a little bit of Chinese history and antiques. While the structure of the plot isn’t exactly novel, the approach using the Chinese antiques and following the characters to solve the puzzles to go to the next clue to find the elusive Buddha head that caused the main character’s family history to be tainted, leaving him in the undignified state that he lives in. There are secrets and twists and adventure plus a bit of family drama in the backstory that works well together.

Schemes in Antiques may seem like very straightforward just from its title alone and probably taking away a bit of the mystery itself. However, it has its own sort of fun elements. Its a plot which centers around a race to finding the truth behind this artifact that was supposed given to Japan but turns out to be fake. As two descendants go on this hunt, their different strengths lead them in different pacings on the trail. Both of these two characters have their own family legacies to fight for with the main character Xu Yuan having a much more direct motive: to find out the truth behind whether his ancestors did disgrace their family name.

The cast itself is pretty decent. The main character, Xu Yuan played by Jiayin Lei is pretty well-casted. While I haven’t seen this actor other than in variety shows, he does capture this role which floats between the constantly drunk electronic store owner with an exceptional antique knowledge living in the shadows of his disgraced family name from his grandfather and the neglect from his own father. However, his encounter with the daughter of one of the members of the antique society becomes an alliance that takes them for quite the dangerous adventure. In a film full of men, this character shines out played by Zhilei Xin who has her own motives to prove that a woman can also amount to purpose to break his father’s old-fashioned mindset. Their competition or opposition is played by Xian Li, the only cast here that I am familiar with especially after his burst of fame after Chinese TV drama series Go Go Squid! (one of my absolute favorite Chinese series as a side note) which has opened up the doors to a huge variety of roles in the past few years. He captures this role pretty well as his character straddles a line throughout as someone with ulterior motives but remains relatively mysterious right up to the end.

Overall, Hong Kong director and screenwriter Derek Kwok’s venture into the China market with this film is a pretty fun one. The runtime is a little wild at over 2 hours and at times feels a little lengthy but the adventure and action is pretty well done and adds in a little bit of comedy, which primarily is in the beginning. The film does build up a certain level of tension by the end and adds a decent twist to the plot in terms of character and the treasure hunt turnout for this antique. With a decent cast and a focus on the Chinese history and adventure based on some puzzle-oriented clues with some Chinese origins as well, it gives the film a unique angle to a fairly basic treasure hunt adventure film.

*Screener provided by Taro PR*

Music Obsessions – October 2021

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Welcome to this month’s music obsessions! The past month has been quite interesting. Looking back, there hasn’t been a lot of new music that I’ve discovered since I’ve been watching a lot of variety shows and stand-up comedy shows. However, fret not, just enough fun music to share this time around! As usual, some fun extras from variety show Singing With Legends at the end.

Let’s go!

不超级的马里奥 Mario Is Not A Superman – Ma Ye 马也

I love funky music like this that plays on video games or other pop culture stuff in their own twist. The whole song has some really fun lyrics about how Mario isn’t super in his pursuit for Princess Peach and whatnot which breaks the norm and its fairly entertaining over with its rhythm and music.

你不適合兩個人 You Aren’t Suitable for Two People – Sunnee 楊芸晴

While I never followed Rocket Girls 101 much, I actually do like Sunnee a lot whether its from her appearances in variety shows or her performance ability. I’ve been going back to listen to some of her singles and they all are pretty good. This is her latest single (I think) and while the music video has some awkward overacting, the song itself is pretty good. The whole thing is pretty simple but somehow Sunnee’s voice is one that I find so soothing to listen to.

違背的青春 Against Youth – Joker Xue 薛之謙

I don’t really actively follow Joker Xue’s music normally but whenever his music pops up wherever I always end up searching up the music since his voice is very unique mostly for how he sings. This time its from the new season of Singing With Legends where he performs this song. The performance itself is also pretty good (even if something funny happens) but there’s nothing better than sharing the original so here we go! Its also a different song from previous songs that I’ve shared before of Joker Xue’s songs as its not about love but more about youth and life itself.

不良少年 High School Punk- Lil Ghost小鬼王琳凯

I’ve shared a good few Lil Ghost’s songs at this point. Its pretty nice to see that as he develops his music career, he has proved that he is a great rapper and hip hop artist but also equally capable in other styles of music. The last few songs that he’s released has broken away from the usual hip hop style from when he started and has changed slowly but its always very upbeat and fun songs.

Pull Up- Panthepack

Panthepack has definitely been releasing their song’s very regularly now. The last few weeks had a few new releases. Jackson Wang creating this hip hop group really is quite interesting especially after I recognized the other three artists. One of them being more familiar as he was a mentor in Listen Up Season 1. Either way, their songs and music videos have pretty decent budget behind it and really good production value. I do like this one a lot as it does feature a lot of different hip hop artists from the Chinese entertainment industry in the video. Plus, its super upbeat and full of positive and happy vibes. Its like the joy of having fun with friends. Good times overall.

Extras from Variety Show “Singing With Legends Season 3”

I absolutely love the Chinese variety show Singing with Legends. At Season 3, this season has some of my favorite singers gathered together so suffice to say, I can’t give up a chance to share some of George Lam’s duets. Both songs are basically Hong Kong classics. The favorite is a mesh of Danny Chan’s song with a little snippet from Rod Stewart’s Sailing. Its a great new rendition.

The second is from their performance after the group’s have been formed in A Team for George Lam and Fox Hu. George Lam is one of my favorite singers even if I don’t listen all time. This song of his is one of my easily Top 5 favorite songs ever. This rendition definitely didn’t disappoint. Its hard to imagine that George Lam is 74 years old and still sings so incredibly good.

That’s it for this Music Obsessions!
What have you been listening to recently?

Music Obsessions – September 2021

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September is here! Next Music Obsessions is here as the first weekend arrives! This month has been a decent mix. Its mostly songs that I’ve found through different variety shows and TV series. Considering there’s a lot of variety shows I’m watching that are music-oriented, so its pretty fun overall.

我只能離開 I Can Only Leave – Renzhong Yan 顏人中

While I have my opinions on Chinese drama A Little Thing Called First Love and should get a TV binge out for it at some point this coming month, this song is really good. I always catch music by Renzhong Yan here and there but never can pinpoint his music specifically. However, I do like his voice overall. Its pretty unique. Plus, this song worked really well in the series in terms of the lyrics so it was a memorable one.

3189 – 焦迈奇 Maiqi Jiao

3189 is an absolutely unique song. The most random song ever if anything right from the lyrics to the music video itself. Something about getting sleep back and happiness and a bunch of odd things and yet, somehow there’s this very catchy element of all the conversation where it feels somehow relevant to what its about as it pulls in Mary Had A Little Lamb but a flipped version of it but its all about trying to go to sleep, counting sheep and stuff..at least that’s my interpretation but then its a little bit more and somehow I find some of it feels relatable. Its just really random and I like odd stuff so this is right up my alley.

With that said, I found this while watching the cover from the performance on “Call My By Fire” by one of my fave groups there with Jordan Chan, Michael Tse, Jerry Lamb, Julian Cheung, Edmond Leung, all big names in Hong Kong. Either way, you can find their performance here also which has a pretty fun twist to it.

The Oath of Love 余生，请多指教- Andy Yang 杨紫 & Sean Xiao 肖战
(Tencent TV series “The Oath of Love” Main Theme)

The Oath of Love finally is launching on Tencent in September. Consider me happy. Big fan of the two main leads who also sings this duet. This duet makes me anticipate the series even more as they seem to have fantastic chemistry. Maybe finally have a series that will follow the wonderful dynamic of the leads following Go Go Squid!. I’m getting carried away but nice sweet song overall.

再見，少年 Farewell, My Lad – 梁靜茹 Fish Leong
(“Farewell, My Lad” Main Theme)

I honestly think that Farewell, My Lad is the upcoming film that will be a family of stories that follows Better Days. I mean, look at the typography they use. Either way, just a small thought on this new Chinese film. I’m hoping that this film will be available. Big fan of Fish Leong. She’s probably one of my top 5 favorite female singers and this song is just so good. I do think the whole scenes from the film does fit the song a lot also.

Let’s Do This! – Cacien Team
(“Girls Like Us” Performance)

I usually don’t post up performances for any of the variety shows as their own part but most of my playlist right now is from performances from “Girls Like Us” Chinese female hip hop competition. Cacien’s group is very unique and the songs that they make is super positive. This performance is pretty good plus the song makes me feel happy so its a good one to wrap up this month’s music obsessions.

That’s it for this Music Obsessions!
What have you been listening to?