Feeling kind of bored on Tuesday night, I decided to head over to Causeway Bay to catch Lau Ching Wan’s new film, Mad Detective. The movie was directed by long time collaborators Johnnie To and Wai Ka Fai, who have created some of my favorite contemporary Hong Kong films. While they often take on different genres, there’s always something quirky about their work that I like.

An entertaining, intricately woven morality tale, Mad Detective represents a significant triumph for the two directors. Here Johnnie To and Wai Ka Fai have perfected a kind of concept they have been dabbling with for a decade. Not only were they able to pull off employing challenging sub-scenarios within the film, they made these complex devices both gripping and moving. This was not lazy filmmaking. (more…)