

Director: Alexi Tan
Cast: Liu Ye, Daniel Wu, Zhang Zhen, Tony Yang, Sun Hong Lei, Shu Qi

This film is the closing film for Venice Film Festival 2007. Yes, *this* year!

I can't believe this ... 
For the first time, we manage to catch the film before Venice's Opening ... 
hee hee ...

The official website (with English)
click
http://www.bloodbrothersthemovie.com/

Synopsis
The story revolves around the fate of three friends (two are brothers and 1 mutual friend) as they depart from their rural hometown in Zhujiajiao to seek a better prospect in Shanghai ...

My thoughts

-- Well, I find myself in a dilemma ... becos I would hope that people support the Chinese cinema. What's more, it has been selected as the closing film for Venice Film Festival this year, not without reasons ... the film boast of a promising cast (Liu Ye, Daniel Wu, Zhang Zhen, Tony Yang, Sun Hong Lei, Shu Qi), a story of potential (modeled after John Woo's Bullet in the Head), dealing with interesting albeit common themes of brotherhood/friendship, trust and betrayal, interwoven with love and romance ... 

-- Frankly, the film has rather nice to look at frames, but somehow when pieced together, the entire story fails to captivate sufficiently inspite of its many turns of events, all cramped tightly into a 96 min film so that you will NOT find it a bore ... it is NOT slow nor boring, it just lacks something ... maybe characterization ... maybe contrast that will swing our emotions ...

Conclusion
It has potentials, but something is amiss.
Watch and decide for yourself