An incompetent attempt to abridge a TV series

Chow Yun-Fat, Fong Lui, and Joey Wang in A Hearty Response (1986)

Leslie Cheung and Andy Lau in Shanghai Grand (1996)

Chow Yun-Fat and Andy Lau in God of Gamblers (1989)

Chow Yun-Fat, Leslie Cheung, and Lung Ti in A Better Tomorrow (1986)

Chow Yun-Fat

Ray Lui

Angie Chiu

Kiu-Ying Chan

Siu Fung Koo

After losing everything, a young man rebuilds his life and finds love in 1920s Shanghai -- all while rising to power in an organized crime syndicate.

Chun Keung Chiu

Shang hai tan xu ji

There&apos;s probably some historical value to watching the Bund, since it more or less started Chow Yun Fat&apos;s career, and there might be a good story in there somewhere. But this movie isn&apos;t so much a movie as it is an entire TV series lopped into bite-sized pieces with a butcher knife and stitched together with barbed wire.

Essentially it seems to try and tell the entire story of the series it&apos;s based on (I say based on, but the movie is actually a compilation of scenes from that series, without any original footage that I can tell) in as few scenes as possible. Characters appear and disappear without explanation, musical cues cut out in strange ways, and major plot points seem to be leapfrogged in order to allow the movie to achieve it&apos;s brisk 100 minute length. I could follow the broader story but often didn&apos;t understand the details in any given scene, and any emotional impact it might have carried if told properly was entirely lost as I just tried to keep up.

It&apos;s possible that if seen in its original serial form it&apos;d be worthwhile, though the production quality certainly doesn&apos;t live up to Hong Kong cinema of the time. But given the choice between seeing this movie and not seeing the Bund at all, I&apos;d say the latter is the better option.

Also, shoutout to them using the intro to &quot;Time&quot; by Pink Floyd for suspenseful scenes. I somehow suspect they didn&apos;t have a license for that.

There's probably some historical value to watching the Bund, since it more or less started Chow Yun Fat's career, and there might be a good story in there somewhere. But this movie isn't so much a movie as it is an entire TV series lopped into bite-sized pieces with a butcher knife and stitched together with barbed wire.

Essentially it seems to try and tell the entire story of the series it's based on (I say based on, but the movie is actually a compilation of scenes from that series, without any original footage that I can tell) in as few scenes as possible. Characters appear and disappear without explanation, musical cues cut out in strange ways, and major plot points seem to be leapfrogged in order to allow the movie to achieve it's brisk 100 minute length. I could follow the broader story but often didn't understand the details in any given scene, and any emotional impact it might have carried if told properly was entirely lost as I just tried to keep up.

It's possible that if seen in its original serial form it'd be worthwhile, though the production quality certainly doesn't live up to Hong Kong cinema of the time. But given the choice between seeing this movie and not seeing the Bund at all, I'd say the latter is the better option.

Also, shoutout to them using the intro to "Time" by Pink Floyd for suspenseful scenes. I somehow suspect they didn't have a license for that.

bappamtv

Shang hai tan xu ji

🎭 Top Cast

🎬 Technical Specs

🏷️ Keywords

🎯 Categories

⭐ Featured Review

🎬 More Like This

📖 Synopsis