Producers: John Chong and Wilson Yip   Director:  Soi Cheang   Screenplay: Au Kin-Yee Au, Chan Tai-Lee, Jack Lai Chun and Shum Kwan-Sin   Cast: Louis Koo, Raymond Lam, Terrance (Chun-Him) Lau, Philip Ng, Richie Jen, German Cheung, Tony Tsz-Tung Wu, Tak-Bun Wong, Fish Liew, Wan Ching Won, Kenny Wong, Cecilia Choi and Sammo Kam-Bo Hung   Distributor: Well Go USA

Grade: B

A martial arts epic set in a sprawling but claustrophobic environment, Soi Cheang’s “Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In” is long and convoluted but extraordinarily stylish and viscerally exciting.  The locale is Kowloon, the erstwhile fortress in Hong Kong that became a lawless, densely populated enclave controlled by triad gangs for much of the latter part of the twentieth century.  The plot, adapted by a quartet of scriptwriters from the novel “City of Darkness” by Yu-Yi (Yu Wing Leung) with a nod to the manhwa of the same name illustrated by Andy Seto, revolves around struggles for control among gang leaders in the years preceding the British turnover of Hong Kong to the Chinese mainland government that was completed in 1997.

The background is set out economically in an action-filled opening explaining how Jim (Aaron Kwok), the former criminal overlord of the Kowloon realm, was overthrown in a war led by other triad leaders, who assumed joint control after his fall.  The senior partner is Cyclone (Louis Koo), whose headquarters is his barber shop; his army includes his lieutenant Shin (Terrance Lau), who’s good with a motorcycle; Twelfth Master (Tony Wu), who wields a mean sword; and AV (German Cheung), a kickboxer who hides his scarred face with heavy bandages and tends to the wounded.  Cyclone maintains good relations with other leaders, most notably Dik Chau (Richie Jen), whose family was killed by Jim and is intent on taking revenge on the dead leader’s son, who survived the war but has never been identified. 

One boss stands apart from the others: bellicose Mr. Big (Sammo Hung), a drug lord who schemes to acquire property in the cramped, multi-tiered enclave with the intention of selling it at a profit to the incoming Chinese government.  His lieutenant is King (Philip Ng), a flamboyant fighter who’s endowed with “spirit powers” that render him virtually impervious to injury.  A small army of soldiers with varied loyalties add to the mix, which is almost exclusively male, though there are a few women, mostly prostitutes who are often brutalized by their clients; the most noticeable is Fanny (Fish Liew), whose little daughter (Wan Ching Won) tears up over the violence she witnesses.

Into this tense, volatile mix of warriors and frenemies comes Chan Lok-kwan (Raymond Lam), a desperate young man in need of an ID card to remain in Hong Kong.  When Mr. Big stiffs him in a deal to get him the document, he steals a bag of what he thinks is money from the boss; it actually contains drugs, and brings down King and his comrades on him.  But Chan makes it into Kowloon, where he’s taken up by Cyclone and, after some initial resistance, his three top guys.  Of course, Chan’s real identity eventually comes out—you can guess who he is—and Chau goes ballistic, bringing chaos that Mr. Big is happy to take advantage of. 

In the ensuing mayhem Chan is injured and lies wounded for a long while, but all the others are very active, including Cyclone and Mr. Big, who face off against each other in a knockdown battle.  But the big finale is the one in which Chan, Shin, Twelfth Master and AV join forces to take on the apparently invincible King, whose supernatural powers appear unassailable.  That battle goes on in a light bulb-festooned square dominated by the so-called Dragon Throne, through the multi-storied ghettos, across rooftops and fire escapes until finally the way to short-circuit King’s advantage is revealed—purely by accident. 

That’s just the most spectacular of the martial-arts sequences choreographed by Kenji Tanigaki and his team which are executed by the cast, many of them legendary stars of the genre, with amazing facility and edited by Cheung Ka-fai with vigor.  (He and Cheang handle the intervening non-action scenes solemnly, however, which while perhaps necessary to keep the complicated plot coherent, does make for some heavy going.)  Though Lam, to be honest, makes a rather bland hero, the older contingent is fantastic, and his three young comrades are all charismatic, each in his own way.  Best of all is Ng, whose preening, over-the-top King sports a malicious cackle that would make Tommy Udo envious. 

And the action is staged against a background that’s equally extravagant.  Mak Kwok keung’s production design creates a world of dark corners, tight corridors and buildings constructed atop one another that’s rich in detail (there’s a dedication to the late Bruce Yu for “image design”), at once monumental and stifling.  Cinematographer Cheng Siu- keung uses it lovingly in his widescreen visuals, while Kenji Kawai contributes an energetic score that wouldn’t be out of place in a typical Hollywood blockbuster.

A caption at the close informs us that the criminal enclave was demolished by the British colonial regime in 1993, before Hong Kong was transferred to the Chinese government.  But while the historical Kowloon might be gone, we’ll always have Cheang’s outrageously exhilarating evocation of it.

Producers: Patrick Ewald, Shaked Berenson, Andreas Wentz, Nicolas Veinberg, Steven P. Wegner, Robin Jonas and Jonathan E. Lim  Director: David Schurmann   Screenplay: Kristen Lazarian and Paulina Lagudi   Cast: Jean Reno, Adriana Barraza, Alexia Moyano, Nicolás Francella, Rochi Hernández, Juan José Garnica, Pedro Urizzi, Amanda Magalhães, Maurício Xavier, Pedro Caetano, Thalma de Freitas, Ravel Cabral and Duda Galvão   Distributor: Roadside Attractions

Grade:  B

Nice, sweet, touching, uplifting and fun—all apply to this easygoing tale of a reclusive Brazilian man rejuvenated by rescuing a wayward penguin that becomes attached to him.  Fortunately another word—cloying—doesn’t, even if manipulative does.  David Schurmann’s “My Penguin Friend” might be the best 1950s Disney live-action family film that Disney never made.

It’s based on an extraordinary true story: in 2011 retiree João Perei de Souza, living in a Brazilian coastal community, found a Magellanic penguin that had been caught up in an oil slick.  He carefully cleaned off the bird’s feathers, nursed it back to health, and released it back into the sea.  The following year it returned from its home in Patagonia, five thousand miles away, and remained with its rescuer, who’d named it Dindim after a child’s mispronunciation of penguim (the Portuguese word for penguin) for several months before departing again.  This back-and-forth continued for eight years.  (In 2020 Alayne Kay Christian published a children’s book with illustrations by Milanka Reardon, “An Old Man and His Penguin,” about the duo, while videos and documentaries spread word about them.)

That’s the story that inspired screenwriters Kristen Lazarian and Paulina Lagudi and director Schurmann, who have given the strange but simple tale a dramatic (some would say melodramatic) arc for the screen.  But the centerpiece remains the relationship between the old man and the bird.

In this telling, João is introduced as a virile young fisherman (played by Pedro Urizzi) happily married to Maria (Amanda Magalhães).  Their young son Miguel (Juan José Garnica) begs his father to take him out on his boat—it’s the kid’s birthday—and João reluctantly agrees.  But a storm suddenly arises, the boat capsizes, and the boy drowns. 

Decades later João (now played by Jean Reno) remains heartbroken, refusing to have much to do with his neighbors, even old friends like Oscar (Maurício Xavier, played in his younger days by Pedro Caetano).  Maria (now Adriana Barraza) remains loving and supportive but pained by her husband’s morose reclusiveness.  When he carries the penguin home from the ocean, she’s astonished by his insistence about caring for it, and even mildly annoyed by his giving it the run of their home. 

But the change of attitude she sees in him is gratifying.  Without belaboring the fact, it’s clear that Dindim, as it’s named by little local girl Lucia (Duda Galvão), becomes a stand-in for the dead Miguel—it even waddles among the mementos left in the room his parents have kept in his memory—and the bird’s presence breaks down the shell João’s built around himself.  He’s actually jovial and convivial again.  And once Dindim’s annual routine of departure and return becomes apparent, he remains that way: the penguin is a friend, not a pet, he explains to those who ask, and he does what he wants.

Dindim’s time in Ilha Grande dominates the film, with footage of the bird’s waddling through the streets to the smiles of passersby or causing mischief in the house that it’s made a home away from home. But those sequences are contrasted with the periods the bird spends with its colony back in Patagonia, where it’s observed by a research team—Adriana (Alexia Moyano), Carlos (Nicolás Francella) and Stephanie (Rocío Hernández).  When they hear about the penguin that reappears each year in Brazil, they investigate whether it might be one of theirs (Adriana is hopeful, Carlos dismissive) and when they learn it is, ask journalist Paulo (Ravel Cabral) to track João down; he’s instrumental in publicizing the story.  But there’s a hitch: the team’s superiors want Dindim brought in for further study, and that results in an accident that requires a distraught João to enlist Oscar and the other fishermen to go out into rough waters to rescue the bird again.                               

Truth be told, that entire part of the film doesn’t work, not only because the Patagonian scenes are stilted and forced, haltingly acted (the dialogue sounds badly dubbed), but because it interrupts the much more affecting material.  Reno brings depth to João, navigating his emotional transitions with admirable sensitivity and interacting with the penguins—ten of them, according to the credits—like a proud father.  Barraza brings strength to Maria, and the rest of the cast add to the ambience without overwhelming the story with local color. 

That’s provided by the visuals—the production design by Mercedes Alfonsín and especially the lovely widescreen cinematography by Anthony Dod Mantle, who gets a bit cute when he employs a fish-eye lens as a sort of Pengy Cam to suggest seeing things from Dindim’s perspective.  Schurmann and editor Teresa Font can’t be accused of rushing things—the movie does move slowly, which might be a drawback for youngsters accustomed to a more frantic pace in their entertainment; but the only real irritant is the score by Fernando Velázquez, which too often opts for either cutesiness, or overemphasis, or both. 

At least in the print seen for this review, incidentally, the final credits give the film’s original title, “The Penguin & the Fisherman.”