Director: Tsui Hark

Starring: Angelica Lee, Isabella Leung, Cheng Chang, Guo Xiao-Dong

Featuring: Tony Leung Ka-Fai

Hey! Remember when Tsui Hark was considered a vital film-maker and you looked forward to his latest project? Yep, I do too, and that’s why this film feels like it’s (pardon the pun) missing a certain something.

Like most of Tsui’s movies, Missing is technically well-made. The cinematography and editing are top-notch — this is indeed a gorgeous film to look at — and the acting isn’t bad either. But it really feels like Tsui was on auto-pilot here and is just doing the cinematic equivalent of painting by numbers.

The story seems like it could have been something so much more, with Angelica Lee playing a woman who takes to using psychotropic drugs to see her dead fiancee in order to solve the mystery of his death. But there are so many lame false endings and unbelievable plot twists thrown out that it comes off like Tsui was pulling a Wong Jing by using the “flying paper” style of film-making — i.e., just trying to come up with something interesting when you have little to work with.

Sometimes, this schizophrenic method can work, but when one of your plot twists involves the phrase “it was just a dream”, you know you’ve run into an artistically bankrupt work. The beautiful mise-en-scene can only take Missing so far, especially in the crowded world of Chinese ghost movies. If you’re a huge fan of the genre or Tsui Hark, then you might want to check this out. The key word being “might”.

Film Review By: Martin Alton

You can buy this DVD at: www.hongkong-store.com