Movie Review: SDU: Sex Duties Unit/飛虎出征

aka Gaydar Speed TrapAfter the success of his last film, a lot of people were looking forward to Pang Ho Cheung’s next movie with anticipation.

Pang Ho Cheung has contributed significantly to the current state of local cinema; he has almost single-handedly created a small but significant space in which a film can be both Category III and critically acceptable as well as commercially successful ( Love in a Puff, Dream Home, Vulgaria).

I usually enjoy his movies more symbolically than implicitly; I appreciate the idea that his movies exist more than I appreciate the movies themselves.

I am glad not only that he attempts the films he does, but that the films get made. If the films aren’t necessarily cinematic gems, at least they are .

I realize that’s probably not very clear.

Trivial Matters wasn’t a great film, but it was a very interesting one, and it was (and is) different than most of the other HK films I see.

So was Exodus.

All of his films are relatively unusual, and that’s probably what I appreciate most about them.

I enjoyed more for what it did than what it was.

A resolutely local, profane, and sexually deviant film, it thumbed its nose at the Big Red Market, which is not an easy risk to take.

But it paid off, as ended up one of the highest-grossing domestic films of 2012.

So now we have the follow-up:

The story of four B-Team SDU cops who go to Macau for a little horizontal refreshment, the movie is a light-hearted comedy that aims to please as well as titillate. 

“We won’t be late for them!”

It is, after all, Category III. 

But I will say that the rating is far and away because of the profanity and the sex.

There’s no full-frontal nudity.

The movie has no mosaic. I promise.

We see none of ‘the hair down there.’

Dammit.

Why do you think they call them public hairs?!?

But there’s a lot of other prurient entertainment going on.

Suddenly all that math revision becomes useful.

Like all of his recent films, Pang’s use of profane (and therefore highly realistic) dialogue is a lot of fun to watch, if only because it is not a frequent occurrence. 

“F@#$ you, you f@#$in’ f@#$!”

So we’ve got foul language. 

That said, it is draped over a story that is neither very interesting nor entertaining.

Like  Vulgaria.

Both films rely on, and entertain with, very funny dialogue and situations that certainly made me laugh a lot.

But those situations don’t enhance the story; they are substitutes for it.

The characters developed themselves, but the narrative struck me as lazy; the stereotypical innocent/new hooker (with a heart of gold) meme was trotted out without even a cursory effort at selling it.

Pun intended.

Lau On Ki is good in the role, but it helped her that she didn’t have to work very hard.

Chapman To is funny, but he’s playing Chapman To. 

We who are about to eat salute you.

Derek Tsang and Matt Chow are both funny and engaging, in ways I would rather that you see for yourself. 

What’s she doing back there?

Shawn Yue Man Lok’s character was supposedly an ABC from Boston.

“F@#$in’ Red Sawx…”

But there was nothing to either explain or flesh out that detail. It just got tossed around. 

Simon Lui was surprisingly restrained and appreciable, and I really enjoyed his scenes.

Married life suits him.

Jim Chim is as annoying as ever, and I was hoping he’d get raped by a shark.

In real life.

“I annoy; therefore I am.”

But never mind that. 

Pang Ho Cheung certainly deserves to congratulate himself for Vulgaria‘s success, and so his referencing that film in   SDU: Sex Duties Unit/飛虎出征 is understandable.

I have nothing against self parody or self-reference, but when you do it three times in the same movie… you just might be Scud.

Speaking of gay movies…

It’s a tough call sometimes in this ‘postmodern’ age when irony gets bandied about as a virtue.

It has long been debated whether or not ‘ironic’ depictions of problematic behavīor such as racism, misogyny or homophobia do or do not in fact constitute the very things they claim to lampoon.

Quentin Tarantino can say that his liberal use of racial slurs is meant to parody and impugn racism, but I’m not convinced.

Especially since he doesn’t make fun of Jews. But I digress.

It’s nice to see a movie where the dialogue and characters are realistic. 

A gay character in SDU: Sex Duties Unit/飛虎出征, after coming out to his ‘friends,’ is constantly joked to because of (and about) his orientation.

It seemed the jokes were mean to convey some sense of acceptance by his colleagues.

But there was always ‘one more’ joke.

The film seems to be open-minded but I am not so sure.

It’s a thin line between parody and endorsement.

“Tell me about it!”

Maybe it was supposed to be inclusive.

Maybe it struck me as simply tasteless and sad.

But that’s an easy thing for me to say only if I find the portrayals of Mainland sex workers equally problematic.

And I can’t say that I do.

Maybe because making fun of the ‘Northern mushrooms’ isn’t a running gag.

But so what?

Like almost all of his previous movies, I can honestly say that I enjoy the fact that  Sex Duties Unit/飛虎出征 exists much more than the film itself.

If that’s a back-handed compliment, then so be it.

I sincerely am glad the film is out there, even if I didn’t enjoy it as much as I had hoped.