CHONGQING HOTPOT (火锅英雄) (2016)

Genre: Crime/Drama
Director: Yang Qing
Cast: Chen Kun, Bai Baihe, Qin Hao, Yu Entai, Wang Yanling, Yin Fang, Li Jiu Xiao, Zhang Yi Chi
Runtime: 1 hr 39 mins
Rating: PG13 (Some Violence)
Released By: Golden Village Pictures & mm2 Entertainment
Official Website: 

Opening Day: 14 April 2016

Synopsis: Three high school classmates open a hotpot restaurant in an old bomb shelter in Chongqing. The business turns out a glorious failure. They find a buyer for the restaurant, but must first “enlarge the space.” Digging, they emerge in the vault of the bank next doors. Now they must devise a plan to sneak into the bank and fix the hole. Lucky break: a girl they know from high school is working in the bank. Bad break: the bank is a target of some badass robbers. Working with two of China’s biggest stars, director Yang Qing’s 2nd feature after One Night in Supermarket (2009) continues to showcase his talents with plot twists and comic timing. It’s a spicy hot riot.

Movie Review:

Not many viewers in Singapore would be familiar with an unassuming low-budget movie back in 2009 called ‘One Night in Supermarket’, but that cinematic debut by Mainland Chinese filmmaker Yang Qing was a cult hit that got critics excited about ‘the next Ning Hao’. Those notices certainly hasn’t escaped veteran producer Chen Kuo-fu, who has boarded his similarly themed follow-up also set in the city of Chongqing. As the opening voice-over narration informs, it is a place famous for the titular dish of chilli oil, dried chilli and peppercorn served in hole-in-the-wall restaurants within its labyrinth network of underground passages and bomb shelters.

One such eatery is ‘Cave Hot Pot’, owned and operated by longtime chums Liu Bo (Chen Kun), Xu Dong (Qin Hao) and Four Eyes (Yu Entai). Unfortunately for these young entrepreneurs, business has been terrible, so their only hope is to sell off the place to a local businessman who owns a chain of such restaurants in the city. In order to make the sale more favourable, the trio attempt a DIY expansion using jackhammers without so much as a permit, leading them to stumble upon an adjacent bank vault. Whereas a more conventional narrative might see their friendship tested over how to divide the loot amongst themselves, the protagonists here are flawed but righteous – meaning that instead of stealing the money, their intention is to find a way to seal the hole they breached.

Just so happens that their former middle-school classmate Yu Xiaohui (Bai Baihe) works at the bank, but the disgruntled employee abused by her fellow co-worker Miss Zhang (Xia Tian) and derided by her supervisor (Song Wenxin) decides to take the plan one step further and suggests that they rob her company at the same time. Yet as we’ve learnt from the pre-credits scene, these hapless heroes will run into a gang of vicious animal-masked bank robbers aiming for the same loot. No thanks to their wheelman being discovered by a policeman on patrol duty, these professional criminals are also desperate for another way out of the joint, which inexorably leads them to the hole at the back of the vault.

That confrontation forms the backbone of a surprisingly violent third act – not only does Liu Bo get punched repeatedly in the face until his left eye gets swollen shut, he is also slashed across the face and kicked repeatedly in the gut – which recalls Park Chan-wook’s ‘Old Boy’ trilogy as well as the many Korean gangster thrillers that have tried to follow in its footsteps. Yet what sets Yang’s genre addition apart is his ability to wring genuine sentiment from his core quartet of working-class folks, all of whom are struggling in their own ways against the vicissitudes of their respective lives. Xu Dong has an insecure wife he has to placate every now and then on the phone, while Four Eyes still harbours a lifelong ambition of chasing his dreams in Beijing.

Most poignantly, Liu Bo’s gambling addiction leaves him deep in debt with a local loan shark Brother Seven (Chen Nuo), which in turn places his grandparents whom he lives with in harm’s way. His desperation also threatens to unravel his friendship with both longtime buddies, neither of which wish to be implicated in a serious case of theft. Yu’s entry not only makes it less of a male-dominated affair, but also adds a fresh texture to the web of relationships by letting her and Liu Bo rekindle their high school feelings for each other – and a love letter that she wrote for him back when they were still in school becomes a key narrative device that would decide both their fates.

The mix of elements from comedy to drama to action does make for some abrupt tonal shifts, but like the dish from which it draws its name, ‘Chongqing Hot Pot’ serves up a tasty if somewhat jarring and uneven blend of flavours. If anything, Yang captures the vibe and energy of the titular location strikingly, a much less affluent but no less buzzing city than the oft-seen Beijing or Shanghai. It isn’t often that we get to see such a vivid portrayal of crime and societal disaffection from Mainland Chinese cinema, which in itself is one more reason to savour this concoction of farce, romance and blood. 

Movie Rating:

(True to the titular dish, this is one tasty if occasionally jarring blend of farce, romance and blood that packs a fiery kick)