Full Throttle

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An excellent underground motos races movie highlighted by a deeper background theme

Full Throttle is not an A Moment Of Romance like Andy Lau Tak-Wah's movie at all. Andy lives a romance with Gigi Leung Wing-Kei alright, but firstly this romanceis treated in very sober and manner and without cliché, and secondly the movie is way more centered on Joe's character and psychological state. The film spawned a sequel a few years later : Legend Of Speed, in which the cars replace Full Throttle's motorbikes. Because just like its sequel depicted the car tuning wave, FT is a symbol of a whole generation of underground bikers racing on streets, in the middle of the night or in the wee small hours.

The movie narrates the story of Joe (Andy Lau) who is the unchallenged number 1 of illegal motorbike street races in Hong-Kong. However when David Kwan (David Ng Dai-Wai), a spoiled child coming back from Europe, arrives in town, in spite of the fact that he bonds with Joe, he doesn't resist to the will of challenging him. But during their race, Joe skids at 200 kmph on a can in a dangerous bend and escapes by a hair's-breadth to death. His girlfriend (Gigi Leung) who wish never to see him race again, is going to face Joe's will for revenge, but the fear of the road and of its dangers isn't something to undervalue, that's a lesson that Joe's gonna learn.

The film treats before everything of the man and his will to go further, higher, faster...Why do they race ? Why risking your life like that for self-satisfaction only ? Does men need to go beyond their bounds ? Such questions are asked here. And the bar owner (very well played by Elvis Tsui Kam-Kong) ventures to answer when Andy asks him "I don't really need to race, then why am I doing it ?", he answers "You don't really need your fancy clothes and still you're right to wear it". And even if the final moral is more ambiguous, Derek Yee Tung-Sing seems to show his admiration for men and the challenges they impose on themselves, you understand that men have gone beyond his animal needs and that if the Egypt Pyramides, la Joconde or the Lord Of The Rings have been made, it's for the same reason that push Joe to race against the wind, to go beyond his needs and grow through his passion.

Andy Lau is uneven, he shows a real immersion into his character during scenes like those with his father or everything following the accident and draws a pretty good general performance but still "fail" in a few other scenes. Gigi Leung, despite her young age, truly amazes, she wonderfully wedges in this young woman rather introverted and neglected role. Chin Kar-Lok is also efficient and play this dare-devil faultlessly. But the palm goes to David Wu, an actor unfortunately too rare, who shows a laid-back attitude and a simpleness quite enjoyable and who really brings some coolness rather infrequent among hong-kongese actors, he seems to be himself and to live the dialogues without any more pretension, and given that the role can be taken that way, it works great.

Derek Yee's visual direction is extremely effective, he gives us several very well-made shots during the motorbike races, and he even does really great with the scene following just after the wreck where Andy Lau, unable to move, observes his friends and the first-aider taking care of him, all of this covered by a strange ritual music and punctuated with flashbacks (the famous movie of your life that unreel before your eyes). And also in the great scene when Andy gets back on a bike for the first time since the accident and everything starts to stretch and the only sound he can hear is his own heartbeat...really tense.

In Brief, this motorbike film almost generationnal, despite crushing the box-office back then, reveals to be an excellent movie quite swinging thanks to a few races very well-filmed an a background theme most interesting. Actors are good and music is an incontrovertible one. You'd have understood, Full Throttle is acutely recommended !...