netwallah Review of Devil Angel

Devil Angel (1995)

Vivian Hsu is lovely in this Hong Kong romantic melodrama (the two other principals are, too)

[6/10 · 31 May 2006]

This disconnected but often attractive Hong Kong romance has one virtue, the presence of model-singer-actress Vivian Hsu, who is very beautiful indeed, and she is surprisingly good at acting, even with a poorly written screenplay and uncertain directing. The general lines of the plot are mixed up, but it goes something like this: the girl, Suen, and boy, Kit, swear to love each other until the end; though they could not arrange to be born together, they can die together. A few years later, as the movie begins, the boy is in trouble because he's bought too many stocks and can't cover them, and so he's ruined. The girl runs to join him and they travel, mostly to resorts, go swimming, take amusement park rides, look happy, and have a lot of pretty sex. A rich and beautiful but ill woman, Hung, sees the boy and falls for him, and her assistants pay the boy to spend a night with her. Throughout the movie there's a recurrent theme of preparing to die together, and images of gunshot death pop up in dreams or waking reveries. It's almost a constant motif. Later, when Kit has been caught and jailed, Suen goes to Hung for help, and she bails him out. Suen, pretending to be Kit's sister, lives with them, even as they get married. She goes through pain and desperation, and as Hung is dying, she sees Kit ready to go with her and despairs. But Hung dies, and she speaks to Kit about a childish love, saying earlier she couldn't imagine living without him, but now she loves life more. "I love you," she says, "and I'm leaving." And she does, smiling. He stays; apparently he loves his dead wife more than his living childhood sweetheart. There are unexplained back-stories and play scenes and repetitions. This melodramatic romance could have been much better if somebody had rewritten the screenplay, but, again, it's nice to see so much of Vivian Hsu.