...Or the Highway: I Did It My Way (2024) Review

Director: Jason Kwan

Notable Cast: Andy Lau, Gordon Lam, Eddie Peng, Liu Yase, Simon Yam, Lam Suet, Kent Cheng Jak-Si, Philip Keung Ho-Man, Hedwig Tam Sin-Yin, Kevin Chu, Terrance Lau, Tony Ho, Angie Cheung Wai-Yee

 

Even though the films Chasing the Dragon and Chasing the Dragon II: Wild Wild Bunch received an overall mixed reception, co-director Jason Kwan became a new director I was excited to follow. Although those films certainly had their fair share of Wong-Jing-isms to them, which led to audiences having some mixed emotions, they were stylish and highly entertaining. Regarding Hong Kong crime capers, that’s a great foundation on which to build. 

 

For his first solo-directing effort since the Chasing the Dragon duology, cinematographer turned director Jason Kwan tackled very similar subject matter with the oddly titled I Did It My Way. Boasting a stacked cast of A-list talent and featuring a classic Hong Kong crime narrative that bounces between 80s heroic bloodshed and a more modern Chinese blockbuster, I Did It My Way will very much appeal on the surface to fans of the genre. Even with a somewhat muddled narrative and some melodramatic punches that don’t quite land, it never ceases to be an entertaining romp carried by its powerhouse dual leads. 

 

Chasing the Dragon II: Wild Wild Bunch (2019)

Directors: Wong Jing, Jason Kwan

Notable Cast: Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Louis Koo Tin-Lok, Gordon Lam Ka-Tung, Sabrina Qiu Lu-Fan, Willie Wai Kar-Hung, Jason Wong Chung-Fung, Simon Yam, Du Jiang, Candice Yu On-On

One of the most beautiful and baffling things about Hong Kong and more recently Mainland Chinese cinema is their ability to embrace the thematic franchise. A franchise doesn’t need to inherently share characters or plot lines and for the longest time, HK has done it best – expressly in their action franchises. When the first Chasing the Dragon film became a relative success, thanks mostly to a unique performance by Donnie Yen as the villain and Andy Lau to parallel his story, it wasn’t all that shocking that its sequel would be a thematic one. Instead of a drug kingpin in the '70s, Chasing the Dragon II: Wild Wild Bunch tells the ‘based on a true story’ of a '90s kidnapping mogul and the undercover cop set to unravel his massive money-making schemes. Once again, the film is powered on the sheer skill of two brilliant actors, Tony Leung and Louis “I’m in every film” Koo, and the combination of its cast with another easy to consume slab of crime entertainment does have its merits. Wild Wild Bunch is infectiously enjoyable in a way that betrays its obvious mainstream pandering and occasionally overzealous style. Partner that with the scene devouring performances and Wild Wild Bunch is borderline criminal in its entertaining qualities.