The Last Dance

I didn't want to go see a movie about a Hong Kong funeral director, but my wife made me go. Sounded boring. But WOW. This is one of those rare movies that can appreciated by all cultures and all age groups. It's a dark comedy that can make you smile or have tears of compassion well up in your eyes -- even as you follow the story in subtitles. I am not familiar with the Chinese actors, I hear that some of them are very well known, and I can see why. They were all brilliant, bringing to live a screenplay that is rich in emotion and drama. Solid editing and post-production work as well. Catch it if you can. Maybe someday it will even be on Netflix!

I snuck into this film expecting absolutely nothing, since I was unaware of even its title. Asians dominated the crowd of 25 matinee, so I figured it was an Asian film. This was such a beautiful experience to have unfold before me. Standup comic Dayo Wong is Dominic. His wedding planning business went bust during Hong Kong Covid. But his girlfriend's retiring Uncle Ming has turned over his half stake in his funeral business to him. The other half is held by Master Man (Michael Hui), a well regarded Taoist priest. MM lives with his ambulance driver daughter Yuet (Michelle Wai) and son Ben, who is continuing the Taoist tradition. Ben in turn has a wife and son. Dom visits often. He implements a lot of wacky money making ideas. But it's also a very dramatic film. The priest performs the "breaking hell's gate" ritual, which liberates dead souls so they can move on, as he did with his own deceased wife. Women are forbidden from such jobs, and Yuet is still holding a grudge. All the characters are very well developed. There are beautiful establishing shots of Hong Kong. I was very moved by the film and there was detectable crying in the audience. I would definitely try to see it. It was first released in HK, England, then Ireland. Now the US in very limited release. Anselm Chan is a fine writer/director.

"Dominic" (Dayo Wong) is struggling to make ends meet, post COVID, with his business in tatters and his repayment bills at almost $13,000 per month. He's not afraid of hard work, though, so when his "Uncle Ming" (Paul Chun) offers him his share in a funeral parlour he jumps at the chance. His partner - rather sarcastically referred to as "Hello Man" (Michael Hui) comes across as a rather curmudgeonly fellow - a traditionalist Taoist priest who lives with his ambulance-driving daughter "Yuet" (Michelle Wai) and his favourite son "Ben" (Pak Hon Chu) who is attempting to follow in his father's footsteps. Thing is, in his excitement to get the job done and to make enough money to clear his debts, he makes quite a few schoolboy errors at the start that are way more lively to offend the ancestors than send them peaceably on their way to the next life, and that just irks the older man who feels his new pal is disrespectful. As the story unfolds, we follow a young man who learns a little more about a business that is really anything but. At times this is quite a funny story, with a special appearance by a full-sized, papier-mâché, yellow Maserati rather summing up the ineptness of "Dominic" as he strives for success, but that humour rather quickly evaporates leaving us with a familial drama the can be quite poignant at times as it looks at the restricting roles for women and the hereditary responsibility of sons. Given the professions of the characters, grief is never far away and we focus quiet tenderly at times at just how people come to terms with that - or not, whilst we also try to reconcile just how families themselves change from generation to generation, with some tough decisions having to be made that centre around "Ben" and his need to look forward and not back. The acting is engaging and the dialogue well written, allowing the action to do plenty of the work without subjecting us to a constant surfeit of chatter, and it handles the topic of death and the provisions we make to deal with it and it's aftermath sensitively.

I went in watching this not knowing a single thing but was weeping by the end of it. This is a character-driven movie with well-written characters. I'm not sure if it was intended but the start of the movie made me slightly uncomfortable (?) because the protagonist was clearly in it for the money, which was understandable because he had a lot of debts. However as the movie progressed and Dominic (the protagonist) gained more experience in the funeral business, he also became more empathetic and respectful of not only the dead but the dead's family. It was really good but the one aspect of this movie that hit me the most was the relationship between Hello-man and Man Yuet, his daughter. Throughout most of the movie they barely got along but it was when crisis struck that he and his daughter started getting closer. They didn't have a perfect relationship but they loved each other in their own ways and it's another parent-daughter dynamic that reminded me of the quote from Arcane, "Is there anything so undoing as a daughter?"

You can never compare this film with other title that shoot for a far bigger picture or genre.

But this film is a lead example of masterpiece, doing everything well within its lane, especially with such a non-mainstream topic about some Chinese funeral ceremony. It is absolutely amazing how the director and team able to tell a story/paint a beautiful picture around this topic.

It has great acting, although the pace at the first part of the film might be a little slow for some audience, but it was just interesting enough to keep my attention. With that, the film has great introduction to all the major characters in this story in order to move into act 2 and 3.

Beautiful film that send great message without shoving it down your throat. None of the actors' performance or the scripts were written over the top that it became unrealistic or forcing a emotional reaction. But rather a natural state of flow that takes the audience emotion for a ride.

The best film from HK so far.