The "Sha Po Lang" aka "SPL" thread

grim_tales · Post by **grim_tales** » 14 Jan 2006, 17:54

Havent you checked to see if it plays all right?

That happened to me with my Naked Gun set (one of the discs was a rattler) but it played fine.

romerojpg · Post by **romerojpg** » 14 Jan 2006, 18:27

I dont care if it plays right, if its got any mark at all it goes back. If I need to sell it and its got marks its harder to sell, so any mark at all and no way I keep it.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 14 Jan 2006, 20:19

just watched this what a cracking movie! really bleak and dark with some cracking action in the latter half. very brutal and it's great to see sammo can still kick ass!

Toge · Post by **Toge** » 14 Jan 2006, 21:10

cant't wait to see this!

Toge · Post by **Toge** » 14 Jan 2006, 21:11

cant't wait to see this!

romerojpg · Post by **romerojpg** » 15 Jan 2006, 00:11

So much you posted twice

I hope its a cracker and may try the scratched dvd, and prey it doesnt go off half way thru

SpiDER · Post by **SpiDER** » 16 Jan 2006, 12:36

Just finished seeing this ... awsome. Loved the ending.

Ricochan38 · Post by **Ricochan38** » 16 Jan 2006, 15:07

its good, but highly overrated imho.

thelostdragon · Post by **thelostdragon** » 23 Jan 2006, 03:22

Loved the film. Here is my review:
http://www.asia-on-dvd.com/index.php?na ... cle&sid=50

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 23 Jan 2006, 17:17

Any news on who has the UK rights? I hope HKL change their mind and pick this up.

What does Sha Po Long stand for? There must be an easier to remember Western name surely?

BiscLimpkit · Post by **BiscLimpkit** » 23 Jan 2006, 18:49

awesome film btw

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 23 Jan 2006, 18:53

bradavon wrote:Any news on who has the UK rights? I hope HKL change their mind and pick this up.

What does Sha Po Long stand for? There must be an easier to remember Western name surely?

Dont mention such things on a public forum. Who knows what smart western movie producer is lurking here, and takes that comment as a cue to rename it into something like "'Triad Terror-Fu" or whatever.

thelostdragon · Post by **thelostdragon** » 23 Jan 2006, 21:42

The terms 'Sha', 'Po', and 'Lang' are actually the names of three stars.

brooce-leroy · Post by **brooce-leroy** » 23 Jan 2006, 22:53

Sha is Chinese for Kill.
Po is the first character (of two) that forms the word Destroy.
Lang means Wolf.

All literally of course.

BiscLimpkit · Post by **BiscLimpkit** » 23 Jan 2006, 22:56

Man I feel like a tool. I was calling this film Sho Pa Lang for like the last two months. This was to my Chinese mates as well. I wonder if they spotted my mistake and were just playing along? :x

brooce-leroy · Post by **brooce-leroy** » 23 Jan 2006, 23:02

They didn't want to make you feel sheepish Bics.

thelostdragon · Post by **thelostdragon** » 23 Jan 2006, 23:05

He he he! LOL. Well, I suppose that when pronounced in Chinese it sounds completely different to Western ears until one has gotten used to the pronounciation. During my first Mandarin lessons there was a German guy who claimed to be exactly repeating what the teacher said and then he started to have an argument with the teacher telling him that he wasn't listening carefully enough to him, lol.

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 23 Jan 2006, 23:43

thelostdragon wrote:He he he! LOL. Well, I suppose that when pronounced in Chinese it sounds completely different to Western ears until one has gotten used to the pronounciation. During my first Mandarin lessons there was a German guy who claimed to be exactly repeating what the teacher said and then he started to have an argument with the teacher telling him that he wasn't listening carefully enough to him, lol.

I once got into a shouting row with my kung fu sifu, when we were practicing staff, cause he had a tendency to change his manner of counting from exercise to exercise, so he had shown what we needed to do, twirling that thing 1-2-3 on whole rotations, so we all started doing that form and he kept chastising me for doing it too fast, too slow, not enough times whatever, but I had kept the exact same counting as he had before when he showed it. But when we were actually doing it he used another rythm of counting (so before it was 1-2-3 a count for each side... and the 2nd time it was a count for a whole rotation (2 sides).

Him not being the most social guy you are ever likely to meet, and I'm not the kinda guy who would accept some guy shouting at me while it's not my fault, I just sweared and shouted back at him, almost temted to stick that staff up his ass, untill some of my kung-fu classmates explained to him that before he had used a different count...

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 24 Jan 2006, 14:06

BiscLimpkit wrote:Man I feel like a tool. I was calling this film Sho Pa Lang for like the last two months. This was to my Chinese mates as well. I wonder if they spotted my mistake and were just playing along? :x

What does Sha mean?

Yi-Long wrote:and I'm not the kinda guy who would accept some guy shouting at me while it's not my fault

What really?

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 24 Jan 2006, 14:28

Yi-Long wrote:and I'm not the kinda guy who would accept some guy shouting at me while it's not my fault

What really?

AND WHAT THE FLYING FUCK IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN!?!?!?!? :x :x :x

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 24 Jan 2006, 20:32

Just finished watching Sha Po Lang.

First impressions: I liked it, certainly one of the best movies to come out of HK lately, but I didnt love it.

The movie started out very very good, Sammo was absolutely brilliant in it, both menacing and 'caring', and just portraying a realistic character.

Simon Yam was better then usual. I'm not a big fan of Yam, cause I usually have the feeling he sleepwalks through most of his parts. In this one, he's pretty good. Not GREAT or anything, but good.

Donnie Yen isn't an actor. He's usually a bit of the martial arts equivelant of Michael Wong. But in this movie he's OK. I would have prefered a better actor, but the part also isnt too tasking, plus there are hardly any better martial artists around in HK, so Donnie does OK in this.

Cinematography was very good, at times absolutely fantastic even (the part in the beginning where the group of 4 cops leave the policestation, meet Donnie Yen in his car, and the following scenes where the cops bust a hide-out and get the drugs and money, while at the meantime Donnie checks out his new office and the desks of his coworkers, was extremely well done. Sound was equally good, and at times great, especially in the scene I just described.

Like I said, the movie started out very very strong, but along the way there were a couple of plotholes.
It's never explained as how the bad guys find out someone had videotaped the murder, or WHO taped it, yet they somehow manage to find the guy who taped it. Why did the guy make a copy of it in the first place? Why didnt he tell the cops?
Also, the ending was a bit ridiculous. One minute Sammo is lying knocked out in a pile of GLASS, the next minute he grabs Donnie from behind. Donnie gone deaf all of a sudden? You wouldnt hear a 200 pound fat guy crawling out of a pile of glass? And to land exactly on the car of Sammo's family...
These kind of things bother me a bit. I know it's a movie, and it's a good twist ending, non-hollywood, it has a message about each action having consequences, etc etc... but this was all a bit too much.
There are more plotholes, like the gangsters not checking the bag, so Yam could shoot them all, or how Jing Wu could find all the cops in that one night and whack them... (I understand the first, as he was recognised by one of Sammo's men (also a big coincidence), but the 2nd and 3rd? )

The action was good, best we've seen from HK in ages, but I was still a bit disappointed. It's very clear Donnie choreographed it cause his ego really shines through. We get to see all the trademarkstuff from him, but I feel Wu Jing, and ESPECIALLY Sammo, didnt got much opportunity to show what they got. Jing Wu makes a couple of nice twists and twirl jumps, but the fact that he's mainly fighting with his knives, means he doesnt get to showcase his awesome wushu skills, and/or his great kicking. Sammo especially only gets to do pretty basic stuff. I really hoped we would get to see some nice moves from Sammo as well, but it was all pretty basic as far as fancy moves go. The speed of the exchanges was very good though. And don't get me wrong, I like seeing Donnie strutt his stuff... I was just hoping the others would strutt some of their stuff as well... (what is 'strutting' btw???)

Ok... so with all this negative talk, you'd think I didnt like it, dont you!?
Well... no actually. I DID like it, and I liked it a lot. Like I said before, it's one of the best movies to come out of HK ina long time. Sure, that also says alot about the sorry state HK Cinema is in right now, but it had a good story, some very good performances, especially Sammo, good action, very good mature supporting cast (a HK movie without 16 year old popstars!?!? WTF!?!? ), nice use of locations (I think the beach is the one I visited this summer, on Lantau Island, but I'm not sure) and very good cinematography and music.

It's a very good movie. Not the best action of the year (That award will surely go to Tony Jaa's Tom Yum Goong), and it has a bunch of plotholes, but it's very entertaining nontheless. Plus it has left some room for a sequal.

Overall, I'd rate it 8 out of 10.

tom2681 · Post by **tom2681** » 24 Jan 2006, 21:08

And he calls it Sha Po Lam.

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 24 Jan 2006, 21:42

Tom2681 wrote:And he calls it Sha Po Lam.

Aw shit, it's Sha Po Lang, isnt it!? I got messed up cause around the web it's written Sha Po Lam by some, including by me now I guess

I'll edit it...

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 24 Jan 2006, 22:00

Yes it is. Point proven

the68monkey · Post by **the68monkey** » 10 Dec 2006, 03:23

I'd been looking forward to these for a LONG, LONG time, and thanks to an unnamed Swedish connection (

), I finally got to watch it tonight! Woohoo!

What a shame they spent all the money on paying big-name stars to choreograph some very impressive fights, but forgot to hire WRITERS!!! And I'm sorry, but whoever did the score for this film should die a slow and painful death. It was pure melodrama, without any real drama to it. Thank goodness I got to watch Sammo in action, though. But too bad I didn't have a fucking clue what his character was really all about, thanks to the complete lack of characterization and good writing.

Simon Yam, I'll prefer to remember your superb performance in PTU, thank you very much. As for SPL, I'll try to wipe this from my memory.