Mad Detective (2007)

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Blistering performances.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Before this I haven't watched a single movie for a while (for about 4 months) and I decided to give an opportunity to Asian cinematography. And I certainly did not regret. This movie isn't as complex as other crime movies but it contains great amount of drama and humor. This "weird" detective is one of the best roles I have seen in a while and in my opinion he carries this whole movie to the next level. If you want to give a chance to Asian cinematography I would highly recommend you this movie.

This film is certainly the opposite of the usual detective film. Instead of the detective catching the bad guys as a result of being logical, analytical, and clever, the lead character in this film solves crimes by psychic and irrational means. That in itself is a fascinating premise, and if this film had not gone so over the top in places, and had been more subtle, it could have been a very profound film which explored all sorts of interesting implications for the detection of crime. However, the psychic cop is just too bonkers, and extremely annoying. The intention seems to have been to portray him as disturbingly autistic, and to go for some laughs as well. I absolutely hated the Swedish TV series THE BRIDGE (2011) because the lead detective was a woman who was so extremely autistic that the series was intensely annoying and watching it became pointless. This film suffers from the same syndrome, though to a lesser extent. I also think of A BEAUTIFUL MIND (2001) in which a genius is portrayed as an annoying autistic person. Why is it that today so many movies can only portray people who are more intelligent than others by grovelling with apology to the audience for daring to show the mental superiority of character by saying: 'but don't worry, everyone, they are really crazy, and their genius is a pathological aberration, so you don't need to feel inferior.' We certainly do live in an age which could well be called The Triumph of the Lowest Common Denominator. (I say that despite the fact that, education having long since collapsed, there are probably few people left alive apart from professional mathematicians who even know what a denominator is.) In a moronic age, the only genius which is permissible is truly that which is apologetically portrayed as being outrageously insane. Then we can all feel better, can't we? Relaxing in a hot bath of ignorance can be blissful, as we drift into decline as a civilization.

Saw 'Mad Detective' (2007) in CantoneseThe movie is about Detective Bun, a clinically insane detective who had hyper-eccentric methods of solving crimes. He has a supernatural gift of seeing a person's 'inner personality', allowing him to see the true nature of the person rather than just the outward mask.He also lives with his ghost-like illusion of his wife - an apparition that nobody else can see, but he interacts with on a regular basis. He is brought in to a case by Inspector Ka-On, who considers Bun a mentor of sorts.The case is of missing officer Wong, who went on a chase with his partner, Ko Chi-Wai, after an Indian thief into the jungle one night. Wong and his gun went missing that night, and subsequently, the gun has turned up at some robberies which resulted in murders. Inspector Ka-On is on the task of solving the case, and he looks up to Detective Bun for clues.The movie is weird in places, starting with the protagonist seeming like a dark version of 'Monk', but moves on to the supernatural, with Bun's visions being ratified as real. The premise is a bit odd to digest, but is done competently. The audience will have to pay attention to keep track of what is real and what is Bun's visions. I think it could have been done a lot better. But it's not to belittle the movie - I started the movie late at night, thinking I'll just skim through it, but was gripped enough to stay awake throughout.

When one detective is crazy and the other one is a greedy gangster in the disguise of a detective and the third one is a bitch that does not want to be dominated by her crazy man and the fourth one is a frightened little boy in the disguise of a courageous crime solver, you can be sure nothing is simple and everything is definitely twisted, distorted, warped and a few other limping true menaces. And only one will have to survive to clean up the snake nest, and only one will survive. Then the rest is anecdotic. But I like this detective clairvoyant when you bury him alive. I must admit it is funny to follow the intricate and completely messed up chase after an Indian criminal who will be the first one to be killed though he probably never killed anyone. You need eggs to break if you want to make an omelet, don't you? The eggs are of course always innocent even if they come from the rear end of some chicken or rather hen. A film that is more funny than frightening but maybe that is due to the fact that we do not have a dubbed version, only a subtitled one.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines