As Lee plays a defiant “Sweet Potato” in his first film showcased in the Critics Week segment of the Venice Film Festival, he distinguishes himself as a bold debutant in directing. Perhaps the experience dissatisfied him, but the life of an ex-convict aspiring to lead a regular life faced many hardships. What could possibly go wrong? Now think about this five times more and ex-con is worsted by even a larger number of life scenarios. The first and nearest to a respite that he gets throughout the 81 minutes of the movie is right at the start when he volunteers information about himself during the barbecuing episode with his childhood friends in a voice over that plays out before the beginning of the movie. However this relaxed scenario is unlikely to last longer than a minute or so because a series of ex events is about to unfold.
Co-written alongside Lin Cheng Hsun, the movie is not the regular action noir one would expect owing to the events taking place. The film gives a glimpse of the challenges Taiwan’s contemporary youth witness be it the corruption, unemployment and the misplaced opportunities, all of which occur with uttermost force against the anti-hero, reminding him of his struggles and wrong choices made in the past. It also serves as a reminder that having a pristine life is nothing but a mere ‘dream’ for the system does not allow all wrongs to be made right.
The only thing that stands between Sweet Potato’s dream of having a 9-5 job is the Good Citizen Certificate that this potential employer asks him to produce. This is something that he of course can never obtain. Hence, having lost most of the options, he is doing his best to survive. His patience appears to have no limits until his own mother, a pathological gambler in huge debt, delivers the final blow.
The Sweet Potatoe character’s duality and temperament change is proof of mastery on both parts, the scripters and Lee who has built a sound reputation for himself with directors like Chang Tso-chi, Bi Gan, Ho Wi Ding, and more recently Alan Yang with the AAF productions “Tigertail” in 2020. Nevertheless, Lee does allow some of his nearly all amateur cast to stand out in supporting parts, including Lin Ke Ren who plays a psychotic hitman serving the tiled ‘boss’ whose presence is never shown and Lin Ying Wei who takes on the role of peas’ childhood friend ‘Seven’. The blend is effective as the mix of professional and amateur actors enhances the realism of the film.
There are discrepancies in music selection that seem baffling at times, such as electronic beats or light-hearted singing, not incorporating lyricism where it doesn’t make sense, and the movie suffering as a result of this in several instances. But, Director Zhu Ying’s strategy of melding slow camera pans with breathtaking views of a foggy metropolis rounds out the narrative by providing a handful of attractive visuals that highlight the setting’s magnificence while also depicting the suffocating environment.
The film ‘Love is a Gun’ does encapsulate the grim elements of modern day Taiwan while also adding dark humor to balance it. For instance, during the film, Sweet Potato’s girlfriend Lulu (Zheng Qing Yu) expresses her frustration about him to a co-worker in a sex parlor with an illuminated interior who sits by the window hoping for patrons. One could say that the title of such a bleak film is terribly heartbreaking while it captures great wit at how life’s value is contextualized in a world where there aren’t any options.
Nobody in the movie can, so as Lee Hong-chi knows how to ‘sell’ it, that’s what the strongest dramatic scenes in the movie are made of. In the same vein as the movie sink or swim there’s a message that Lee Hong-chi knows how to convey. It’s highly unlikely that ‘Love is a Gun’ will make history as the most creative movie, however, debuting instaurations are not so bad either, which makes the director a promising name to follow in the future.
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