Children can be a real
handful. I neither have nor want any,
myself, and I suppose, to some people, this makes me a bad person. It’s not that I don’t like kids (some would
say that I act like one). Some of them I
get along with like gangbusters. But in
the main, I prefer them in small doses.
Cinema has done nothing to disparage this perspective. For every Gordie Lachance, there’s one or
more Clifford Danielses. I think the
problem lies in the fact that most screenwriters simply don’t quite get writing
child characters. This is funny, because
at one point or another in life, we’ve all been one. These characters tend to be either
tooth-achingly sweet or misanthropically self-centered. Even giving them a reason for their bad
behavior doesn’t discount their actions.
Further, children are more often than not written to be little adults,
unreasonably wise beyond their years, because, you know, making mud pies is
beneath them (or, at the very least, makes for bad movie watching). When kids are given supernatural powers, they
get even worse, most especially when they’re already dead. This is a mainstay of Asian ghost stories,
where children who died horrible deaths come back to take vengeance on adults
who didn’t even have anything to do with their demises. Such is the case with Dennis Yu’s The Imp (aka Xiong Bang).
Keung (Charlie Chin) can’t get
hired for anything. It’s not that he
doesn’t put in the effort. The whole
universe just seems to be against him.
With a baby on the way, he finally lands a job as a security guard in a
large building complex. But the titular
entity has plans for Keung, his friends, and his family, and none of them are
very good.
The Imp takes its horror concept and posits it in everyday
life. Keung and his wife Lan (Dorothy
Yu) are low-income people struggling to make ends meet. The pressure of their impending bundle of joy
crushes down on them. They are normal
folks with real-world issues. This is
compounded by Keung’s inability to find work.
His familial responsibilities weigh heavily on him, but he keeps
trying. Chin does a great job of
encompassing both the sad sack and Everyman aspects of his character. At work, Keung is surrounded by character
types, all of them just grounded enough to be believable. Han (Chan Shen) is the elder of the group,
the leader. He’s an old hand and
accepting of Keung. Fatty (Kent Cheng)
is, no surprise, the fat guy, but the film doesn’t define him by his weight,
ironically enough. He’s not some slob
constantly stuffing food into his face.
These two are the most important in Keung’s story, because they are the
ones most eager to help Keung out (Fatty even transports Lan to her pre-natal
appointments). Yet, Han considers firing
Keung when the fatalities start piling up.
He’s not above letting superstition guide his actions, though his
decisions may be in the best interest of all involved, save Keung. The other two that we are introduced to, Ting
(Hui Bing-Sam) and Mr. Hong Kong (Wong Ching), are more peripheral. Ting is a bookworm with very little
interaction with Keung. Mr. Hong Kong is
a bit of a boorish dolt who doesn’t really care for dogs. Yu gives all of the characters just enough
personality to distinguish one from another, and they are compelling enough to get
us involved in their fates. Even when
all Hell breaks loose, the film maintains a certain sense of grounding. This is a world where the supernatural
reigns, but the characters still have to get up and go to work every day.
The mystical elements of the film
focus strongly on predestination, especially as it pertains to the concept of
Yin and Yang. Keung was born under the
strongest possible Yin signage (being both sinister and feminine, this points
to not only Keung’s fate but also a character weakness that makes him a bit of
a pushover). Under the tutelage of
Master Chiu (Yueh Hua), a Taoist (?) priest, Keung attempts to defy his
destiny. They post amulets in places of
power, they fix the Feng Shui in Keung’s apartment, and so on. But the ghost always comes out on top. There is a sense of desperation at play in
the film, even when the characters are going through a ceremony that they
believe has to work. It’s this struggle
to thwart fate which drives the horror of the film. The characters believe in the use of magic to
aid their cause, and the film accepts that these things exist. Yet, it never goes so far as making them feel
outlandish. They’re simply another
component of this world.
Yu and company take their story
very seriously. There is little to no
humor in the film, as might be expected in a Hong Kong film of this
vintage. Fatty, the clear, viable target
for derision is treated like an ordinary guy who just happens to be
overweight. He doesn’t do pratfalls, he
doesn’t make a pig of himself. Keung is
fighting for his life and soul as well as that of his family, and hope is
threadbare. It’s this grim earnestness
that makes The Imp such an affecting
experience and one worthy of praise.
MVT: The film’s tone strikes
just the right amount of dread.
Make or Break: The finale is
tense and serious, and it brings home the message.
Score: 7/10
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