The 2002(ti) was also a small car by BMW in the late seventies.
It featured a 2 litre engine in a small chassis somewhat of the size of a VW Polo.
Can you imagine 130 turbo powered horsepowers in a car that's about 700 kg heavy?
Damnit, this was a rocket. My father nearly killed himself in winter 1978 hitting two trees beside a icy road in his 2002.

"You know I'm scary!" - the late Grandma Four

A movie released in 2001. ('2001' as a title was taken).

Director:

Wilson Yip

Writers:

Vincent Kok, Chi-kin Kwok, Kam-Yuen Szeto, Wilson Yip.

Players:

Nicholas Tse as Tide, hero.
Stephen Fung as Wind aka Fung, sidekick.
Kar-Ying Law as Paper Chan, mentor.
Rain Li as Rain, sidekick's love interest.
Sam Lee as Sam, first-reel sidekick.
Danielle Graham as Nurse Danielle, hero's love interest.
Anya as Fire Ghost, villain's love interest.
Alex Fong as Water Ghost, villain.

Language

Cantonese.

Genres

Kung-fu, action, comedy, romance, fantasy, science-fiction, you name it, it's in there.

DVD specs

Soundtrack: 5.1 and 2.0 Dolby Digital tracks in both the original Cantonese and a Mandarin dub.
Subtitles: English, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese.
Aspect ratio: 16:9, non-anamorphic.
Region: All.
Format: NTSC.
Length: 1hr 37m.
Extras: Character bios (virtually illegible!), trailer, "Making-of" feature (Chinese only).

(This review based on watching the Cantonese 5.1 track with English subtitles).

Plot Summary

Tide is the sole living member of Division 2002 of the Hong Kong Police Department. Born with the power to see and communicate with ghosts, Tide and his deceased partner, Sam, are the policers of the Hong Kong afterlife. Think Ghostbusters but with long leather jackets, kung-fu, and a healthy dose of Chinese spiritualism.

It's re-incarnation season, though (didn't know there was a season for it, did you?) and Sam's off to begin a new life. (Naturally this is represented by a shot of Sam swimming the breaststroke through what one assumes is a fallopian tube). Tide needs a new partner! Luckily it turns out that a local traffic-cop, Wind, also has the sixth sense, so he becomes 2002's newest recruit.

But is it any good?

It's great! Only the coldest of hearts wouldn't be warmed by this movie - only the frowniest of frowns would remain... frowny.

Nicholas Tse and Stephen Fung are re-united, post Gen-X Cops, and they work really well together. Sam Lee is also a Gen-X Cops veteran and he's fun to watch but is only in the first five minutes or so. Kar-Ying Law does a perfectly respectable turn as dual mentor/comic-relief. No-one else has very much to do, really - the girls just have to look pretty, and the villains have to look menacing.

The central ghostly concept of the movie is a lot of fun. I'd guess it's firmly based on Chinese spiritualism rather than more familiar (to me) Western notions. There's a lot of things that seemed novel to me (guns loaded with human blood to kill ghosts, 'vision drops' to render ghosts visible, 'touch gloves' to render them tangible) which might be perfectly standard fare in Chinese ghost-busting movies; I don't know.

Tide: Vision Drops, so spirits will appear. Halves the ghost's power. But you only have five minutes.
Fung: Why five and not six?
Tide: How would I know? Why so many questions? Why are you a guy? Why are you named Fung?

The background seemed so thoroughly thought-out, in fact, that I found myself thinking it must be based on some previously-established fiction. I wondered if this movie was based on a TV series, or a book, or comic, but I did some digging and it appears to stand alone. (Alas! I wanted more.)

The most striking thing about this movie is that it has such a lot of heart. There are some genuinely touching moments throughout, as Tide helps people on their way into the afterlife. There's a number of laugh-out-loud comedy moments; some beautiful slapstick, some genuinely witty dialogue. The two love stories are both very lightly handled, so that you care about the characters but aren't drowned in sentiment.

My only real criticism is of the fight-scenes. Having been spoiled rotten by the incredible choreography in Jackie Chan movies and suchlike, the fights in this just aren't up to scratch. They're reasonably fun to watch, but they aren't really impressive.

The thing is, though, the poor fight scenes don't really matter. There's only a few of them anyway. This movie isn't about fighting; it's about people.

You'll laugh! You'll cry! You'll wonder what the hell's going on and decide it probably doesn't matter! See this movie.


Sources: IMDB, watching my copy of the DVD repeatedly.

Tip: If you're having trouble finding this movie on DVD, because when you search for '2002' you get back all the films released in 2002, try searching for the actors involved, e.g. Nicholas Tse. Lots of sites let you search by actor.

2001... 2002 ... 2003

Who and what was honored in 2002?

                         Nobel Peace Prize:  Jimmy Carter
                    Nobel Literature Prize:  Imre Kertesz
                              Booker Prize:  Life of Pi by Yann Martel
                 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction:  Empire Falls by Richard Rosso
                              Turner Prize:  Keith Tyson
                      Oscar - Best Picture:  A Beautiful Mind
                        Oscar - Best Actor:  Denzel Washington
                      Oscar - Best Actress:  Halle Berry
                      Grammy - Best Record:  Walk On by U2
  American Music Awards - Best Male Artist:  Lenny Kravitz
American Music Awards - Best Female Artist:  Janet Jackson 
                    RIAA Top Selling Album:  The Eminem Show by Eminem
                        Top grossing movie:  Spiderman 
      Golden Razzies Award - Worst Picture:  Swept Away
                                 World Cup:  Brazil
         Time Magazine's Women of the Year:  Cynthia Cooper, Sherron Watkins and Coleen Rowley

What happened in 2002 ?

January
Euro currency becomes legal tender. Enron (or what remains of it) gets investigated by the US Department of Justice.

February
Salt Lake City hosts the Winter Olympics. Slobodan Milosevic sees his day in court.

March
Operation Anaconda is launched against remnants of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

April
Israeli forces and Palestinian militants confront each other in Bethlehem.

May
East Timor becomes independent and is renamed Timor Leste. Jimmy Carter visits Cuba. Maverick Dutch politican Pym Fortuyn assassinated.

June
Martha Stewart is probed by the US House of Representative's Energy and Commerce Committee. Japan and South Korea jointly host the World Cup.

July
WorldCom files for bankruptcy. Jacques Chirac survives an assassination attempt. John Walker Lindt is sentenced to 20 years imprisonment.

August
118 Russian soldiers are killed by a Chechen missile attack on their Mi-26 helicopter.

September
950 passengers drown when a ferry sinks off the coast of The Gambia. Switzerland joins the United Nations.

October
Terrorism strikes - 202 people are killed in the Bali Bombings, the French oil tanker Limburg is bombed off Yemen and Chechen rebels hold 700 people hostage in Moscow.

November
The United Nations Security Council approves unanimously Resolution 1441 that forces Iraq to disarm its suspected WMD program. Hans Blix arrives in Iraq. Hu Jintao becomes General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. Argentina defaults on a US$ 850 million World Bank payment. Several former Warsaw Pact countries join NATO. Islamists start riots at the Miss World contest in Nigeria.

December
Peace accord signed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Who died ?

Dudley Moore, Cyrus Vance, Princess Margaret, , The Queen Mother (Elizabeth), Peggy Lee, Daniel Pearl, Astrid Lindgren, Spike Milligan, Alexander Lebed, Pym Fortuyn, John Gotti, Ann Landers, Abu Nidal, Myra Hindley, General Ne Win, James Colburn, Joe Strumer

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.