Here's one of these films that must of gone unnoticed in it's two week running. This would have to be one of the most overlooked films of 2002. We have two great male leads for starters who play good off each other. Taiwanese cop, Leung (always impressive) becomes obsessed with this case involving bizarre instances and deaths, if stylish, some in graphic detail that all lead to some fungus which has made it's way into the brain of the victims. Morse, strong here again in these roles, plays a FBI serial killer profiler, who teams up with Leung where he almost becomes more concerned with the destruction of Leung's family, than this mind wracking case. It involved a standoff that went horribly wrong, involving a family member, from which Leung's little daughter has gone mute. It's good too that we have the family angle, and more lighter, happier moments with Leung's family and Morse, who puts him in place, regarding his lovely wife, child. This film will cause you to use your noggen, even more so towards it's bleak end. Double Vision has some very violent scenes, I warn you, one involving a priest being disemboweled, as a few quite graphic be headings in a temple. This violence quite caught me by surprise. This is a supernatural violent, and imaginative thriller of a higher order, and damn well engrossing. If you're a supernatural horror freak or not, as not ever hearing of this one, hunt it down. I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised.
Keywords: serial killerfbitaiwan
Plot summary
An FBI Agent pairs with a troubled Taiwan cop to hunt for a serial killer who's embedding a mysterious fungus in the brains of victims.
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One of 2002's most overlooked films, that delivers, deserves strict vision
A good stir-fry
I am not a fan of Asian action movies, and I was concerned when I rented this film. It actually proved to be something very different - a mix of many well known themes with exotic (for us) Taiwanese culture flavor, and all is quite well done. We have a lot in this film - the righteous cop who pays for his integrity with the cost of his family life, the cop partners who hate one another, and learn later to work together and respect each other, the clash between the American and local (in this case Taiwanese) cultures, the X-files like conflicts between science and super-natural, between believers and skeptics. It is like the Taiwanese movie industry (which I know very little about) tried to catch back with all these themes in one single film. Surprisingly it works not bad, mostly because of a director who know how to keep the balance, and to direct the actors in this maze of themes. At the end the films fails to be memorable not because it is over-charged, but because the ending plays too much tribute to the mode of the openness to bizarre and as in many other films recently it is too long and too elaborated. However, it is worth seeing, and a different experience for the mystery-action films fans. 7/10 on my personal scale.
But there was no coherent sense to the storyline...
This is the second time I sit down to watch the 2002 movie "Double Vision" (aka "Shuang tong"). I watched it for the first time back in around 2005 or so, but honestly have zero recollection of the movie whatsoever. So as I had the chance to revisit the movie again in 2021, I sat down to watch it.
Yeah, let me just be the first to say that this movie was confusing and I honestly have no clue what it was about or what was really going on. To me, this movie was a massive swing and a miss. So it seems that I haven't really been missing out on a great cinematic masterpiece here by not remembering this 2002 movie.
I literally have no idea or clue as to what writers Chao-Bin Su and Kuo-Fu Chen were trying to accomplish with the storyline they concocted for "Double Vision".
As I sat down again in 2021 to watch it, I must admit that seeing that the movie had Tony Ka Fai Leung on the cast list was somewhat of a bonus. But as it turned out then even he could not manage to do much for this train wreck of a movie.
Aside from Tony Ka Fai Leung, then the movie also have the likes of David Morse and Rene Liu on the cast list, so it wasn't because the movie was inadequately cast, not at all.
This movie was just simply one that went over my head, and I must admit that it offered not a whole lot of enjoyment or entertainment value actually. As the movie ended, I just sat there with no answers to the questions as to what was really going on. So it was a waste of time really.
My rating of "Double Vision" lands on a mere three out of ten stars, based mostly on the fact that the movie's storyline was just rubbish. The acting in the movie was good, and the production level of the movie was good. But the abysmal storyline just dragged everything down.