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Such a frustrating disappointment

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

THE BARE-FOOTED KID is a 1990s remake of the old 1970s Chang Cheh Shaw Brothers film DISCIPLES OF SHAOLIN. Aaron Kwok takes the titular role, one which was played by Alexander Fu Sheng in the original, and the film was directed by Johnnie To, right around the time he was making the HEROIC TRIO movies. Like many 1990s Hong Kong movies, this film's all about wire work and outlandish martial arts.The plot is a simple one with similarities to YOJIMBO. The main character is a pauper who arrives at a dyeing workshop and soon finds himself involved with the people who run it. Unfortunately for him, a rival business owner is desperate for the workshop's secrets, and violence soon erupts between the two companies with the bare-footed kid right at the heart of it.This is a fun, light, and rather insubstantial film. For the first hour it plays out exactly as you would expect, with lots of cheesy music and romantic scenes and earnest acting from the main cast members. There's plenty of action here, all of it defying the laws of gravity in the best '90s Hong Kong tradition. I used to hate this wire work stuff for its lack of realism, but it has grown on me over the years and I can appreciate the visual artistry nowadays.Aaron Kwok is merely adequate as the titular character. He's handsome enough but he doesn't have much charisma, although I suppose his talents would grow with experience over the years. The supporting cast is much more interesting, featuring as it does Shaw Brothers legend Ti Lung in a strong role as a steadfast ally. It's a little like Lung's part in DRUNKEN MASTER II, although Lung has less acting to do here and more fighting. He does get at least one fantastic scene to himself. Maggie Cheung plays it subdued and is far less annoying than usual, and Kenneth Tsang is reliable as ever as the baddie of the piece. The film really hits hard for the insanely dramatic climax, the one part of the movie that successfully recaptures the old Shaw Brothers spirit.

Johnny To has recently become the critic's HK director to tout. He certainly has a stylistic flair for gangster movies but I am not familiar with his martial art films so this was a treat.In terms of story, the movie is certainly a throwback to the HK films of the seventies. An illiterate young man travels to a town to find the best friend of his recently deceased father. He wants to retrieve a prized possession of his father's that the friend is holding on to. He finds the man (Ti Lung) working at a cloth factory that's being harassed by the local crime boss. We meet the owner of the factory, a beautiful widow. The young man also meets a beautiful young woman who's a teacher so he decides to have her teach him how to spell his name. Of course the young man is thrust into the middle of a conflict.The story is played with a comic touch that carries the film for most of the way until the end which is quite serious. For me, what didn't work is how the exaggerated, wide angle, cartoony film technique was really unsuited for the end of the film. The action is very sped up during some tragic scenes. I started watching HK kung fu films during the end of the Shaw era and I've never warmed up to the kung fu film style of the 1990's. Too many cuts (move, move, cut, move, cut, punch, punch, cut) and too many sloppily composed action scenes. It seems every film had to have a scene with the hero running on the heads and shoulders of a crowd. IN Johnny To's defense, he seems to do an average of 4 films a year and that's not enough time to really make a great fight scene.If you like 90's style HK action, this is a good film. For aficionado's of classic Shaw, this might not be that exciting.

I wonder why so many people mention only Chow Yun-fat among the actors in [A Better Tomorrow] in talking about the film. I love him, too, but the focus of ABT is Sung Tse-ho played wonderfully by Ti Lung. ABT was my first Ti Lung experience, and since then I wish I had a chance to see the martial art films of 70's in which he had starred. I haven't had such a luck yet, but I found [Barefooted Kid] a good treat. Though Lung plays a supporting role, you can fully taste of his noble warrior appeal in this. Great. And Maggie Cheung is even greater. She portrays a warm-hearted (treats the barefooted kid very kindly), beautiful (yes, Maggie is beautiful), brave (neither surrenders to the greedy local strong man, nor fears loving Lung's character being a widow in those old days), and wise (disperses a bunch of beggars troubling a bride, by scattering the coins) character brilliantly.Lung and Maggie work beautifully together in the most impressive scenes -- meeting up on a full moon night, collecting the stone dust in rain, walking on a street in the rainy evening. Above all, it's a love story (for me, at least). Aaron Kwok and Wu Chien-lien form a charming couple also. And it is nice surprise to see Kenneth Tsang (who played Danny Lee's sidekick cop in [The Killer] and the taxi company owner in ABT) play a pure villain. Plus, it has good action sequences -- nothing new, but neat, enjoyable movie.

Brilliant kung-fu scenes, loads of melodrama, peculiar footwear symbolism and an unhappy (?) end makes Barefoot Kid an unforgettable film.One of the silliest subtitles I've seen...