If you’re looking for an old school action movie featuring great fights, shootouts, and chase scenes, Weekend in Taipei is a great choice. You can consider it a guilty pleasure if that makes things easier for you. The story is simple but appropriate for an experience like this. We will be following a DEA agent who travels to Taipei, Taiwan tracking down a lead that might break his case wide open. What he will find there are bad guys, incriminating evidence, and the love of his life. So, you already know the drill: first come the action scenes then a bit of romance and snappy dialogue, rinse and repeat until the big finale. The formula is quite simple but highly effective.
The exotic locations are a huge reason why these action movies set in Southeast Asia work so well. We will get both the hustle and bustle of a big city like Taipei but we will also be visiting the rural areas. Usually, when you’re making a movie like this, you’re go-to destination is Thailand. Off the top of my head, I can list two action movies set there: Bangkok Dangerous and One Night in Bangkok. They’re not the only ones, of course, but there had to be a first and that first is Kickboxer starring Jean Claude Van Damme. I’ll just mention two more and that’s it: Rambo 2008 edition and Nicolas Winding Refn’s Only God Forgives. Okay, just one more, sleek French actioner Farang.
To take full advantage of this phenomenal location, you’ll need a good director, producer, and cinematographer. Not to mention a decent budget to make all of that and more happen. Weekend in Taipei has all those things. It looks absolutely fantastic, like a AAA movie, a big summer blockbuster you somehow missed. Since a huge part of the story is driving and car culture in general, you can expect to see some pretty nifty vehicles. Hell, the first action scene is one hot lady driving a red Ferrari 488 Pista Spider through the busy streets of Taipei. It just doesn’t get better than that. I think they were trying to exploit the huge success of Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift.
Sung Kang, who plays Son in that franchise, is the main bad guy here. Apart from him, we’ve got dependable Luke Evans in the lead role. He was surprisingly good during the fight scenes that were masterfully choreographed. Lun-Mei Gwei plays his love interest Joey with confidence, strength, and style. She’s much more than a hot lady who’s falling for our tough DEA agent. I started watching Weekend in Taipei late one night, not thinking much of it. However, once I saw the first fight scene, some fifteen minutes in, I knew that this was going to be one hell of a movie. It was just so kinetic, brutal, and engaging that I had to stop watching and wait for a better opportunity.
Too bad there were only a couple of these scenes but still, the point stands. I expected nothing less from Luc Besson, the guy behind such hits as Leon, The Fifth Element, and Lucy. That last one, starring Scarlett Johansson was also filmed in Taipei, Taiwan and ever since then, Luc has been looking to get back to this stunning location. He was the producer here so we can classify Weekend in Taipei as one of his B-roll action movies. Don’t get me wrong, these movies are awesome and I highly recommend you check them out. I’m talking about such gems as Taxi, The Transporter, and Banlieue 13.
Since I’ve mentioned Luc Besson, I also must mention a slew of sexual assault allegations launched against him in recent years. Not to mention the whole Maiwen and Milla Jovovich saga. Moving on, you should also know that realism is not something they were striving for here but entertainment. This applies not only to the action scenes but the story as well. So, if you’re looking for something gritty and realistic, you won’t find that here. Moreover, despite the R rating and nasty fights, the dialogue and atmosphere are quite casual, like they belong in a romantic comedy.
Director: George Huang
Writers: Luc Besson, George Huang
Cast: Luke Evans, Lun-Mei Gwei, Sung Kang, Wyatt Yang, Pernell Walker, Yi-ching Lu, Patrick Pei-hsu Lee
Fun Facts: Weekend in Taipei is the first movie produced by EuropaCorp after the whole mess that Luc Besson’s rape allegations, one of which he was officially cleared in a court process, created. Besson and Huang met with Taipei City mayor Chiang Wan-an to get support for the movie. They’ve got it and the city even stepped in as one of the producers. The original location for the movie was Hong Kong. However, Luc wanted to work in Taipei again after the huge success of his last production there (Lucy).
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IMDb Link: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt28142896/
