Blood Ties (还魂), a horror movie released in Singapore in 2009, is a directorial feature debut by Singapore's Chai Yee-Wei. It's based on a short movie of the same name, which was also directed and written by Yee-Wei.Blood Ties features internationally recognized Hong Kong veteran actors - Kenneth Tsang (Memoirs of a Geisha) and Cheng Pei-Pei (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon), Singaporean actor David Leong (Painted Skin), and Malaysian's talented new actress Joey Leong.
Synopsis: A young police detective, Shun (David Leong) and his wife, Mei (Maggie Lee) were brutally murdered by a group of local drug dealers. The local Chinese believe, when a person dies, his soul returns on the 7th night. Shun's spirit indeed returns to possess his little sister Qing (Joey Leong) on the 7th night of his death to exact his bloody retribution because he couldn't die in peace.
Blood Ties is a horror movie, a tale of vengeance that starts with Qing, a teenage girl possessed by his dead brother and in the course of one night, hunts down and murders his killers one by one.
Here are excerpts from two reviews.
1) movieXclusive.com
Like its title implies, what the film has going for it is the copious amount of blood gracing the screen. Characters are shot, stabbed and even castrated in the bloodiest manners imaginable... Still, as bloody as things can get, there is little here that is explicit and graphic enough that the average horror fan may deem as repulsive.
The film's trademarks extend to its use of languages as well, clearly emphasizing the multilingual aspect of Singapore. All the characters are able to understand each other despite speaking different languages comprising Mandarin, English, Hokkien, Cantonese and even a bit of Malay.
Casting-wise, Chai has assembled a talented mix of youth and experience. The anchor of the story, Qing is brilliantly played by first-time Malaysian actress Joey Leong. Leong gives Qing the right touch of innocence when she is her normal self and yet displays an extremely vicious personality when she is possessed by her brother.
2) LoveHKFilm.com
Structurally, Blood Ties boasts a non-linear narrative, complete with a series of repeated, increasingly disturbing flashbacks, each revealing a little more about Shun, the gangsters, and the double murder than the audience previously thought. Was Shun really a corrupt cop as his superior officer seems to believe? What was the real nature of his murder? And what really happened to his wife? All of these questions get answered in a brutal, bloody fashion. In fact, flashbacks are so numerous (bordering on tedious) and so gory that the film could easily be re-titled "Bloody Flashbacks."
The key actor in the film is Joey Leong. The Malaysian actress acquits herself well in the role of the possessed Qing, effectively portraying the role of a vengeful spirit confined to the body of a young girl.
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Note: This movie has only been released in the Malaysian cinemas recently (October 2010).
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