In “Amphetamine”, Scud's most visually polished drama about a toxic and intoxicated love between a young Australian financial executive Daniel (Thomas Price) and a straight Hong Kong jack of all trades Kafka (Byron Pang), hope is the only thing permanently absent.
Amphetamine is screening at International Film Festival Rotterdam
The melancholic Kafka is caught between working three jobs to help provide for his sick mother and a not so functional relationship with his girlfriend, who is struggling to understand his broken psyche. When she decides to break off in broad daylight in a posh bar, the boy with the sword has already caught Daniel's eye. Just to make sure we'll understand this instant crush, Scud shows us Kafka's beauty from all sides. Right at the beginning of the film, we observe him giving swimming lessons and being pestered by an elderly man who tells him “he has a body like Michelangelo's”. Soon after, he'll be practicing martial arts alone at the top of the hill, shirtless of course. We understand.
Heiward Mak's match cuts keep awarness of the significant moments in the past that have a direct impact on the now going, and Scud choses the most impressive ones to make the images stick in one's mind. One of those is seen in the breakup scene, when we, for a brief moment, got to see Kafka and his girlfriend naked, with her saying only one line: “Fine, whetever.” The same passive-aggressive energy is in the air at the restaurant table. She'll repeat the almost exact words before leaving.
The DoP Charlie Lam who has worked with the likes of Max Makowski (“One Last Dance” 2006 for which he scooped the Best Cinematography Award at Newport Beach Film Festival) and Ho Cheung-pang (“Exodus” 2007, which brought him the recognition for cinematography at San Sebastian Film Festival) brings literally the blues to the screen. The crystal clear, cold tones that underline all that's wrong, both with the more-or-less one-sided love story and the addiction that turns Kafka into a zombified version of himself, make for the perfect setting, together with the excellent work by the art director Jack Chan.
What really works well in the movie is Daniel's character development. He is by no means different from wealthy hetero men prying upon young girls, and using their weaknesses to make them hooked, On the other hand, Scud is desperately trying to point out the difference. When asked what is the difference between loving a woman and a man, Daniel compares women to mortgages that once you draw, you need to keep on paying for the rest of your life.
The strongest performance is given by Byron Pang, whose character, while slowly losing his mind under the influence throws everyone else in the shadow.
