A Better Tomorrow Trilogy 英雄本色系列 (1986-1989): Why You Should Watch This Chinese-Language (Cantonese) Film
In the summer of 1986, a Hong Kong film changed the course of Chinese-language cinema. Chow Yun-fat — then known as the "box office poison" — Ti Lung — recently let go by Shaw Brothers — and John Woo — a director at a creative dead end. Three "losers" came together to create a legend.
A Better Tomorrow grossed HK$34.65 million, breaking Hong Kong's all-time box office record. It won Best Film at both the Golden Horse and Hong Kong Film Awards, and spawned an entire genre — the "hero film."
More importantly, it gave us an unforgettable screen icon: Mark Gor. Trench coat. Sunglasses. Twin pistols. A toothpick perpetually dangling from his lips. This image defined an entire generation's understanding of what a "hero" looks like.
Today, I want to talk about this trilogy and why it remains an unassailable peak in Chinese-language cinema.
Part One: A Better Tomorrow (英雄本色) (1986) — Three Losers' Last Stand
A Better Tomorrow tells a story of brotherhood and loyalty between two gangsters.
Sung Tse-ho (Ti Lung) is the leader of a counterfeit money ring who wants to leave the underworld. His younger brother Sung Tse-kit (Leslie Cheung) is a police academy cadet who is ashamed of him. Mark Gor (Chow Yun-fat) is Tse-ho's sworn brother who avenges him and ends up crippled, working as a car park cleaner.
When Tse-ho is released from prison, the once all-powerful gang boss is met with his brother's coldness, his brother's destitution, and a world he no longer belongs to.
The film's behind-the-scenes story is itself a hero's journey.
John Woo — returned to Hong Kong from Taiwan, his career at rock bottom. He didn't want to make comedies anymore, but the studio had him typecast. Tsui Hark gave him a chance: remake a 1967 film of the same name by Long Gang. Woo poured his own heart into the script, letting Chow Yun-fat speak his words.
Chow Yun-fat — the "box office poison" label followed him everywhere. When filming began, he was only supposed to appear in a cameo, paid by the day. His role kept growing until he became the lead. He delivered one of the greatest performances in cinema history.
Ti Lung — a kung fu superstar a decade ago, now abandoned by Shaw Brothers, his hairline receding, his body aging. His line in the film — "I haven't been the boss for a long time" — was about himself.
Three losers, working from a script just a few pages long, created a myth.
Details That Made History
1. The Toothpick (or Matchstick)
Chow Yun-fat came up with this himself. John Woo, shooting the gunfight scenes, needed his actors to keep their faces steady. But humans naturally blink when firing a gun. A hero blinking just looked weird. So Chow came up with the idea of biting down on a matchstick. The biting force kept his facial muscles steady, and his eyes stayed locked.
2. Eating Lunch in the Car Park
After his release from prison, Tse-ho finds the fallen Mark Gor in an underground car park. Mark squats beside a broken car, eating his boxed lunch, unable to lift his head. No dialogue. No crying. But in that moment of humiliation and loyalty, countless audience members wept.
3. The Maple Forest Shootout
Mark walks through a Taiwanese nightclub with a gun hidden in a flowerpot. He strolls down the corridor, then draws and opens fire in the private room. This was John Woo's first perfect realization of "heroic bloodshed." Slow motion. Twin pistols. Doves. Every element that would become his signature begins here.
4. The Line
"What I've lost, I will take back with my own hands!"
This was John Woo speaking to himself. And to everyone struggling at rock bottom.
Part Two: A Better Tomorrow II (英雄本色II) (1987) — The Peak of Stylized Violence
After the first film's massive success, a sequel was quickly rushed into production. A Better Tomorrow II was released in 1987.
Since Mark Gor had died in the first film, the sequel brought Chow Yun-fat back as Ken — Mark's twin brother. The plot continues from the first film's ending, with Tse-ho cooperating with the police after his release, while Ken gets drawn into another gang war.
Achievements and Controversy
The second film pushed John Woo's "heroic bloodshed" to its extreme. The final shootout — endless slow-motion gunfire, rivers of blood, a rain of shell casings — is one of the most intense sequences in Hong Kong action cinema history.
Critics pointed out issues. Due to creative differences between John Woo and producer Tsui Hark, the film was criticized for its "lost narrative control" — a scattered plot and over-sentimental scenes.
But even so, A Better Tomorrow II remains an undeniable work. It established John Woo as the "godfather of heroic bloodshed" and embedded Chow Yun-fat's twin-pistol hero image deep in the cultural consciousness.
One scene: Ken stands before a mirror, sliding his twin pistols into his trench coat. The camera slows. The music swells. In that moment, he is no longer just a killer — he is a walking poem.
Part Three: A Better Tomorrow III: Love and Death in Saigon (英雄本色III夕陽之歌) (1989) — Tsui Hark's Fatalistic Fable
By the third installment, John Woo had stepped aside. Tsui Hark took over directing duties.
This is a prequel — the story of Mark Gor before the first film, during the Vietnam War. The year is 1974 in Saigon. Mark (Chow Yun-fat) is still just an ordinary young man, far from becoming the "hero" we know. He travels to Saigon with his cousin to bring his uncle back to Hong Kong, only to get caught in local gang conflicts and meet a mysterious woman named Ying (Anita Mui).
Controversy and Depth
A Better Tomorrow III is the most controversial of the trilogy. Critics said it was "a wolf in sheep's clothing" — Mark here doesn't act like Mark at all. He is weak, lacking his signature霸气 (commanding presence).
But the film's true value lies deeper.
Korean director Park Chan-wook — yes, the man who made Oldboy — wrote a lengthy analysis of this film. He called A Better Tomorrow III a "cinema of the future" — a political fable about displacement and exile.
Park wrote:
"Tsui Hark believed that the 1974 unification of Vietnam and the subsequent mass evacuation of Overseas Chinese were historically identical to the 1997 Hong Kong handover and the ensuing wave of migration. Mark never became a hero. He was just a displaced refugee. His fate was already written in the previous film — just as Hong Kong's fate was already known before the handover."
This is a brutal reading. In the first two films, we saw the righteous justice of a hero. In the third, we see how a hero is shaped by history — and then discarded.
Mark's signature trench coat and sunglasses were gifts from Ying. His legendary twin-pistol skills were taught to her. Every "divine" quality of the hero, it turns out, was gifted by a woman.
The third film reaches its climax in its final 140 seconds — low-angle shots, fragmented editing, complex music. The helicopter's takeoff and landing symbolize escape and return. But escape to what?
As Park Chan-wook wrote: "All the blood and gunpowder are ultimately futile. The point is Tsui Hark's nihilism."
A Better Tomorrow III is not a "fun" film. But its weight gives the entire trilogy a meaningful conclusion.
Why This Trilogy Is Worth Watching Again and Again
1. It Defines the "Hero"
In Chinese-language cinema, the concept of the "hero" was largely defined by A Better Tomorrow.
Heroes are not perfect. Mark is crippled. Tse-ho served time. Ken is pushed to the brink. But what makes them heroes is not that they never fall — it's that they never stay down.
"What I've lost, I will take back with my own hands."
The power of this line is not in its volume. It's in the person who speaks it — someone who has fallen, but still stands.
2. The Origin of Heroic Bloodshed
The term "heroic bloodshed" has been used so often it's almost cliché. But its origin is here.
John Woo's gun battles are not just action sequences. The slow-motion gunfire and bloodshed are rituals. The trajectory of the bullets traces emotional arcs. The elegance of the twin pistols is the last dignity of the tragic hero.
3. The Golden Era's Finest Artists
The A Better Tomorrow trilogy brought together the brightest stars of its era: Chow Yun-fat, Ti Lung, Leslie Cheung, Anita Mui, Tony Leung Ka-fai.
Every one at their peak. Chow's Mark Gor is a role he will never surpass. Ti Lung's Sung Tse-ho is the prototype for every "boss" who followed. Leslie's Sung Tse-kit is young, stubborn, heartbreaking. Anita's Ying is tender and fierce.
An unrepeatable gathering of legends.
4. Echoes of an Era
A Better Tomorrow was released in 1986 — eleven years before Hong Kong's handover to China. At that time, Hong Kong was in a state of anxious self-definition.
When John Woo made Mark Gor cry "What I've lost, I will take back with my own hands," it was both a personal cry of defiance and a collective expression of anxiety.
In the third film, Tsui Hark pushed this mood further — using the Vietnam War as a metaphor for Hong Kong's fate. Not all homecomings are happy. Not all heroes get happy endings.
The trilogy, in its own way, tracks Hong Kong's emotional journey toward 1997: anticipation, ecstasy, and unease.
Final Thoughts
The A Better Tomorrow trilogy is not perfect. The sequels have flaws. The third film is controversial.
But it created a myth.
That trench coat. Those sunglasses. The toothpick forever at the corner of his mouth. The twin-pistol stance of utter fearlessness — these symbols have transcended cinema. They are part of popular culture.
Every time I revisit the series, I remember Mark Gor eating lunch in the car park. He squats beside a broken car, head down, unable to look at his former boss. Not because he is ashamed of his poverty — but because he still owes his brother an explanation.
That silent bow of the head has more power than any roar.
Perhaps this is the miracle of Hong Kong cinema's golden age: it let the most fallen men play the proudest heroes.
"See you there. I won't leave without seeing you."
Tom De · The Movie Prince 🎬
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