Rent Vulgaria (2012)

Sales of Popping Candy have gone through the roof - goodness knows why? - Vulgaria review by Strovey

The film starts with advice for the viewing audience, the film has coarse language, despicable behaviour and if you are sensitive to this please leave within ten seconds.

They are not lying, Vulgaria is rude, offensive, extremely low-brow and equally as funny.

Not an easy thing to do when it looks as if you trying to get cheap laughs but Vulgaria manages this extremely well. Not only that but inside all the bestiality, eating any animal, oral sex and the like there is an underlying almost serious message to be had.

As I said an extremely skilful piece of storytelling.

Pang made Vulgaria over the course of 12 days on a tight budget and one cannot help but feel there is more than an element of autobiography here except perhaps some of the extreme moments – well let us hope so. If you watch the film you will know exactly what I am referencing.

Pang references the influence of mainland China on Hong Kong and the restrictive and overall corrupt handbrake it applies but also weaves in comments on social media consumption and its influence, the never-ending crusade for Asian parents to have their children succeed academically and professionally even if the ideas seem thrown in haphazardly. All this is compressed in the microcosm of To’s world. If you want to watch a crude film about gangsters funding a remake of their favourite Asian porn then you can also watch that. It is a film with genuinely many layers.

Chapman To, who plays producer To Wai-cheung, anchors the film perfectly, sleazy but not really sleazy, as dishonest as he needs to be but essentially he will sacrifice and do anything to make his film. Unlike characters in similar films that ultimately prove weak when push-comes-to-shove To’s producer pays the price, he says he will – no matter how unsavioury.

Made on such a low budget within 12 days the story can feel a tad unfocused with some scenes and set pieces not entirely coherent with the story but the actors To, Cheung, the alluring Dada Chan et al pull you through these moments. There is a slight dragging and slowing down near the end but nothing that kills your attention and enthusiasm.

Overall though, unless you are extremely straight-laced or very sensitive, Vulgaria is very funny. Laugh-out-loud funny at points and when it is not you will still be giggling and smiling throughout. The film is bracketed with the producer To giving a lecture to his professor friend’s students about being a film producer and it fits the story perfectly, including the final moments which are in some ways and eye-opener to this character that maybe you did not see coming.

If you are a lover of films and like stories about filmmaking, with some really crude humour then I would say seek out Vulgaria and even if you do not like these types of stories perhaps give it a viewing to see how a film can be made that makes you laugh, blanch and think all at once.

Good Hong Kong stuff.