Another Heaven

In my dream of being a filmmaker, one that will likely go unrealized, but whatever, I've always wanted to remake two movies. One was a Chinese film inexplicably named Adventurers. It has nothing to do with adventuring, but it did have some fantastic action sequences I wanted to rip off, or pay homage to, and a twisty story that I wanted to change slightly. The other is this movie, Another Heaven.

Another Heaven is not a good movie, but I remembered distinctly enjoying watching it. I liked how the story starts as a serious police drama and then gets steadily dumber until the characters are battling an abstract concept (abstract concepts, incidentally, look exactly like bad CGI water).

So what is this movie about? Well, there's a murder case involving a man who had his brains cooked into a lovely stew. Then, there are more murder cases where people have their brains eaten. If this sounds like some sort of gourmet zombie, you're sort of right. Eventually, it is revealed that the villain is a hot chick, only it's actually some sort of strange being that can change bodies. This leads to a highly amusing gay kiss sequence. (He kissed you! Shoot him in the balls!) This also eventually leads to the final battle against CG water, and a female character constantly trying to kill herself and having the hero save her, which is much funnier than it really should be, primarily due to how increasingly ridiculous it gets.

In the good corner, there are two cops, one a young guy named Manabu, who has fashionable hair and no personality. The other is a crotchety old cop who seems to be a distant relative of Corey Hart, given his propensity towards nocturnal sunglasses. Manabu has a creepy stalker/girlfriend who fits the 'Manic Pixie Dreamgirl' archetype, and also is there to figure out things way before everyone else for no discernible reason. It's all very stupid, but fun! It also tries to teach a lesson about the horrors of violent entertainment, except it is violent entertainment so it doesn't work.

I don't think I ever thought this would be a traditionally good movie. The plot is too dumb, the characters really aren't terrible interesting, and it just gets steadily more ridiculous as it goes. But the first time I watched it, I enjoyed it so much, I thought it would be simply fun to remake.

Well, I watched it again, and as fun as it is, it's probably too stupid to make into a good movie. The characters are a bit too thin, and the story about the evil that lurks within the heart of men isn't exactly strong. I still like it though, and I appreciate how something so silly got made into a real movie. Bless you, Another Heaven, for being so enjoyably lame.