In the late 1980s, Aaron Kwok, who entered the industry as a dancer, was turned into a TELEVISION actor by TVB's artist manager Feng Meiji. Although he participated in many dramas during this period, because most of his performances were dragon sets and supporting roles, his acting performances never improved, and then he began to go to Taiwan to develop, and finally became popular with TV commercials and Chinese album "Can't Finish Loving You".
A few years later, he was invited back to Hong Kong to officially enter the film industry, but because the type of screen role has long been fixed, he has been defined as an "idol actor" by the outside world, in order to get rid of this label, Aaron Kwok decided to completely transform in 1995. This year, he not only cut out the iconic "Rich City Head", an image he had never seen before facing the audience, but also slowed down the pace of taking over the drama, starring in only two masterpieces that he believed could show a new self, one of which was the boxing action film "Romantic Storm", which was officially released in 1996.
This film is invested by Taiwan's Longxiang Pictures, Wu Yusen and other people founded the new mileage film company production, its director Liang Baijian from 1984 "Two Tigers" and "Laughing Craftsman" from the beginning of all the way to follow Wu Yusen as an assistant director, it can be said that later Wu Yusen can come out of the trough until the international film industry, indispensable to Liang Baijian's credit, so Wu Yusen supported him to officially sit on the seat of the main director with this "Romantic Storm", which is also a kind of return.
The protagonist of the story, Ah Qin (Aaron Kwok), was once sentenced to a teaching center for taking the lead for his classmates, so that he was the only one in the family who could not immigrate, so he was depressed and became self-abandoned.
By chance, he meets his father's student Jianhua (Li Ruotong) and falls in love with her at first sight, and then embarks on a fierce pursuit, jianhua, who also has a good feeling for Ah Qin, can't bear to see him doing nothing all day, so he uses words to stimulate him to reinvigorate.
In order to let Jianhua see the future, Ah Qin found Master Hong Zhong (Hong Jinbao) through the introduction of the counselor, hoping to learn fighting from the other side, at first because Hong Zhong suspected that the risk of fighting sports was too high and it was difficult to maintain his livelihood, so he did not want to teach, until later he saw Ah Qin being taught by Jianhua's brother, Chen Binglie (Tang Wenlong), who is known as the "Hong Kong Boxer King", when he revealed a momentum of not accepting defeat, believing that he could become a boxer in the future, so he began to train Ah Qin.
After hard practice, Ah Qin ushered in his first boxing match, but he was still inexperienced, but he was repeatedly inferior at the beginning, and then with the encouragement of Jianhua's presence, he was able to fight more and more courageously and finally knocked his opponent down.
After the victory of the first battle, Ah Qin will become a dark horse in the boxing world all the way through the pass, so he invited Chen Binglie to fight to save his dignity, but the result was that he lost his hand in the game and caused the opponent to die unexpectedly, although the battle made Ah Qin famous in one fell swoop, it also caused a gap between him and Jianhua, and made him feel sorry for Chen Binglie's death.
Since then, Ah Qin once anesthetized himself by fighting for life and death by the black market boxing match, and the retired former boxer who has changed to the bar business saw that he was injured every day, and persuaded Ah Qin to give up the black market boxing tournament and get back on track to win back an Asian championship on behalf of Hong Kong.
At this time, Ah Qin, who thought that he would not see Jianhua again, met each other on the street, and both of them could not resist the resurgence of old feelings, Jianhua not only forgave Ah Qin from the bottom of his heart, but also asked him to help his brother Chen Binglie complete his last wish to challenge the Asian boxing king Yamada Honichi (Sawada Kenya), for this reason, Ah Qin decided to stand in the ring again and compete with Yamada Honichi in the Asian Boxing Championship.
Due to Ah Qin's long-term involvement in black market boxing, his body has long been left with serious internal injuries, so it is difficult to withstand the continuous blows of Yamada Honichi, but in order to fulfill his promise to Jianhua and prove himself to his family, Ah Qin chose to fight to the end, although he finally successfully defeated his opponent and won the golden belt, he also paid for his life.
The film's action scenes are very realistic, fist to flesh, full of energy, but unlike the general boxing movies, this film does not deliberately highlight the two major elements of blood and inspiration, but with love, family affection through it, which also provides a sufficient foothold for Ah Qin from the beginning of the chaotic life to the later great transformation of striving for progress, such as his decision to challenge the Asian boxing king's motivation is no longer full of personal heroism, but out of the inability to face himself, unable to face the death of Jianhua brother, but also out of "atonement" And the decisions made, so this character reveals more of the shadow of an ordinary person than a hero.
From the effect point of view, this "Romantic Storm" may not be a big investment in large productions, but after all, this is Liang Baijian's first time as a director, so he also invited a lot of friends in the circle to help, among which in addition to Hong Jinbao's emotional intelligence starring master Hong, there are also xu Anhua, Gao Zhisen, Chen Guo, Mai Zhaohui, Hu Dawei and other well-known directors joint cameos, thus adding a lot of brilliance to the film.
This film is not only of great significance to Liang Baijian, but also an important turning point for Aaron Kwok from the film road, because from here on, he has lost as much as possible at the performance level of the "idol acting method" that only emphasizes the outside and not the inside, and more is to act from the inside, and then the emotions of the character of Ah Qin are three-dimensional and convincing, whether it is Ah Qin's decadence and depression before his family will immigrate, the gentle persistence when he gets along with Jianhua, or the tenacity when he stands in the ring. In the end, he lay down on the hospital bed of helplessness and so on, Aaron Kwok grasped it very well, so that the inherent impression he left on the audience that he would only play handsome was changed to a certain extent.
Although the box office of this film exceeded 10 million Hong Kong dollars after its release that year, it is a pity that Aaron Kwok's efforts to transform did not let him get any praise and appreciation, not even the nomination of the Academy Awards, but was also sneered by the outside world that he was "not doing the right thing" and "should go back to singing", which is so-called thankless. But combined with Aaron Kwok's film career, it is precisely because of this "Romantic Storm" that he has the opportunity to change his drama path, and also laid the foundation for him to later win the film emperor, no wonder there are media comments that Aaron Kwok in this movie is a lost pearl that was ignored that year.