January 12, 2025
by Carla Hay
Directed by George Huang
Some language in Mandarin with subtitles
Culture Representation: Taking place in Taiwan and briefly in the United States, the action film “Weekend in Taipei” features a predominantly Asian cast of characters (with some white people and Latin people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A Drug Enforcement Agency operative travels to Taipei, Taiwan, for a weekend and finds himself trying to rescue his ex-lover, who is now married to the drug kingpin that he has wanted to take down for years.
Culture Audience: “Weekend in Taipei” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and action movies that are tacky and predictable.
“Weekend in Taipei” has a mashup of action movie clichés and some cornball comedy. It’s a lackluster and stiffly acted story about an American law agent who goes to Taipei and gets involved in the problems of his ex-lover and her corrupt husband. Most of the cast members’ acting performances are unconvincing and unappealing. It doesn’t help that too much of the movie’s dialogue and action scenes are mindless and very phony-looking.
Directed by George Huang (who co-wrote the “Weekend in Taipei” screenplay with Luc Besson), “Weekend in Taipei” is the type of film where you know how it’s going to end about 20 minutes into this 100-minute movie, which was filmed on location in Taipei, Taiwan. How many movies have there been about a “rogue” agent who doesn’t follow orders, gets into all sorts of trouble, and has a romance along the way? You can add “Weekend in Taipei” to the list of movies with this over-used concept.
“Weekend in Taipei” begins in Taipei, where the chairman of chairman of Kwang Industries (a seafood company)—a wealthy businessman whose last name is Kwang (played by Sung Kang)—is about to go on trial for various charges, including selling counterfeit assets and violating bans on net fishing. A whistleblower later reveals that Kwang Industries illegally kills 650,000 dolphins a year. Kwang thinks he can be acquitted in this trial because he’s been getting away with many crimes for years.
Kwang is every bit the stereotypical ruthless and corrupt business mogul. However, he claims to be in love with his trophy wife Joey Kwang (played by Gwei Lun-Mei), who is definitely not in love with him. They have been married for 15 years. Joey is first seen in the movie buying a red Ferrari, while she’s wearing a tight black dress, long black gloves and a thick diamond necklace, as if she’s trying to look like Audrey Hepburn in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” The only thing missing from this outfit is a diamond tiara.
The Ferrari is a birthday gift for Kwang, but there’s no love behind this gift. Joey can barely hide her contempt and disgust for Kwang. And neither can Joey’s 13-year-old son Raymond (played by Wyatt Yang), who is first seen in the movie packing a suitcase because he wants to run away from home. Joey convinces Raymond to not to leave. Raymond is Kwang’s adopted stepson. Raymond’s biological father was a pastry chef who died before Raymond was born, according to what Joey has told Raymond and other people.
Why is Joey trapped in a miserable marriage to a man whom she and Raymond both despise? That answer comes much later in the movie, but it’s easy to see that one of the reasons why Joey married Kwang was for his money. How much does Joey know about Kwang’s dirty dealings? That question is also answered later.
Meanwhile, in Minneapolis, a Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) officer named John Lawlor (played by Luke Evans) is undercover as a cook in a seafood restaurant, which is really a place where Kwang has been smuggling heroin. John’s badge accidentally drops out of his trousers on the floor while he’s working in the kitchen. Some of Kwang’s goons also happen to be in the kitchen, see the badge, and now know that John is law enforcement, even though he tries to deny it.
It leads to the movie’s first big fight scene, with John taking on four to six men at the same time. None of it looks believable. This massive fight is going on in the kitchen, which has a window facing the area where restaurant customers are seated. The customers don’t notice this violent brawl (their oblviousness is supposed to be funny) until something else happens.
At one point during the fight, John takes a handheld torch and lights an opponent on fire. The man in flames runs into the area where the customers are seated and jumps into a giant aquarium, which predictably smashes, causing chaos in the restaurant. In the end, John is able to get all of the bad guys arrested, find $300 million worth of heroin hidden in the restaurant, and save a dying goldfish that he brings back to his DEA office, where he keeps the fish in a goldfish bowl.
John’s no-nonsense supervisor Charlotte Fields (played by Pernell Walker) is pleased about this drug bust except for the destruction that John caused in the process. As soon as it’s known that Kwang is behind this smuggling operation, John wants to be involved in the sting to get Kwang arrested for drug trafficking. However, Charlotte adamantly tells John that he can’t be involved because of John’s personal grudge against Kwang for something that happened 15 years ago.
You don’t have to be a genius to know that this grudge also has something to do with Joey. (The trailer for “Weekend in Taipei” already reveals that John and Joey used to be romantically involved with each other.) Charlotte orders John to go on an “extended” leave of absence, starting that weekend. Instead of going on vacation, John (using the alias George Washington) flies to Taipei to try to get Kwang arrested for drug trafficking.
Because John is supposed to be the “hero” of the story, “Weekend in Taipei” predictably has an incompetent local law enforcement officer who’s too ignorant to figure out what’s going on before John does. This bungling cop is Deputy Liu (played by Tsun-Hua Tuo), who has people on his police force who are little too chummy with Kwang. When John arrives in Taipei, he gets in touch with two shifty-looking pals named Agent Simons (played by Zach Ireland) and Agent Freddie (played by Alain Figlarz), who are both in one big fight/chase scene, and then are never seen in the movie again.
If you’ve seen enough of these types of unimaginative action flicks, you can easily guess what happens in the rest of the movie. Evans makes an effort to give John a sardonic “know it all” personality, but it’s not very believable when John misses so many obvious clues. Yang gives one of the movie’s better performances as Raymond, a good kid who wants Kwang to be brought to justice. The rest of the cast members have unimpressive or bad acting in the movie.
The action scenes look over-choreographed or over-manipulated with computer-generated imagery (in other words: fake), leaving very little room for suspense, but a lot of room for eye-rolling at the ridiculousness of it all. The last third of the movie takes an extensive look at Joey’s past, including how she met John, the history of their romance, and a big secret that she’s been keeping from him in the 15 years since she previously saw him. “Weekend in Taipei” isn’t a movie that has a naturalistic flow. It’s a film that’s really just a checklist of formulaic plot developments that sputter along until the movie’s trite and hokey conclusion.
Ketchup Entertainment released “Weekend in Taipei” in U.S. cinemas on November 8, 2024. The movie was released on digital and VOD on December 3, 2024. “Weekend in Taipei” will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on February 18, 2025.
