A Better Tomorrow (4K Digitally Restored Version)

Dir: John Woo
Scrs: John Woo, Chan Hing-kai, Leung Suk-wah
Prod Co: Cinema City
Cast: Ti Lung, Leslie Cheung, Chow Yun-fat, Waise Lee, Emily Chu
1986 | Colour | DCP | Cantonese | Chi & Eng Subtitles (with Korean projected subtitles) | 96min

When producer Tsui Hark and director/screenwriter John Woo started working on a remake of Patrick Lung Kong’s classic The Story of a Discharged Prisoner (1967), they retained the basic plot of the original (a former gangster trying to redeem himself despite pressure from both sides of the law) but heightened the theme of blood-brotherhood and moral chivalry. Celebrating the gallant valour and loyalty of the outlaw, the film adds a layer of tragic poignancy to the usually gritty gangster genre. Woo draws inspiration from the action aesthetics of his mentor Chang Cheh, formulating in A Better Tomorrow a signature style animated by male camaraderie and stylised violence. Actor Chow Yun-fat’s charismatic Mark, a new character not found in Lung’s original, fashions an iconic look styled by costume designer Bruce Yu, becoming one of the most memorable characters in Hong Kong cinema and sparking a craze among young audiences.

With its visually spectacular gunfight sequences and romanticised reinterpretation of the gangster genre, A Better Tomorrow broke multiple box-office records and also popularised Hong Kong gangster films in overseas markets. Since 1987, the film has been screened multiple times in Korea, where it remains deeply beloved and influential. It inspired a 2010 film and a 2019 musical of the same title, while other works such as Reply 1988 (2015), Extreme Job (2019), and The Worst of Evil (2023) have all paid tribute to Woo’s film in different ways.

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