Mr. Six

Some actors come to the job late. Feng Xiaogang is one of the most commercially successful directors in China and for years he only turned up on screen in bit parts, until Guan Hu handed him the lead in 'Mr. Six'. The film closed the 2015 Venice Film Festival out of competition, played Toronto, opened in China on Christmas Eve and reached British screens on Boxing Day that same year. It was shot under a different name, 'Fading Wave'.

Zhang Xuejun, whom the whole neighbourhood calls Mr. Six, is pushing sixty and lives in a Beijing hutong with a small shop out front. Back in the eighties he was the most feared brawler around and a little of that still holds: neighbours and policemen still listen to him when he starts handing out justice his own way, which runs on giving back what you stole, apologising and looking the other man in the eye. His son Xiaobo moved out a while ago and he's far too proud to go looking for him.

Then word reaches him that the boy is in trouble with a gang of rich kids who race cars for fun. Xiaobo keyed their leader's Ferrari and slept with his girlfriend, so they're holding him in a garage until someone produces one hundred thousand yuan within three days. Mr. Six agrees that his son should pay what he owes, because his code allows no exceptions, but he won't swallow the sneering of boys with money. He gathers his old cronies, scrapes the cash together as best he can and, with a heart that has begun to warn him, proposes settling it the old way, out on a frozen lake.

Alongside Feng are Zhang Hanyu as his friend Men San'er, Xu Qing, Li Yifeng and the singer Kris Wu, while director Ning Hao pops up as an estate agent. Shooting took over Beijing between late November 2014 and February 2015, which means the cold in the alleys and on the ice is the real thing. Most of the international press came down on its side, and more than one critic placed it next to the Clint Eastwood of 'Unforgiven' and 'Gran Torino'. It took around 139 million dollars, Feng won Best Actor at the Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan, the Golden Roosters gave the screenplay their prize and the Hundred Flowers went to Xu Qing and Li Yifeng. Guan Hu went on to make 'The Eight Hundred' and 'Black Dog'.

• Crime
• Action
• Drama