The Twins Effect – Chin Gei Bin (2003)

Directed by: Dante Lam, Donnie Yen | 105 minutes | action, comedy, adventure, horror | Actors: Ekin Cheng, Charlene Choi, Gillian Chung, Jackie Chan, Anthony Wong, Edison Chen, Mickey Hardt, Josie Ho, Ricardo Mamood, Maggie Lau, Karen Mok, Winnie Leung, Mandy Chung, Digger Mesch, Marky Lee Campbell

Anyone who thought that the life of a film critic is only a bed of roses is wrong. Indeed, it is nice to watch some videos and write a piece about it. But sometimes, very occasionally, you come across a movie that you really don’t know what to do with. ‘The Twins Effect’ is such a movie.

Which by the way does not mean that this film is bad, because this Hong Kong production is not. This is typically one of those movies that you don’t remember anything about afterwards. If you have to give a description of this film, then words like ’empty’ and ‘entertaining’ come to mind first.

‘The Twins Effect’ is so messy and chaotic that the storyline gets completely snowed under by the flashy action scenes and slapstick humor. A vague script tells something about vampires that need to be stopped. Of course, that does not happen with a good conversation full of mutual understanding. No, the villains with the pointy fangs have to face harshly that they are not wanted on our beautiful planet. So a brave organization takes on the undead.

Well, you can’t accuse the makers of this film of originality. ‘The Twins Effect’ has ‘borrowed’ a lot of elements from the ‘Blade’ movies. Yet this Chinese production manages to distinguish itself from the Wesley Snipes vehicles. The atmosphere of this Hong Kong spectacle is much more light-hearted and cheerful than that of the self-serious ‘Blade’ trilogy.

The unadulterated, saccharine bite-swallow ambiance of ‘The Twins Effect’ is easy to explain. In fact, this Hong Kong product is nothing more than a commercial disguised as a feature film. What is the case? The word ‘Twins’ in the English title of this cinematographic nobody refers to Charlene Choi and Gillian Chung. The ladies are extremely popular in China as a singing duo. Their nickname is, surprisingly, ‘the twins’ aka ‘The Twins’.

Choi and Chung are the lure of the film. At least in Asia, here in Europe hardly anyone has ever heard of them.

It will soon become clear to you that the film is built entirely around the twins. Director Dante Lam never misses a moment to portray his muses. And to be honest, that’s quite pleasant. The girls look nice and although they don’t act very well now, they manage to camouflage that with their enthusiasm and pleasant appearance. In addition, the two are quite well attuned to each other and that sometimes results in quite comical moments. And a few songs of course, after all it is about a singing duo.

But then again, what should you do as a film distributor with a film that purely relies on the ‘star power’ of two girls that the audience in Europe does not know? Simple: put the name of an actor who is well known here just pontifically on the cover of the DVD.

In order to market this film in our country, distributor Bridge has chosen to present living legend Jackie Chan as an attraction. And as is often the case, that is completely unjustified. Chan’s presence in ‘The Twins Effect’ is minimal.

Another point where Bridge goes wrong is with the language edition. With the DVD you can only ‘choose’ to play the film in English. And that’s a shame, because a film is always best in the original language. In the case of ‘The Twins Effect’ it is Cantonese. It must be said that the English dubbing of this film is not nearly as disastrous as you would expect from the average Hong Kong film, but it is still a shame that you do not have the choice to choose your favorite sound channel yourself.

After all this criticism, you might be inclined to think that this Hong Kong piece is a worthless piece of junk. Nothing is less true! ‘The Twins Effect’ guarantees an evening of carefree entertainment. The action is well put together and the humor is so innocent that you will never be annoyed by it. All this is packed in a flashy jacket that fits so nicely that you’ll forget you’re wearing it once you’ve closed the last button.