A Better Tomorrow is one of the most extravagant, elegant gangster movies ever made. It became the highest-grossing film in Hong Kong history and single-handedly launched a new genre: the swashbuckling, guns-blazing hero film (not to mention spawning a sequel and a prequel). You might think you've seen this story before-two brothers, on opposite sides of the law, reluctantly teaming up to bring down a crime syndicate-but director John Woo tackles the material with such earnestness and passion that he does nothing less than reinvent it. It's truly a bravura piece of work-the tragic sweep of a Sergio Leone film crossed with the rhapsodic violence of Sam Peckinpah. At A Better Tomorrow's heart beats an ardent, charismatic performance by Chow Yun-fat (the role that made him a superstar in HK) whose devotion to his triad brother knows no bounds. Woo explores the macho code of loyalty and sacrifice among gang members (a theme borrowed from the Chinese wu xia pian or "martial chivalry" genre of the 1960s) with tremendous resonance, giving it a charge bordering on the homoerotic. --Tod Booth