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| Chongquing Blues - Wang Xueqi, Fan Bingbing; UPCOMING 11-5 2010 RELEASE | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Feb 18 2010, 01:41 PM (918 Views) | |
| Hitman-Reloaded | Feb 18 2010, 01:41 PM Post #1 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Wang Xiaoshuai starts work on Mosaic 24 September, 2009 - Chinese film-maker Wang Xiaoshuai has started shooting his new drama Mosaic, with backing from Beijing-based entertainment group Tempo Films Investment. Starring Wang Xueqi, Fan Bingbing and young actors Qin Hao, Zi Yi and Li Feier, the film revolves around a sailor who returns to his home town and discovers his son’s tragic death. The film will shoot for two months, mostly in the south-western city of Chongqing, and is scheduled for release in mid-2010. Tempo Films has signed a five-year, three-picture deal with Wang. The company is co-founded by Taiwanese director-producer Hsu Hsiao-ming, who wrote and produced Wang’s Berlin-winning Beijing Bicycle (2001). Apart from Wang, Tempo’s film production wing has also signed three other Chinese filmmakers: Yang Shupeng (The Robbers), Lee Xin (Bamboo Shoot) and TV director Li Jun. The company plans to produce five films in the coming year. Tempo Films recently acquired Beijing-based production and distribution company Cheerland, which previously produced The Post-modern Life Of My Aunt and The Children Of Huangshi, both starring Chow Yun-fat. The company now owns Cheerland’s distribution resources and plans to distribute a series of films and TV dramas starting with The Robbers in November. Besides film and TV production and distribution, Tempo is also exploring artist management and has signed up diving champion Tian Liang. http://www.screendaily.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | Feb 18 2010, 01:42 PM Post #2 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Films Distribution nabs 'Chongquing Blues' Gallic firm fields pic everywhere beyond China By JOHN HOPEWELL Gaul's Films Distribution has taken worldwide rights outside mainland China to "Chongqing Blues," the latest movie from Wang Xiaoshuai ("In Love We Trust"). Films Distribution sold Berlin 2008 Competition player "Trust." Its pickup comes as the Paris-based sales company continued to push out sales on a range of titles, including a sale at Berlin to Japan's Shochiku on Daniel Monzon's Goya winner "Cell 211." Produced by Hsu Hsiaoming, Hsu Bingshi and Wang for Tempo Films and WXS Prods., "Blues" toplines Wang Xueqi, Fang Bingbing, Qin Hao, Zi Yi and Li Fei. The drama turns on a father's investigating the death of his estranged son in a supermarket robbery. Films Distribution will present "Blues" at Cannes. "Wang Xiaoshuai is very good at showing the changing of the world, relations between generations: His main themes are all in this movie," said Films Distribution partner Nicolas Brigaud-Robert. "Blues" was well-received at the Paris Project co-prod forum last July. Scandinavia's CCV also took "Cell 211" at Berlon, while Atalanta Filmes took Portugal. http://www.variety.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 11 2010, 08:19 PM Post #3 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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3 VIDEO CLIPS CANNES |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 13 2010, 11:54 AM Post #4 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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HI RES GALLERY FROM CANNES PRESS CONFERENCE PRESS CONFERENCE VIDEOS - CANNES OFFICIAL SITE - |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 13 2010, 12:09 PM Post #5 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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FAN BINGBING ON THE RED CARPET![]() ![]() ![]() SINA HI RES PHOTO GALLERY |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 13 2010, 12:53 PM Post #6 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Press Conference with Rizhao Chongqing his morning the press conference was held for the film Rizhao Chongqing (Chongqing Blues) presented today in Competition. The director Wang Xiaoshuai and four of his actors, Fan Bingbing, Qing Hao, Zi Yi and Li Feier, answered questions from journalists. Chosen extracts. A symbolic drama about the loss of values as seen by Wang Xiaoshuai “A very important point which remains hidden in the film is the feeling of value. Because in a context of rapid economic growth, we have lost values. This is shown through the character of the father: he is seeking to know his son, to rediscover his values, but he’s lost him forever.” Fan Bingbing in a more ‘natural’ role “This role is very different from those I’ve interpreted before. Here I witness the fight between the police officer and the young man. The father wants to get closer to the only person who has seen what happened, I wanted to be that person. It’s the first time I’ve worked with Wang Xiaoshuai. He taught me to simplify: in this role I’m very simple and natural.” Wang Xiaoshuai’s attachment for the town of Chongqing “Chongqing is a town that has been placed under direct administration since 1997. It has developed very fast. Like New York or Shanghai, there are loads of skyscrapers, but in the course of this development, many poorer layers of the population have appeared. I really like Chongqing, I think I will shoot other films there. » http://www.festival-cannes.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 13 2010, 12:54 PM Post #7 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Rizhao Chongqing, a Chinese drama in Competition With Rizhao Chongqing (Chongqing Blues), Wang Xiaoshuai is the first director to enter the Festival Competition. The Chinese film maker, who is in the running for the Palme d’or, is back on the Croisette to present a film in the Official Selection for the fourth time in his career. Three screenings of Rizhao Chongqing are scheduled today in the Grand Théâtre Lumière, at 8:30, 14:30 and 19:30. In 2005, Wang Xiaoshuai was awarded the Prix du Jury for Shanghai Dreams, the story of a young girl who falls in love for the first time in a rural province, when her father wants to leave for Shanghai. In Rizhao Chongqing, he recounts the anguish of Lin, a ship’s captain who returns from several months at sea to find that his son has died, killed by the police. He returns to Chongqing, his former home in western China, which has recently become a mega-city that symbolises China’s economic explosion. He struggles to bring to light what has happened. In the course of this introspective voyage, Lin realises that he did not know his son well and that his absence was very hard on the boy. If Rizhao Chongqing signals the return of Wang Xiaoshuai, the film is also the occasion for presenting a panoramic sketch of modern China. As in a number of his feature films, the director bears witness to the social upheaval in his country. “I am often looking for stories that are representative of contemporary China. In the newspapers and on the Internet, I read many stories like this: bits of news like a hostage taking or police actions that often end in a dramatic way. I find this all the more interesting because the image we have of China is that of a safe and peaceful country These stories open up questions about the recent changes that China has undergone and they become the starting point of a film.” This China that Wang Xiaoshuai describes is very different from the one he knew in his youth. It is a country where economic growth has accelerated everything, a country in perpetual change. For him, this father symbolises the new contemporary China: looking back to his past, he realises he has lost everything. http://www.festival-cannes.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 13 2010, 12:59 PM Post #8 |
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Chongqing Blues (Rizhao Chongqing) Dir: Wang Xiaoshuai. China. 2010. 110mins Not so much a whodunnit as a whathappened, the tenth feature by mainland Chinese director Wang Xiaoshuai (Beijing Bicycle Shanghai Dreams) traces an absent father’s attempt to discover the circumstances behind the police shooting of a son he abandoned fifteen years previously. A strong performance by Wang Xueqi as the father provides emotional ballast but fails to make up for the glacial pacing of the drama; and although there are some effective emotional tugs and an evocative use of the film’s dirty industrial city setting, the audience’s investment in the slowbuild structure is never paid back in full. Wang’s films are virtually invisible in China, and while there is little except its portrayal of disaffected youth to trouble the censors in Chongqing Blues, its resolutely arthouse target means it is unlikely to be an exception. Elsewhere in the world continued festival action is likely after the film’s Cannes competition berth, and theatrically it may just add a territory or two to the pair (France and Greece) notched up by the director’s previous, the high-concept but low-tension leukaemia drama In Love We Trust. Chongqing is a big, ugly river-port city in Sichuan province. Dop Wu Di’s atmospheric camerawork presents it as a reticent, unromantic place, offering grey skies and walls of dirty concrete (in the city) or rusting metal (in the shipyards) to the inquiring eye. And reticence, not to say downright hostility, is what weathered ship’s captain Lin Quanhai (Wang Xueqi) encounters at every turn as he tries to find out what happened to his 25-year-old son Lin Bo (Zi Yi), news of whose death reached him six months after the fact, on his return from a long sea voyage. His former wife Yuying (Li Lingyu) refuses to let him in, but from some old newspapers she throws at him, Quanhai discovers that Bo was shot by police after stabbing two people in a supermarket and taking a woman doctor (Li Feier) hostage. Bo’s best friend, Xiao Hao (Qin Hao) initially refuses to tell Quanhai anything, but agrees to enlarge and print the only photo the father can find of his dead son - a still from the CCTV camera footage of the supermarket incident. There’s a poignancy here as Quanhai contemplates the blurred and pixellated face of the 25-year-old Bo, who he last saw when he was 10; the not-so-hidden subtext is that the father’s investigation is actually an attempt to build some kind of rapport with a son he never knew, and assuage the demons of guilt. But although all this is there for the reading in the twitches of Wang Xuegi’s impassive face the director never quite seems confident that we’ve got the message, repeatedly flogging the delicacy out of the pixellated-portrait metaphor. And although some of the meetings the stubborn father forces on friends and witnesses in the course of his quest are affecting, they also have a plodding inevitability about them: it comes as something of a relief to finally meet the policeman who shot the fatal bullet after ticking off the supermarket guard, the girl who was stabbed, the doctor who was taken hostage and the girlfriend whose dumping of Bo triggered his cry for help. Emotionally, the film is no less linear, moving from tight-lipped closure to something very close to sentimentality (underlined by sparse string melodies that become more insistent and weepy towards the end) as the father discovers that his lost son was obsessed with him, and the sea. As a film about fathers and sons, Chongqing Blues has some resonance. The film is also chock-full of images of passage and change: the river that flows down to the sea where two key scenes are set; the rusty cable car that connects port and town; shopping mall escalators, monorails, motorway ramps and bridges: all connect with the constant movement that is Quanhai’s career, and also, until he begins questioning it, his life strategy. But the slight, mushy story, and the overly pretty actors cast in the three main youth roles, are not really up to the task of carrying what would otherwise be a stimulating symbolic load. Production companies: Tempo Films, WXS Productions, Beijing Bona Film & TV Culture Co International sales: Films Distribution, +33 1 5310 3399 Producers: Hsu Hsiao-Ming, Wang Xiaoshuai, Hsu Bing-His, Zhang Hao Screenplay: Yang Yishu, Wang Xiaoshuai Cinematography: Wu Di Production designer: Lu Dong Editors: Yang Hongyu, Fang Lei Music: Peter Wong Main cast: Wang Xueqi, Fan Bingbing, Li Lingyu, Qin Hao, Zi Yi, Li Feier http://www.screendaily.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 14 2010, 12:05 PM Post #9 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Wang Xiaoshuai returns to Cannes Shanghai native brings a little controversy with 'Blues' By Jonathan Landreth BEIJING -- "Chongqing Blues" director Wang Xiaoshuai is no stranger to Cannes or controversy. The man, who will turn 44 on the Croisette this year, won the Jury Prize in 2005 for "Shanghai Dreams," the story of a father and daughter torn apart by the Cultural Revolution. A Shanghai native who was "sent down" to Southwest China in the upheaval of the 1960s, Wang was blacklisted for his first feature, 1993's "The Days," releasing subsequent films under an assumed name. In Competition with "Blues" this year, Wang will show the jury another film focused on China's growing pains. But there are signs that the trained painter, screenwriter and occasional actor -- he appeared in Jia Zhangke's "The World" and Lou Ye's "Weekend Lover," for instance -- may have mellowed with age, choosing to work inside China's restrictive film establishment when, for the first time, the potential for domestic commercial returns is real and the need to please festival juries (and overseas distributors) is diminished. China's boxoffice shot up 43% last year to $909 million and is expected to expand further as the growing middle class develops the moviegoing habit and begins to demand more than politically correct kung fu films and period war epics. In "Blues," Wang revisits the kidnapping theme of 1998's "So Close to Paradise" and takes viewers deep into the largest of China's self-governing municipalities, Chongqing, home to more than 31 million people. Based loosely on the true story of a Chinese policeman who shot and killed hostage taker in a shopping center in 2008 -- and coming on the heels of news reports of widespread corruption and kidnapping in the southwestern megacity -- "Blues" could shine a timely, dramatic light. When lead character Old Lin discovers that his estranged 25-year-old son was gunned down by police for stabbing a waitress and kidnapping a nurse, he searches for reasons for his son's failures and finds only his absence to blame. But Wang chose not to put the policeman at the center of "Blues" because, he said, "the censors wouldn't have liked that." He chose instead to tell the story from the perspective of Old Lin, the victim's father. In a telephone interview, Wang addressed the meaning of the son's tragedy and his father's search for redemption, cautiously allowing that Old Lin, played by veteran actor Wang Xueqi, is a "little bit" of an stand-in for China today. "There are so many stories of kidnapping in China, but this one stuck out because the policeman wrote about his regrets on the Internet afterwards, answering netizens' questions," Wang said. Further revealing the allegory between art and life in China, Wang's choice to work closely with censors -- who made "very little change" to "Blues" -- gave him hope that his film may be released here in June. Self-censor and get paid seems to be the message: "I think they want to put it out at the Shanghai Film Festival," he said, hopefully. It would be hasty to dismiss as compromise the choices made by director Wang and his lead actor, whose career stretches back to Chen Kaige's "Yellow Earth (1984). To lovers of Chinese cinema, both men are symbols of the finely honed adaptive skills it takes to make movies in China. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 14 2010, 12:08 PM Post #10 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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Chongqing Blues -- Film Review Bottom Line: An average father-and-son angst story with a strong lead performance By Maggie Lee CANNES -- Even though upgraded to Competition from its original place in Un Certain Regard, "Chongqing Blues" represents no notable artistic leap in Sixth Generation filmmaker Wang Xiaoshuai's repertoire. Flowing with the same pensive, heavy cadence of the river that visually and metaphorically dominates the film, it is an old style exploration of the new face of China through an itinerant father's return to the titular city to make sense of his son's death after abandoning his family for 15 years. It may be solidly directed with Bressonian detachment and anchored by an absorbing performance by lead actor Wang Xueqi, but it is neither outstanding nor revelatory enough to play outside of a cluster of European art house cinemas. While away on a long voyage, ship captain Lin Quanhai (Wang)'s 24-year-old son Bo (Zi Yi) was shot by police for a random stabbing and hostage taking incident in a mall. Lin left his native city Chongqing when Bo was only 10. He goes back to talk to those involved in the case or close to Bo's life in order to understand the circumstances of his death. Lin's journey is both that of an errant father taking stock of his guilty past and the return of a prodigal son to his hometown to find himself an outsider. However, other than a vague suggestion of wanderlust and phone calls from Lin's new wife expressing agitation at his long absence, there is no penetration into why he was unwilling to stay put with either of his families. Wang's director's statement citing Lin as a symbol of restless, ever-changing contemporary China doesn't explain or convince. Wang's usual strength of depicting without condescension youth boxed in by their backgrounds ("Beijing Bicycle") or political milieu ("Shanghai Dreams") are compromised by contrived scenes to emphasize Lin's disconnect from his son's generation -- like his gawking in the club where Bo's buddy Hao (Qin Hao) dances, or his attempt to enlarge a screen-capture image of Bo (the pixilated effect symbolizes his blurry impression of his son). Nor do accounts or flashbacks by Hao, Bo's girlfriend Xiaowen (Li Feier) or the hostage (Fan Bingbing) provide enough insight into Bo's inner world and eventual breakdown (except that he misses his dad), to make him speak for China's disaffected youth. The city's grungy character is captured by a roving handheld camera that follows Lin's from behind as he wanders around muggy streets strewn with dank and weathered buildings, always teeming with scruffily dressed crowds wearing stressed out frowns. These downcast images are intermittently juxtaposed with splendid wide shots of the riverside cityscape, veiled in layers of fog and haunting compositions of a pier filled with scrap construction vehicles. Editing is clean and maintains a comfortably measured pace even if the film is overall too long at 115 minutes. Occasional use of a romantic piano score sits awkwardly with the gritty realism conveyed by the ambient sound and natural lighting in outdoor scenes. Venue: Festival de Cannes -- Competition Sales: Film Distribution Production companies: Tempo Films, Beijing Bona Films & TV Culture Co., WXS Productions Cast: Wang Xueqi, Fan Bingbing, Qin Hao, Zi Yi, Li Feier Director-screenwriter: Wang Xiaoshuai Screenwriter: Yang Yishu Producers: Hsu Bing-Hsi, Zhang Hao Director of photography: Wu Di Production designer: Lu Dong Music: Henry Wu Costume designer: Fang Yan Editors: Yang Hongyu, Fang Lei No rating, 115 minutes http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 14 2010, 12:28 PM Post #11 |
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Chongqing Blues Rizhao Chongqing (China) By JUSTIN CHANG A Tempo Films, WXS Prods. and Beijing Bona Films & Television Culture Co. presentation. (International sales: Films Distribution, Paris.) Produced by Hsu Hsiao-ming, Wang Xiaoshuai, Hsu Bing-his, Zhang Hao. Co-producer, Isabelle Glachant. Directed by Wang Xiaoshuai. Executive director, Li Shuang. Screenplay, Yang Yishu, Wang. (Mandarin dialogue) An irreparable father-son bond triggers a study in bleak cityscapes and pervasive intergenerational malaise in "Chongqing Blues." Initially as glum as its title would suggest, Wang Xiaoshuai's poignant if plodding ninth feature -- which follows an absentee father trying to glean information about the dead son he never knew -- eventually opens up with a handful of quietly affecting moments, but elsewhere bogs down in psychodramatic flashbacks that ultimately sentimentalize as much as they clarify. Respectable fest run looks assured for a downbeat drama that won't do much to widen the Chinese helmer's commercial following offshore. Forming a loose urban triptych with Wang's "Beijing Bicycle" (2002) and Cannes jury prizewinner "Shanghai Dreams" (2005), "Chongqing Blues" opens with a blunt, effective evocation of its title: It's Chongqing, and it's blue. A cable car carries sea captain Lin Quanhai (Wang Xueqi) above the harbor and into the city, located in China's Sichuan province and captured here at bustling street level. Quanhai is on a sad and lonely mission: Returning from several months at sea, he's seeking firsthand accounts of the recent death of his son Bo (Zi Yi, seen in the past), who knifed two people in a mall, took one hostage and was eventually shot dead by police. Angrily rebuffed by the boy's grief-stricken mother -- who, like Quanhai, now has a family of her own -- the father patiently, doggedly reaches out to those involved: the two stab victims, the brave hostage (Fan Bingbing), even the cop who fired the gun. With some persuasion, most of them prove willing to talk, their firsthand accounts murkily illustrated by flashbacks and security-cam footage. Pic is shot in a key of dour naturalism, with little artificial lighting and a searching handheld style that mirrors the restless probing of Quanhai's quest; Wu Di's camera frequently favors a position from directly behind the man's head, suggesting a Sino spin on the Dardenne brothers' "The Son," also a fable of fatherly redemption. Yet there's a rather studied quality to the bleakness here, which is interrupted periodically by explosive emotional outbursts that don't always feel organic. Quanhai is obsessed with piecing together a portrait of his son (quite literally, when he demands a blown-up poster of Bo's face from a low-grade screen capture), setting up a psychological mystery that the flashbacks dispel rather too quickly. These scenes do energize the film to a degree, administering a jolt of hostage drama to the proceedings. But the more we see of this troubled teen, the less interesting he becomes, especially in a contrived memory sequence, set at the port city of Rizhao (pic's Chinese title is "Rizhao Chongqing"). As ever with Wang's films, "Chongqing Blues" is invested in thematic questions that loom large over the central drama, as signaled by repeated shots of the city's fog-enshrouded skyline. An immersive sequence set in a nightclub jammed with revelers blissing out on teen pop conveys the profound alienation Quanhai (and by extension, all parents his age) feels toward the younger generation -- depicted here as almost uniformly aimless party animals, too busy texting and shooting pool to show their elders the proper respect. Countering this ungenerous view somewhat is the character of Bo's best friend, Xiao Hao (well played by Qin Hao), who resists Quanhai's company at first but eventually comes around. So, too, does the audience, helpfully enabled by vet thesp Wang Xueqi's stoic, stubborn yet affable presence as a dad trying to bridge the generation gap and atone for his negligence -- and, in the film's relatively optimistic view, succeeding as best he can. Music, withheld at first but for a few wryly plucked guitar strings, gradually trickles into the picture and threatens to turn downright treacly in the final stretch. Camera (color, widescreen), Wu Di; editors, Yang Hongyu, Fang Lei; music, Peter Wong; art director, Lu Dong; set decorator, Guo Zhen; costume designer, Pang Yan; sound designer, Fu Kang; line producer, Yuan Yi-hsin. Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (competing), May 13, 2010. Running time: 114 MIN. http://www.variety.com/ |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | May 15 2010, 03:15 AM Post #12 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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![]() 12 MIN PRESS CONFERENCE - VIDEO |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | Oct 28 2010, 03:36 AM Post #13 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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![]() ![]() FULL GALLERY |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | Oct 28 2010, 03:38 AM Post #14 |
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Black Belt 10th Dan
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[YOUTUBE]http://you.video.sina.com.cn/api/sinawebApi/outplayrefer.php/vid=40470357_28/s.swf[/YOUTUBE] |
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| Hitman-Reloaded | Oct 28 2010, 03:41 AM Post #15 |
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