Chicken a la Queen (1990)

A film about prostitution in the usual subtle and tasteful HK style. The film stars a couple of former teen idols, Loretta Lee and Sarah Lee, playing less wholesome roles than fans may be accustomed to. They play young prostitutes on the mean streets of HK, selling their bodies (though we hardly actually see this) and getting battered by their pimps (which we see a lot of). The two girls have a friendship akin to sisterhood yet they have different pimps. One of them is a vile thug who delights in beating his women. The other is kinder... and an undercover cop played by Roy Cheung. 

The film is really about an undercover police operation to smash a Triad gang but mostly the film is a string of violent episodes between the pimps and their girls. Girls get dragged along by cars, thrown through tables, whipped, kicked and beaten. Yet somehow seem still more or less unscathed and ready to "work" a short time later. To be honest after the first hour of violence against women it does get a bit samey...

The two pimps have a rather unrealistic relationship, at one stage one is trying to burn the other alive yet a short time later (after a stern telling off by their boss) they are sitting next to each other with hardly a nasty look. As already said its a film about prostitution without any prostitution, well except one pretty much unnecessary scene where one of the girls bawks at selling herself to a black guy. Loretta Lee also looks a little too cute to be a brutalised whore.

But overall it's a well made film but definitely not a bundle of laughs.