''Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea'' is a 1995 Belgian-French

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...

directed by

Marion Hänsel Marion Hänsel (née Ackermann; 12 February 1949 – 8 June 2020)1995 Cannes Film Festival The 48th Cannes Film Festival was held from 17 to 28 May 1995. The Palme d'Or went to '' Underground'' by Emir Kusturica. The festival opened with ''La Cité des enfants perdus'', directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and closed with '' The Quick and t ...

. The plot is based on the short story titled "Li", by the Greek poet and sailor

Nikos Kavvadias Nikos Kavvadias ( el, Νίκος Καββαδίας; 11 January 1910 in Nikolsk-Ussuriysky – 10 February 1975 in Athens) was a Greek poet, writer and a sailor by profession. He used his travels around the world, the life at sea and its adventures, ...

Plot

Nikos (

Stephen Rea Stephen Rea ( ; born 31 October 1946) is an Irish film and stage actor. Rea has appeared in films such as ''V for Vendetta'', ''Michael Collins'', ''Interview with the Vampire'' and ''Breakfast on Pluto''. Rea was nominated for the Academy Award ...

), a sailor, learns that the company that runs his ship has gone bankrupt. For the few weeks it will take to sell the ship he is on, the ship remains off the coast of

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

. It is boarded by a young beggar girl Li, (Ling Chu) who offers to take care of him in exchange for food for her and her baby brother. Though he claims to have no use for her, Nikos reluctantly agrees to the deal. Nikos struggles with an

opium Opium (or poppy tears, scientific name: ''Lachryma papaveris'') is dried latex obtained from the seed capsules of the opium poppy ''Papaver somniferum''. Approximately 12 percent of opium is made up of the analgesic alkaloid morphine, which i ...

addiction and regret over abandoning his girlfriend and their child. He warms to Li and her brother, treating them as surrogate children. When his final paycheck comes through he decides to return to Europe but not before bringing Li ashore for a day where he meets both her mother and father. Before they part Li and Nikos talk about luck and good fortune and she tells him that his luck has changed. As he boards a new ship to return home he sees that Li has given him a gold dragon embroidered on

Shantung Shandong ( , ; ; alternately romanized as Shantung) is a coastal province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the East China region. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilizatio ...

silk, the symbol Li had previously told Nikos represented luck.

Cast

as Nikos * Ling Chu as Li * Adrian Brine as Captain *

Maka Kotto Maka Kotto (born December 7, 1961) is a Cameroonian-born French-Canadian politician. Educated in France, Kotto immigrated to Quebec, Canada, where he was an educator before entering politics. Kotto was a Parti Québécois member of the National A ...

as African Sailor * Mischa Aznavour as Young Sailor * Koon-Lan Law as Li's Mother *

Jane Birkin Jane Mallory Birkin, Order of British Empire, OBE (born 14 December 1946) is an English-French singer and actress. She attained international fame and notability for her decade-long musical and romantic partnership with Serge Gainsbourg. She als ...

as The Woman Nikos once loved (voice) * Chan Chan Man as Baby Zheng, Li's Little Brother * Chow Jo as Grandfather * Wong Wong as Grandmother * Fow Tse as Stepfather * Cheung Chi Ho as Sailor * Chong Ching as Sailor

References

External links

* 1995 films 1995 drama films Belgian drama films 1990s Dutch-language films 1990s English-language films Films set in Hong Kong Films set on ships Belgian independent films French independent films Films directed by Marion Hänsel Films scored by Wim Mertens English-language Belgian films English-language French films French drama films 1995 independent films 1995 multilingual films Belgian multilingual films French multilingual films 1990s French films {{1990s-France-film-stub