This installment is another prequel, this time concentrating on Chicken (who, for some reason is called Cock in this movie). Growing up in the projects, he falls in love with a girl named Gee (Gigi Leung), but she doesn't like his Triad lifestyle. They eventually come together after the death of Gee's mother (who Chicken respects as his own mother, so now his surrogate family is complete), but Chicken has to go on the run after killing a rival boss. Months later, they get back together and plan to get married but once again "the life" interferes with Chicken's plans and it seems like he and Gee will never get together, until almost ten years later when he meets up with her at Sister Thirteen's (Sandra Ng) wedding.

The movie isn't as violent as most of the others in the series -- in fact, there's kind of a "warm and fuzzy" feeling running through it. It would quickly turn into romantic mush if it wasn't for the good performances of Jordan Chan and Gigi Leung. This is still pretty lightweight stuff, but it's enjoyable, and it does flesh out the character of Chicken a bit more. On its' own, Those Were the Days isn't a great movie -- honestly, this "Triad and good girl" romance thing has been done to death. But as part of the series, I'll be a bit forgiving and say that it's a pretty good film, even though the script doesn't exactly fit in with the previous entries (it has Ho Nam joining the Triad first, whereas Young and Dangeorus: The Prequel had Chicken being the first of the group to join).

[review from www.hkfilm.net]