A Better Tomorrow - Film References

Film References

• Chow Yun-fat's entrance to the restaurant before the shoot-out is John Woo's homage to Mean Streets.
• Woo's film was partially inspired by the 1967 Lung Kong film 英雄本色 (pinyin Yīngxióng běnsè) which has the same Chinese name but a different English name: Story of a Discharged Prisoner, which is #39 on the Hong Kong Film Awards list of the Top 100 Chinese Films.
• The scene in which Mark Lee tells the story of being forced to drink urine is apparently based on a real incident involving Chow Yun-fat and director Ringo Lam, according to Bey Logan on the DVD commentary. This scene was recreated in Woo's Bullet in the Head.