Three triad gangsters kidnap and brutally torture a woman for one month until she died. Then they dismember and cook the body, hide the skull inside the head of a giant-sized Hello Kitty doll.

THERE IS A SECRET IN MY SOUP opens at the scene of the crime and then progresses to the police station, with the officer in charge of the investigation (Michael Wong) questioning the various parties involved. This provides the necessary lead-in to the flashback structure these films invariably adopt. Abused by her husband, Maggie Chan (Cherry Chan) moves out and into an apartment shared by Pat (Angela Tong) and her spouse Rocky, (Hugo Ng). Maggie begins working as a prostitute for the latter but eventually steals some money and Rocky's fancy lighter, prompting the pimp to send psychotic debt collector Joe (Gabriel Harrison / Hoi Chun-kit) after her. Maggie gave the cash to her sickly grandmother, so Rocky demands that she continue to work as one of his girls and pay him $HK20,000 in four installments. She runs away again, however, and Pat is unable to stand up for her this time. Rocky, Joe, and their buddy Fei then takes turns abusing Maggie in increasingly horrific ways.—IvanWong