Summary:
Mark (Yun-Fat Chow) and Ho (Lung Ti) are friends and couriers for a Hong Kong crime syndicate specializing in largescale counterfeiting operations. During a sale in Taiwan, Ho is double-crossed and surrenders to the police so the boss's son can escape. Enraged, Mark goes to the traitor's resteraunt and kills him and all his men, but is shot during the shoot out. Meanwhile, Kit (Leslie Chung), Ho's brother, is a rookie cop whose reputation is tarnished by his gangster brother. When Ho gets out of prison, he wants to start over. Unfortunately, Ho is haunted by his past, and Mark pressures him to return to a life of crime as his partner. The rest of the plot is pretty straightfoward - with the boss's son running things, Mark gets no respect and Ho is worried for his life and his brother's so Mark and Ho must team up once more to topple the big boss.
Critique:
This movie was awesome. Surprisingly good character development too and an especially great performance by Yun-Fat Chow who is AWESOME as Mark. I can definitely see how this movie influenced reservoir dogs - the same sort of crime lifestyle, the suits, the seemeless killing, the butchering of people left and right, intense shootouts - it's hard to see how John Woo would go on to make crap movies like Mission Impossible 2. The action, while excesssive is not unrealistic - and looks like most of the stuff could be possible. Lung Ti is great too as a man who is torn by his loyalty to Mark and his promise to his father to keep Kit out of a life of crime. The movie is a great actioner driven by Yun-Fat Chow's superb character and Woo's brilliant direction which is fast and furious, and never lets up.
Verdict:
Buy this one.
If you liked this movie, watch...
...The Killer
...Leon (The Professional)
...Reservoir Dogs
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