Extraordinary Mission

Another user here called this flick 'heroic bloodshed'. I find that qualification a bit misleading. I'm of the opinion (not shared by everyone) that 'heroic bloodshed' should be reserved for a particular wave of Hong Kong action flicks of the late eighties and early nineties. For my taste, EXTRAORDINARY MISSION is too far removed from the meticulously choreographed, highly stylized gun violence that was so typical of those flicks. (The same user review that equates this flick with heroic bloodshed also mentions Bay as a reference point, which is more on the nose, I think.)

If we have to stick with Eastern action flicks for references I would call this a cross between INFERNAL AFFAIRS (written by the same guy) and last year's OPERATION MEKONG. Sadly, this flick borrows the convoluted plot from the first flick and the overall ridiculousness (and not to mention nationalistic attitude) from the second.

I have nothing against ridiculous action flicks, far from it, but EXTRAORDINARY MISSION tries to be a serious undercover cop drama while serving up nothing but clichés. It fails to be believable. Neither was MEKONG, but what that flick at least delivered was a barrage of hard violence and insane action sequences (with the shoot out in a mall half way through as the real high light). To see anything similar in EXTRAORDINARY MISSION you will have to wait until the last 20 minutes or so. The action is spectacular, but for me, it wasn't worth plowing through ninety minutes of unconvincing, uninteresting undercover blues.

If you're an action fan and haven't already seen OPERATION MEKONG I suggest you put this flick aside and watch that one instead.

This action film but not be for everyone because by many other action standards it could be considered slow. But my movie group liked it - they take time with the characters - they explore their backstories, there are quite a few characters to follow but hang in there. Because there are some set action pieces that are gangbusters. In fact whoever did the main motorcycle stunts and car crashes deserves high praise. Some real stunning stunts - especially when the guy rides his motorcycle from one building to another! Plot wise you've seen it all before - cop goes deep undercover as he tries to bring down vicious drug cartel, but it's handled well and the acting is pretty good. So we recommend EXTRAORDINARY MISSION for the action & stunts!!

Other than those chasing and gun fights, what we got here is a stupidly written screenplay and very bad and wrong casting job. So you just give some fake identity cards to a entry level cop, then this guy could so easily become an undercover druggie who could so easily infiltrate the drug cartel and rapidly raises himself as one the key persons in the cartel? What a joke! Then this guy could so easily arrange meetings with his handler and submit the cartel's activities, manufacturing factories, routes and whatsoever. The crappy screenplay simply making everything look so easily and readily arranged. And then we got the serious problem of casting. The leading actor who plays the undercover guy did a poor convincing job, his only thing to act like a lowlife is just keeping chain smoking. The car chase, the escape....whatever, every scene just look so conveniently and easily self-explained but simply highly unlikely and impossible, yet every impossible scene and scenario just worked out easily.

This film just borrowed a lot of thrilling action scenes to cover up all its impossible and improbable scenarios. The screenplay simply sucks big time, it gives you lot of busy scenes on the screen but never paid any attention to the logic and reasoning. It's more like a video game instead of a convincing movie.

After a promising start, some fine action sequences and beautiful scenery, the film slows down significantly around the halfway mark. It then drags the viewer through a series of events that I just did not find compelling enough. It only livens up towards the end again to bring us a great climatic chase scene with shooting and explosions galore. Like most drug trafficking films it did not capture my attention for the duration of the movie. I must admit, though, this one did have more depth and emotion than most films of the genre, and featured beautiful music, as well. I enjoyed the fact that all the characters managed to find closure for their inner demons.

Needless to say that I sat down to watch this movie because of my admiration and love for the Asian cinema. And with this obviously being an action movie, then what is there not to like?

The storyline in "Extraordinary Mission" (aka "Fei fan ren wu") was a really messy and fuddled one. It was a storyline that made very little sense in most aspects.

And it didn't help that the characters were equally confusing, and not really having any distinctive personalities. This mundane character gallery was definitely weighing down the movie in overall.

The movie was sort of sluggish throughout two-thirds of the movie, right up until the location changed to Thailand. Then the movie amped up its action sequences tremendously.

And while we are on the topic of the action sequences in the movie, then I must admit that they were quite good, and it ultimately was those that held the movie afloat.

"Extraordinary Mission" might have an impressive title, but the movie itself was actually only mediocre.