Bay rong

What does matter in this movie? Isn't it the action? You can throw in a nice characterisation too and you have a nice mixture of an Martial Arts movie. What more to expect? The answer to that is up to you. The action choreography is good enough. The group effect and the actors do their best to hold the tight story together.

While it mixes a few things in the group dynamic (and a few foreseeable "twists" here and there), it does work as a straight story, if you do not expect too much from it. And the (brief)case should not bother you too much. Or the significance it holds (or doesn't). Even if isn't solved for you, this was meant to be that way. And while that seems a bit too much claim for a martial arts movie, it holds up

I must say that Vietnam is actually making a good jab at the martial arts movie market, and "Clash" ("Bay Rong") is an enjoyable action/martial arts movie.

The story is about a group of people who have to steal a laptop from a group of French people. But there is a traitor in the ranks and the laptop becomes an object that several groups of people come to chase after.

The movie wasn't really a character-driven story, obviously, it was without a doubt driven by the sheer action and in-you-face martial arts. And that worked out well enough, so you shouldn't expect to see a lot of award-winning acting here though.

"Clash" had some nicely choreographed martial arts and it was well executed. I must say that Johnny Nguyen (playing Quan) is truly a rising Vietnamese martial arts start and I assume we will see much more of him in the future. I have seen him in 3 movies that I can remember, and have been impressed so far. But Veronica Ngo (playing Trinh) also did some nice martial arts in "Clash".

I thoroughly enjoyed the story, the action and the martial arts in the movie. There were a couple of laughable moments though, such as where they were hiding behind a couch to protect themselves from the fires shot from an AK47, or using a wooden table for protection. That just wasn't very well thought through. But in overall, then the movie proved to be rather enjoyable. If you like martial arts movies with lots of action and adrenaline, then you should definitely sit down to watch "Clash". Especially the final showdown was enjoyable, lots of gunfire, kicking and throwing punches here.

I had never heard about this movie prior to buying it from Amazon, and it was bought simply because it was a Vietnamese action movie and I wanted to see how well the Vietnamese would pull this off. And I must say that I am impressed.

Expectations for any martial arts action film are usually the same: be entertained by lots of great fight scenes. Johnny Nguyen's martial arts expertise doesn't disappoint in Clash, but the film fortunately goes deeper than just that which places it in an elite category of martial arts action films.

Thanh Van "Veronica" Ngo plays Trinh/Phoenix and creates a beautiful, brutal, yet warm and caring lead character that is the centerpiece of the film. When she fights it is masterful, and when she breaks down over those she loves it is touching. Being able to believe in her diversity of actions and emotions shows her mastery of the character.

Johnny Nguyen wrote the story and has created a role for himself, Quan/Tiger, which not only has him taking a back seat to Trinh, but has created a complex character who has secrets, who has emotions beyond being angry at the bad guys, and of course who can grace the scene with his amazing fight sequences. As the dutiful right hand man of Trinh he follows orders, yet does so with a protective eye at every turn. It is obvious as the film progresses that Tiger is developing feelings for Phoenix and at the moment they are finally alone and safe from the chaotic world outside he expresses how he feels by saying, "I don't wanna call you Phoenix anymore, I want to call you by your real name." A subtle way of expressing his feelings that is easily understood by Trinh who made it clear that Rule #1 is never use your real name so you remain an anonymous person. Their moment doesn't degrade into a cheesy roll in the hay but becomes a conversation about the complexity of their lives while acknowledging the mutual feelings and finally the love scene (aka "roll in the hay"). A beautifully conceived scene.

And with the great acting and the complexity of the characters, there are some brief moments of genuine humor (not bad one liners), Christopher Wong's original adrenaline rush score and of course plenty of martial arts fight scenes that don't disappoint, in particular, raiding the house and fighting the "Frenchies." And all that leads to a conclusion that is not what you would predict (thankfully) and yet lends itself perfectly to the hard truth about the complexity that will continue to be their lives beyond this one mission.

If there is a downside to the film, it is the "briefcase." The item that everyone wants is never defined as to it's importance both in it's content and what it has the capability of doing in the wrong hands. From the beginning of the film the depth of the mission is unclear and the briefcase becomes just a prop with no tangible value. However, when you only expect action from a martial arts film and you get so much more with the development of the characters, who cares about the briefcase!

I picked out CLASH from the shelves on the strength of it being a Vietnamese martial arts thriller – and knowing the calibre of recent Thai fare in the same genre, I was hoping it would be up to the challenge. Sadly, it turns out to be a bit of a lacklustre effort, one that's hampered by a low budget and a lack of creativity and freedom in delivering the action.

As soon as the central team are holed up in a dilapidated, run-down old country house as their base of operations, I knew this would be a shot-on-the-cheap kind of movie. And so it turns out to be. Strangely, the plot seems to be virtually copied from the Frankenheimer movie RONIN, right down to the hotel stakeout, the double cross, and the reveal of one character's background at the end. Needless to say, it doesn't hold a candle to that movie.

Instead, this is the kind of predictable and slightly cheesy fare that appears to have been done on the cheap. The script is poor and the performances are nothing to write home about, which leaves us with the martial arts to contend with. I can report that the fights are pretty well staged, if not reaching the same level of greatness that we saw in ONG BAK, for example. Johnny Nguyen is a great fighter, but the camera doesn't love him like it loves him in WARRIOR KING and it's all just a little bit by rote. The same goes for Ngo Thanh Van – she's arresting, but only on a B-movie level.

The result is a film that's average at best, and which feels a little bit stale and past it's sell by date. Nevertheless, I plan to check out a few more Vietnamese movies to see what they're capable of delivering.

I suppose one of the best ways to plunge into the cinema of another country, is for action junkies like myself to see what they have to offer for the genre. I haven't seen a Vietnamese film before Clash, so it's anyone's guess how it would have turned out, though there were plenty of positive reviews for other Vietnamese action flicks such as The Rebel, which also starred leading man Johnny Nguyen, a veteran in his part of the world, who also served as the writer of this film. It shouldn't be that bad, right?

For the most parts, the film was mighty entertaining, telling the story of a female mercenary code named Phoenix (the stunningly beautiful Thanh Van Ngo) who had assembled a rag-tag group of peers to go on missions, one of whom happens to be Johnny Nguyen's Quan with whom she shares a relationship with. Her objective through these dangerous missions is to ultimately save her daughter from the clutches of her evil employer. So much for mother's love, since Phoenix was a one time prostitute who got taken off the streets to do her employer's dirty work, complete with a quick montage of her training.

That's as far as the story goes, with enough twists and turns and double crossings to keep the audience engaged in pretty much a flimsy plot, designed only to keep our characters floating from fight sequence to fight sequence, which is truly the draw of the film, influenced in many ways by Hollywood and Hong Kong action cinema from yesterdays. I have to admit even if there were shades of other films in this, at least this effort had made it through to production with an international crew assisting to spruce up production values, where in Singapore we're still lacking in playing catch up.

Killer moves got designed for Phoenix such as her thigh wraparound the enemy's neck or upper body before giving it a final fatal twist, but to get there, the fight choreography for most of the characters can get a little bit dull and repetitive. Everything will start off with the firing of auto or semi automatic weapons, and when the finite rounds get expended, everyone will turn into Jackie Chan - come to think of it most of Jackie's earlier action films were similarly designed - and relies on the punches and kicks to dispatch opponents. And it does get repetitive as mentioned with the usual punch-punch-kick combo moves that one's enemies could predict with every extended fight.

But thanks to some of the Mixed Martial Arts sequence, Clash at least attempted some variation, and without the use of wires and CG, the fights all look authentic and as our anti- heroes pit their skills against others they get into a battle with. However the finale was a bit of a cop out, which I suspect could have been influenced by test audiences to give it a more positive spin perhaps, since a plot element of a chunky inventory appears magically when in the first place it called for a more tragic and emotional convergence which had to give way.

Still, Clash offers quite a lot especially for action junkies wishing to keep tabs on what's on offer in our neighbour's cinema, and from what I have seen here with its charismatic leads who are not only good lookers but are able to handle their battles with aplomb, we may be in for more treats if more films improve upon what's available now, and could become major contenders for action films that can draw a worldwide audience.