Chuen zik saat sau

For those of us out there that miss the "Old" John Woo from The Killer, Hard Boiled, and A Better Tomorrow 1&2, Johnny To comes to pick up where Woo left off with Fulltime Killers. Now while some call that a blatant bootleg or hijacking of John Woo's style, I call it a pleasant revisit.

Andy Lau plays Tok, a flamboyant leather clad professional killer who not only takes pride in his work but also looks to put himself in the spotlight with every kill he makes. Tok is a sort of tribute to one Castor Troy of Face-Off, with his flair and his trademark smile which he flashes at all times. Takashi Sorimachi plays O, a more traditional killer with a guilty conscience, who stays in the shadows and executes his job keeping himself out of the spotlight. O's guilty conscience is the result of an innocent getting caught up in his world. O is something of a tribute to Chow Yun-Fat's character in The Killer. As a result of O's more low-key approach he is the highest ranked and most sought after professional much to the dismay of Tok. Naturally a rivalry will result between these two polar opposites in an attempt to be the top.

Acting as a catalyst to this rivalry is the lovely Kelly Lin, playing Chin, a mild-mannered video store clerk who is bored by life. An incidental visit by Tok to her video store, and a second job cleaning O's apartment begins a chain of events that puts her in the middle of these two professional killers rivalry.

Fulltime Killer provides mind-blowing action scenes and a love triangle that even guys don't mind keeping up with. A throughly entertaining movie and a throwback to the "old" John Woo puts this movie high on my list. Give it a chance, and you'll be entertained at the very least.

There seem to be a lot of Japanese movies that are pure exercises in style. I tend to like highly cinematic movies, so I usually enjoy myself, but somewhere along the way I always seem to go from thinking, this is just so cool to thinking, is there some point here. Fulltime Killer is lots of fun. It is very stylish, looks nice and has some very striking scenes. But it has about as much depth as a piece of typing paper. There's not much in the way of character development, and the movie feels increasingly unconvincing as it progresses. So while there is stuff I love, like the scene with the grenades, the movie as a whole failed to connect with me on any sort of intellectual or emotional level. Still, it is lots of fun, and I was torn between giving it a 7 or an 8 (which is usually the quandary I face when rating stylish, empty movies). Well worth watching, but not worth remembering.

It is the story of two professional assassins who live to kill. Both are act without remorse or second thoughts, are highly effective and completely relentless. Takashi Sorimachi plays O, the Japanese killer who is considered the best in his (admittedly limited) field. He kills efficiently, dispatching the target, his bodyguards and anyone who could identify him. He is quick, clean and much in demand by those who employ him. Andy Lau is Tok, a Chinese killer who wants to replace O but who is considered too showy and flamboyant. When O executes a hit he simply walks away and disappears into the crowd. Tok escapes on a stolen motorcycle while a police station explodes in the background.

They are brought together by Tok's envy of O and Tok's desire to replace him as the most sought after assassin in Asia. While they stalk and spy on each other, they are also linked by Miss Chin, played by the gorgeous Kelly Lin. She is O's housekeeper and Tok's girlfriend. Simon Yam is Inspector Lee of Interpol who leads a team going after both of the killers and who (literally in one case) are always just a step behind them.

There are references galore to other movies: El Mariachi and Desperado, Blood Simple, Hard Boiled, Point Break, The Godfather, Samurai and probably plenty of others that I missed. Even the Warner Brothers cartoons of Chuck Jones are referenced—one of the more outrageous assassinations by Tok has "Largo Factorum" from The Barber of Seville accompanying the action, in much the same way that Bugs Bunny committed mayhem to the tune of Mozart, Wagner or Rossini.

The action scenes are excellent. There are cars that blow up when shot, pistols that are accurate at 500 yards and huge shotguns that appear from beneath short leather jackets but even with these clichés the action set pieces created by Johnny To are exciting, fast paced, very violent and seamlessly shot and edited.

Sorimachi is properly dour and brooding, almost phlegmatic. His understated acting personifies the loneliness and isolation of his character. Lau, in keeping with his character, has a much more florid style—Tok could be a full time smirker as well as a full time killer.

While not exactly a return to heroic bloodshed—there aren't any heroes here—Fulltime Killer uses many of that genre's conventions. Very much worth seeing and recommended.

Fulltime Killer is a movie about assassins; one's trying to live in seclusion, the other is trying to showboat his way to top to become the #1 Assassin. Andy Lau does a great job as Tok, he has a natual arrogant look to him that really filled out the character. Tok is an up and coming assassin who takes any job he can find, difficult or not, and always delivers, throwing in extra style points to make his work unique.O, or Ono; is the current top assassin. He is played by Japanese actor Takashi Sorimachi, another good choice in casting. His methods are less flashy than Tok's but he is effiecient and very professional about his work. Over the course of the movie, a woman gets involved, as does Interpol, as news of a flashy killer quickly spreads across the surrounding area. The plot obviously ends up pitting the two assassins against each other(like you didn't know)and well, I guess you're going to have to watch it to see who becomes the #1 Fulltime Killer. But before I end this may I at least comment on the dialogue in the movie. I'm no expert in foreign languages but it seemed like there were 4 different languages spoken throughout the course of the movie, Korean, Japanese, Chinese(some form) and English. Like I said, I'm no expert so if they only spoke Japanese and English I wouldn't be surprised. But the dialogue between characters was well crafted, I enjoyed how the characters spoke their native language, or if they didn't, another character would inquire why they didn't. The action scenes were good, not too much physical action, but if you like guns, then this is right up your alley. Finally, I'd like to point out that this movie doesn't center around one assassin, it switches back and forth, and you really will find yourself rooting for one or the other by the end of the film. I rooted for O, did he win? Watch the movie.

Fantastic blood and bullets thriller starring Andy Lau and Takashi Sorimachi as Tok and O , two hitmen at the top of their game. O is the number 1 killer, he does his job and gets away clean. Tok is a showman, taking risks but always making them pay. To be number 1 he knows he has to defeat O, and begins to stalk his prey. Along the way, both hitmen fall for Chin (Kelly Lin), a young Taiwanese woman, and attract the attention of Lee (Simon Yam), a cop determined to bring them both down.

So far, so familiar, but Johnny To delivers a film that ascends over its premise to become a classic of the genre. The action sets are expertly done, and everyone looks totally cool - especially Lau. Slo-mo and visual effects are used but not overused, and there was clearly a decent budget getting thrown around (the list of sponsors in the credits attests to that). There's more depth here than in an average film of its ilk, but there's also a delightful sense of glee in the action pieces that make you think that those involved thankfully weren't taking it completely seriously.

If you're a fan of ‘heroic bloodshed' action and for whatever reason haven't seen this yet, do yourself a favour.