Tempestade de fogo

If there is one Hong Kong action thriller to watch this year, it is without any doubt the exhilarating 'Firestorm'. Emboldened by the success of last year's 'Cold War', co-producer Bill Kong has set veteran screenwriter Alan Yuen to stage an all-out, no-holds-barred cops-versus- criminals action film set in and around downtown Hong Kong. The result is simply jaw-dropping to say the least, choreographed and executed on a scale we believe has never before been seen in any Hong Kong movie, and better still, complemented by a tight engaging script that draws you into its character-driven plot.

There is a hitch though - it does start off rather bumpily. The opening minutes try to pack too many details at one go. A prologue tries to establish Andy Lau and Gordon Lam's respective characters as rivals on the judo mat when they were still kids. Flash forward quickly to present day and Lau's Inspector Lui is the godfather to his informant's (Patrick Keung) autistic daughter. Meanwhile, Lam's ex-con To has just been released from prison, and despite promising his girlfriend, Bing (Chen Yao), that he has turned over a new leaf, quickly falls back on the wrong side of the law. All that backstory makes for a pretty confusing start we must say, but you'll start putting things together once the first major action sequence rolls along.

Led by Hu Jun's Nam, a crew of hardened criminals pulls off a daring midday heist on an armoured car. Flawlessly executed and backed with better firepower than the Hong Kong police force, they not only make off with the loot, but also in the process expose the ineptness of Inspector Lui and his partner's (Kenny Wong) team. To rub salt onto their wounds, Nam turns up right after the crime at the police station to taunt Lui by claiming to be a good and responsible citizen returning the badge of one of the police officers who had dropped it during the melee. The cops' only lead lies in To, apprehended at the scene of the crime for ramming his car into that of Lui's but claiming that it was no more than an accident.

The trailer would have you know that To eventually becomes Lui's informant, but it isn't quite so straightforward. Indeed, Yuen saves what you might expect would be another 'Infernal Affairs' variant for something much more unpredictable; instead, he focuses his attention in the first half of the movie building up the rivalry between Lui and Nam, the former a strict and rigorous officer of the law who firmly believes that his work is his mission and the latter a smart and cunning criminal mastermind with little restraint and even less mercy. Emphasising Lui's convictions as a police officer, the battle of wits between Lui and Nam is meant also as a test of Lui's own tenacity and, by extension, just where his breaking point lies.

To reveal anything more will not do any justice to Yuen's surprisingly twisty and compelling narrative, which plots a gripping trajectory on the way to the formation of a shaky alliance between Lui and To. Except for a deus ex machina that effectively substitutes Nam for another equally vicious criminal named Pak (Ray Lui), the storytelling is pretty much top-notch, deftly using a whole host of characters and their respective motivations to drive the many twists and turns along the way. Chief among that is of course just what will force a law-abiding police officer to his knees such as to abandon his deeply held morals, but aside from that, the more poignant question is in fact what would make a seasoned criminal 'surrender' his personal allegiance to the police.

Especially inspired is Yuen's decision to save Lui and To's alliance till the very end, by which time it isn't so much whether To will ultimately betray Lui but whether the latter will do so the former, seeing as how Lui is no longer the rational minded policeman he used to be at the start. It's a pretty nifty twist, made even more exciting by how it plays out right in the middle of an intense gunfight between Pak and his crew with the full force of the Hong Kong police in the middle of a busy street in the Central district. That extended climax is well worth the price of admission alone, not least for the exceptionally coherent choreography by veteran Chin Kar-Lok but also the sheer effort the filmmakers had taken to film what must have been a logistically mind-boggling sequence.

But it isn't just by the sheer scale and intensity of this last showdown that you'll be blown away; without any doubt, Chin has outdone himself yet again with quite possibly some of the most daring action scenes performed on the busy bustling streets of Hong Kong. From the opening heist to a confrontation between Lui and Nam's men within a public housing apartment building to a stakeout at a public square in between the Sheung Wan and Central area to the final all-out bullets ballad in the heart of Central, the stunts are never less than thrilling every step of the way - and breathtaking even - for the boldness in imagining and then the dedication to execute them.

And for Yuen's ambition of filming a true-blue Hong Kong police thriller, we must say that he has not only accomplished that with 'Firestorm', he has done so exceedingly. This is by far one of the most thrilling Hong Kong action thrillers you'll ever see, not just for its heartstopping action sequences but also for its captivating story of choices, consequences and ultimately principles. It is Hong Kong cinema at its most electrifying, living thoroughly up to its name of being a lightning rod for future such police thrillers to come.

Potential is the one word that comes to mind after watching this.

This is one of those films that really has some gems in it, but is sadly buried by issues. It's a film that is plagued by the issues that most cheesy Hong Kong action films have. Melodrama to the max, CGI all over the place, unbelievable turns of events and convoluted plot. The only thing that makes this movie different from other poorly made action films is... it's not that poorly made at all. In fact, lot's of moments are superb.

Starting with the plot, it's certainly something thats been done before. Cops VS Bank Robbers. The good side of it is that it has some interesting elements towards the end in regards to the morality of the main cop. The bad side... there's too much going on. We side plots all over the place. An overly dramatic plot with one of the criminal and his wife, who is of course friends with the main cop who has a friend who is undercover and has a young daughter and... you get the point, there's just too much. It's not that I don't think these elements could have worked... but they needed to choose only a few and make them way less dramatic. They try to make you feel for these characters by putting them in terrible or dramatic situations, but you end up laughing because it all seems so forced. It will sometimes leave you scratching your head in that way that a lot of Hong Kong films do. I often find myself confused by certain plot elements in these films, and I don't really know why. It seems exclusive to these Hong Kong films. And let me just say, the way they end this is ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS. I don't want to spoil it, but lets just say the "magically appearing truck" that kills a character got a massive "WHAT THE F***!?" from me and is a cheap and terrible deus ex machina.

One of the best elements is the action sequences, which can be gritty and hard hitting... until the GCI and ridiculousness kicks in. You find yourself really getting into it, only to be taken out when the obviously fake explosions send Andy Lau flying up and down and left and right and into cars and out of cars and on cars and blah blah blah. It's cheesy to the max and it blows my mind that they expect us to believe that he could survive all these explosions. It's frustrating beyond belief when you take into account just how gritty the gunfights would have been without this element. I'm pretty sure this was released in 3D in Hong Kong, which explains this element, but doesn't excuse it. Thanks for ruining some good stuff with a gimmick, guys.

There's also some nice directing and cinematography going on here as well. Certain shots are really gorgeous and nice to look at. Even the action scenes are directed well, minus the crappy explosions and stuff. It shows there is some talent going on here.

At the end of the day, I certainly didn't hate this movie. But it frustrates me more than anything, because I see the MASSIVE potential this movie had to be a classic Hong Kong film, but it misses the mark. I'm sure it won't be forgotten, as there are much blander films like this out there, but still.

They did what I'd thought impossible. So many bullets fired and stuff blowed up with an array of grenades and bombs that I actually grew bored when I should have been excited. The producers used up enough of an f/x budget for three of these movies, reducing the story to rubble as severely as to the buildings, streets and vehicles on the receiving end of the demolition crew's excesses. I expect more classiness and coherence from any film starring Andy Lau, making this even more disappointing. It devolved into the sort of direct-to-video fodder cranked out in low-overhead countries with a cast of deservedly unknown players.

Too much drama as in whiney music and over the top special effects and too many pointless shots of Hong Kong. The editing was elementary. I laughed and sighed several times but stuck it out to the end. About the only good thing is the hottie chick that mesmerized me. If you wanna see a good heist film with great plot and action, watch HEAT. Stay away from this Chinese noodle film. It's limp and needs some ginseng.

the prior reviewer wrote " a noteworthy lead role performance from andy lau ", or something of the sort. ...uhhhh, i'm sorry but, nottt! there was actually a very noteworthy performance but it didn't come from andy, i think he tried( he also produced ) but just wasn't up for a above average performance. unfortunately, he was just average and that was one of two things that kill a potentially great action genre movie.

my other gripe with the movie is that even though every action scene was performed in top-notch form, a couple of them were just way way over the top to the point that it make me snicker. on top of that there were another couple of action scenes that were very very hard to believe. the tracer bullets i think were more for the viewers of the movie.

...now, for the good. lam ka tung in a break-out leading man role finally. if lam wasn't in this movie, it would've been a disaster. he was a joy to watch and hes been a little better in other movies but never in the leading role.

even though i mentioned before that some of the action was too unbelievable, there were two that were very very memorable. there were a lot of action scenes and every one was well done, as campy as some of them were.

there was a very pretty leading lady who didn't get much screen time, a couple of big time actors in the leading villain roles ( ray lui and hu jun ), plus a whole slew of solid character actors. the cinematography was decent and if andy lau had turned in a grittier performance it still would've been a great action movie, even with some campy action scenes.

even with all its faults " firestorm ", is still a good action movie and there was some tension and gripping scenes in the movie. still too bad though..., it could've been a special one.