Breaking News

Imagine a street scene. Its not a flash street, just a small side street in down town Hong Kong. Something's going down, but we don't really know what - we can see two men in a car, talking in code with people on their radios, as they watch three men. Then all hell breaks loose, the three men are joined by a fourth and they're shooting. Their weapons cause foot long jagged flames, and those bullets sound like they're hitting spots not far from where we are sitting. We realise the two men in the car were policemen (Inspecter Cheung turns out to be one of the main characters), and they're joined by reinforcements. Lots of them. In a Police van, which the four gunmen steal and get away. Until they're stopped by traffic. More policemen. More shooting. Policemen in uniforms are surrendering and being shot dead anyway. Then the four gunmen make a final getaway, by stealing an ambulance, leaving someone stranded on a stretcher.

That's the first seven minutes of this movie. Afterwards, the gunmen hole up in a labyrinthine apartment block while the Police do their best to smoke them out - there is the CID (the good Inspector Cheung and his team half a dozen) and the OCB led by a very ambitious Inspector Rebecca Fong - there are something like a thousand (!) cops deployed in her assault on the building. Then there is the UCD (?), a sinister group, dressed in black body armour and face masks.

But there is more going on in this movie than the bringing of these criminals (and another pair who just happen to have been in the building as well) to justice or the turf wars between Cheung and Fong. The title gives this away - Breaking News. Thanks to the street fight, the media has got hold of the story and the cops are not looking good. So, most of what Fong is doing is playing up her response for the media - sending in 1,000 cops in bus after bus makes for an impressive sight. Then you put webcams on all the cops and select what is going out to the public. Hell, why not put a sexy soundtrack behind scenes of the cops going after their men.

But the crims aren't beyond playing that game too - they've got their own footage, in which they're winning, setting explosions off that are killing more cops. And they're holed up in an apartment with web access. Then, to show they're real people as well, they cook lunch, a really nice lunch it was too, and broadcast images of them sitting down to a joyful meal with their hostages.

Of course, with the kind of manpower the Police are throwing at the crims, you never really expect them to get away. And yet, the two leaders of the two groups get a lot further than you might expect.

Nice premise, nice looking but for myself it just doesn't completely fall into place for me.

Probably the most noticeable aspect to "Breaking News" is the cinematography.. No doubt about it, the cinematography of Siu-keung Cheng & editing by David Richardson are first class, but it is also the source of my greatest frustration with this film. For mine the camera moves around too often, too quickly & will come to a holt in a sudden jolt. The opening scene in particular is just nauseating despite the obvious skill in putting it all together.

Well worth checking out & I'm sure that we will see a Hollywood rip-off of this film some time in the next couple of years.

After a shoot out goes wrong and the police are made to look like fools the brass resolve to catch the bandits while using the media to fix their busted reputation. However things don't go quite as expected for anyone and what was a simple manhunt becomes a hostage situation with all of Hong Kong watching.

This is an odd film. The plot is a bit too complex for its 90 minute running time, with gunfire exploding often when you least expect it. It starts off with a huge shoot out and then changes feels and tones several times as it goes. And there are a couple of moments where I swear I missed some plot point or other, but found I was simply carried along with the momentum and didn't care for long..

It clearly wants to make a commentary on the use of media by organizations to look good, and it mostly succeeds. (I'm also certain that the parallels to how the US Government is doing a similar thing in Iraq was probably unintentional even if it does make you think.)

This is a very good, and very off beat film that moves to its own beat. Definitely worth seeing, especially if you like action.

8 out of 10

I've seen this movie at the Oldenburg International Fim Festival and I really have to say: It's quite good. The story - Police and its image in the media - is in interesting aspect in todays media world and it is worth to think about this relationship. This movie does right that and criticizes a too close relationship. Besides the story, the movie is a cool action-movie with a totally different style than the average western Hollywood-like action movie. Cool camera-work, nice different-angle shot and other cool stuff. It's just nice to watch. The viewer can see many shootings, but the humor does not come to short, especially the characters are quite funny. A negative aspect might be the usage of the "Bond-effect" (no bullet hits a good guy). But IMHO a cool action movie needs this effect. Otherwise there would be too many characters and there would be no development of these characters. All in All: 8/10, which means: Watch it!

The script is twisted and not exactly what you consider state-of-the-art in terms of European or American cinema. But it's Johnny To, so you know what you'll get. The cinematography is brilliant, the acting unfortunately mediocre, it isn't as intense as in Johnny To's last movie "Throwdown". But still I like this one better, for the Honk Kong pictures and the astonishing opening scene which was filmed uninterrupted for just about five minutes including camera elevations, camera entering appartments, a decent shoot out and a lot of 180° turns without any single cut. The staging of the action in the giant apartment building is tense and gives a disorientation that prepares you for any surprise. Gangsters on floor 9/C. Police on floor 8/B. But they need minutes to clash and one never knows what comes next. After short shootings everyone spreads in another direction and the situation is anything but clear. This is big cinema and gives a new idea how action and tension can be staged besides boring Hollywood standards. This movie owes greatly to the atmosphere of Hong Kong. Crowded streets, huge apartment blocks with the air conditions sticking out like giant bee hives, big limos... and not to forget all the different branches of HK police that always seem to quarrel with each other rather than fighting criminals. If anyone could explain the different branches of HK police and how they interact, feel free to send me an e-mail. There is no good and bad in this movie as the gangsters reveal sympathetic traits of character while cooking for the family taken hostage - they would have become rather cooks and own a restaurant than being "uncle killer" and "uncle bandit". The police appears to be completely disoriented and rather eager to get publicity than fighting the "bad" guys who are especially clever to use the media in their favor. The movie is probably ment as a satire on public organs such as the police and the manipulation of today's mass media to influence public opinion. As I'm no big philosopher I'm gonna stop evaluating right here. For all HK fans and everyone that enjoys a nice camera work including some shoot outs - you definitely have to watch this movie. I had the honor to attend a screening of this movie during the VIENNALE in Vienna on the giant "Gartenbau Kino" Screen.