Accident

"Accident" is a Mystery - Thriller movie in which we follow a group of assassins who stage accidents to eliminate their targets. The leader of the group whose meticulously planned operations begin to unravel after a botched mission.

I liked this movie because it was very interesting, engaging and it had a nice atmosphere. The interpretation of Louis Koo who played as Ho Kwok-fai was very good and the supporting cast was competent, but they didn't reach Koo's interpretation. The movie was intriguing and its reliance on a methodical plot and action sequences worked perfectly. In addition, visually was sleek and stylish, with strong cinematography and enhanced psychological intensity. In conclusion, I have to say that "Accident" is a well-crafted thriller with plenty of tension and suspense, and I recommend you to watch it.

This Hong Kong crime drama is centred on a group of assassins who specialise in murders that look like accidents. They are Ho Kwok-fai, aka 'The Brain'; 'Fatty'; 'The Woman' and 'Uncle'. So far these murders have never been suspected as anything other than accidents but they know that one mistake could lead to them all being investigated. Their latest job is carefully planned but something goes wrong... a bus careers out of control, just misses The Brain and kills Fatty. Was it just an accident or is somebody trying to eliminate The Brain using his own methods. He quickly become convinced that it is the latter. Is he paranoid or is somebody really out to kill him?

One might expect a Hong Kong crime drama to be full of martial arts, shooting and exciting chases; this is different though. It eschews such things, instead opting for a '70s style paranoid thriller where the protagonist isn't sure what is happening but still struggles to stop what might be happening. This approach keeps the tension high as we don't know who can be trusted. Mostly it is gripping but one does occasionally have to suspend ones disbelief... solar eclipses are not surprise events they can be predicts centuries in advance! The cast is solid; I especially liked Louis Koo's performance as The Brain. Overall I'd certainly recommend this to fans of Hong Kong films looking for something a bit different.

These comments are based on watching the film in Cantonese with English subtitles.

I honestly wanted to like this one, it is somewhat moody and slow and ponderous, which I normally don't mind if it is done well. Take David Lynch for example, to whom this movie is likened... Now he does that kind of thing probably better than anyone else I feel because he reaches right down deep into the subconscious, and even though one might not consciously understand exactly what is going on, there IS indeed a powerful atmosphere and you do really feel a tugging at your subconscious which can affect you rather deeply.

BUT... this movie here sort of tries to do that. Technically, it is put together really well, and the acting is fine. Even the basic idea of this special group who arranges 'Accidents' is intriguing. Unfortunately though, in my lowly and wretched opinion, there just isn't enough true substance behind it. Or... if it had even half of the kind of deep atmosphere that Lynch can create, then this could have worked better as more of an 'Art' film. But, I honestly feel that it simply just doesn't have enough going on to do that.

I usually don't mind 'Slow'... But, this one is really, REALLY SLOW, but without any underlying mood or strong enough vibe to make it truly interesting. Yes, the story and plot ultimately are quite good, and the running time most thankfully isn't drawn out unnecessarily which I feel would indeed have made it quite a bit worse. BUT... when all is said and done it really just comes across as very slight and I'm sure more superficial than the filmmakers intended.

There just is not enough characterization to interest you in the people. And, there also is simply not enough going on surrounding the intriguing concept I feel ultimately to make it truly satisfying or honestly in any way really entertaining. Just not much 'there' there...

So, I can see how some might be able to 'tune in' to the VERY mild and extremely understated vibe here and possibly enjoy it more so. But, to me the bottom line is that if you are going to make a story that is this extremely slow and somewhat mysterious, you absolutely HAVE to have more going on, at least in creating a substantial, palpable mood of some kind in order to justify the rather slight things that are happening on the actual screen.

So, yeah, because of what I felt was a pretty strong deficit in the result, despite a very intriguing idea, I really could only give this a '5' It wasn't awful, but I truly think it will leave many feeling like there is nothing much really there when it is over...

I'm not sure what to make of this movie. It's not a long film, and so repeat viewings may make people appreciate its intricacies more. The film revolves around a small tight-knit group of assassins who work by killing their victims in ways that would appear to have been purely an accident, the "accident" being decidedly gruesome once executed.

Led diligently by a straight-forward highly intelligent man they call "Brains", they work to ensure no trace can lead the deaths to themselves. When the tables are turned and a member is killed, the focus closes on "Brain" who struggles to find out what has happened and gone wrong, and who is out to get them.

It's a moody film and uses the claustrophobic HK atmosphere well. One problem is that it's hard to decipher all that is happening from one viewing. It can get ponderous and confusing. The acting is generally very good and the action of the deaths very well done, but it doesn't compensate for the lack of clarity. Then again maybe it wasn't meant to be a tidy film and that is the point.

Overall, I thought it was okay and interesting enough. Maybe with some more work and time on the script then it could have become far better. Not bad, but just not great.

Accident's trailer gives a promising setup of a thriller focused on a team of assassins who make their killings look like accidents, but there's no follow through. Thrilling this is not, especially when you start to get into the grind of just how many niggling details have to be accounted for to make a death believable as an accident and how many things have to come together in the right way and at the right time or the whole thing has to be called off and back to the drawing board.

The movie might at least be intellectually interesting, but nothing is particularly believable or smart (the film is only capable of telling us Louis Koo's character is a genius rather than showing us) and there's minimal plot, dialog, or character interaction. Questions that should be asked aren't. Questions that no one really cares about are lingered on too long. Louis Koo plays the main character, Brain, dominating the screen time, and the disappearance of each of the other capable actors, none of whom are around for long, is keenly felt. I've seen Koo give some fine performances, but here he must spend most of the movie alone and silent, with no one to play off of, which is a tall order for any actor, even if they have a stellar script, which Accident most certainly does not. The silence also conveniently leaves out the need for the film to flesh out Brain's theories and what he's thinking and we're just left to guess--perhaps the director thought this would be a clever style because it would put the audience in the same mindset as the main character, but it just put me in the mindset of wanting to go to sleep.

With the main character being a stony hired killer, there's no one to root for, and it doesn't take too many lingering shots of Brain furrowing his brow to convey the wheels of his genius brain are turning while conducting surveillance of mundane events until you stop caring. Slogging through to the ending adds little, so you might as well just move on when the boredom gets intense. There's really not any "twist" at the end that redeems things, as some reviewers try to make out; I don't know if the film's creators really even intended there to be. If you're "blown away" by the ending, either you haven't seen many movies of this sort, or you should probably consider yourself a pretty thick.

Accident is just another triumph of atmosphere over substance that relies on cheap tricks to bypass viewers' ability to think critically about the weaknesses of the script by implying things that never materialize and various other manipulations that leave you feeling used at the end when it becomes apparent that the things you had to forgive in the hope that this was leading somewhere have led nowhere worth going. Overheard (2009), also with Koo (and Ching Wan Lau and Daniel Wu), comes to mind as an example of a better surveillance-themed movie.