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(Daai si gin)
Johnnie To, Hong Kong / China, 2004
3 out of 4 stars

The film kicks off with a violent confrontation between police and robbers, in which a beat cop is caught in the fray and, what’s worse, caught on camera looking particularly unheroic. This opening sequence is a setup for an hostage plot in which the commanding officer’s main goal is to craft a counternarrative for the media in order to restore her department’s credibility and public image.

The word “satire” popped into my head as I thought about how to describe this movie, but aside from some typically dubious uses of technology, the film avoids that slightly-exaggerated, larger-than-life tone of most satirical films. Indeed, it’s commentary on how PR holds equal importance with solving crime for police today is not particularly subtle, but it does constitute an interesting angle for what could have otherwise been a rote police drama. I find it interesting that, for the most part, the filmmakers refrain from condemning anyone overtly. This leads to less of the usual hand-wringing and finger pointing that we might expect from an American mainstream film attempting to tackle this subject.

The main downside to this film is that characterization is very slight. This is, of course, a film without much filler or prologue, so this decision seems to have been deliberate. I must confess, however, that I do like characterization, and without it, the connections between the characters sometimes seem hard to understand or unearned. It’s also a little difficult to see how the stock “renegade cop” character really ties in to the central commentary of the film, except until maybe the end, and that doesn’t seem to be that crucial, really. It’s almost as if his character is a major concession to the “bread and circuses” reality of mainstream film, something that is as much of an issue in Hong Kong as it is here, in all honesty.

Source: UMVD DVD
10 June, 8:27 PM