This Tony
Leung Chiu-wai film is a little bit Shawshank
– it bears a lot of the narrative hallmarks of that iconic film, but despite
some strong moments and a good lead performance from Leung, it never manages to
be more than decent. Although there are
plenty of ingredients for a fine movie here, it doesn’t quite coalesce into
that satisfying whole (premise spoilers.)
Ahn, an
investigative journalist, has just published a major story on corruption in the
police department. His valiant stand is rewarded
with harsh retribution when a police chief/secret crime boss has him framed for
drug possession and sentenced to three years in prison. Ahn’s unjust sentence brings him a great deal
of suffering, but at the same time, he starts to recognize the depth of the
corruption inside the prison, and he rallies his fellow prisoners to fight for
more humane treatment.
This
film’s worst crime, in my estimation, is being seriously overwritten. While it gains some traction in the second
half as Ahn starts to find allies in the prison, the first half is kind of a
mess. The opening scenes have way too
many instances of stalwart Ahn, the only journalist in Hong Kong with integrity,
talking about how he isn’t afraid to stand up to a dirty police force. We’re talking drinking-game levels of
repetition here. And when Ahn arrives in
prison, the next sizable chunk of the film is dedicated to the horrors he
experiences: beatings and more
unsanctioned forms of torture from the guards, both humiliation and violence
from other prisoners, and all manner of indignities and instances of personal
suffering. Now, I don’t want to make
light of prison conditions in the least, and I’m not trying to negate what Ahn
experiences of his feelings about it.
But the way it’s done just doesn’t work for me. It feels like low-grade torture porn rather
than scenes with anything to say about the issue.
Fortunately,
things improve quite a bit when Ahn and the other prisoners start banding
together. These scenes still show the
injustices occurring in the prison, but they also have an “indomitability of
the human spirit” vibe going for them, making Ahn and his new friends much more
engaging to root for. Instead of an
unrelenting beat-down, we see a two-sided struggle, with the prisoners fighting
tooth and nail despite having the deck stacked against them. I understand that the film needs Ahn to find
his allies fairly slowly, but the first half could’ve used more of this
attitude.
As for
Leung, his performance as Ahn keeps me going in the rough first half of the
movie – the extent to which the character interests me is all down to his
acting, and it’s a relief to see Ahn find some fight in him later in the
film. Instead of just the
principled-if-somewhat-self-righteous character being tortured in every scene,
Ahn starts to emerge as a reasonable strategist who is able to play the game by
different rules than most of his fellow prisoners. What he lacks in size, fiercesomeness, and
street cred, he makes up in shrewd observation and a talent for skills the
other prisoners haven’t had a chance to develop (for instance, an important
victory hinges on Ahn’s fluency in English.)
I just wish we could’ve gotten to that guy a lot sooner.
Recommend?
In
General
– Not necessarily. While it has its
merits, the film spends too much time hammering the same few points before it
settles into the story it really wants to tell.
Tony
Leung Chiu-wai
– Not a must. Leung salvages the film in
the first half and makes of most of Ahn coming into his own in the second, but
the movie just takes too long to get around to some compelling material for
him.
Warnings
Violence,
sexual content (including rape,) drinking/smoking/drug references, language,
and strong thematic elements.
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