This flick is a downer!
Everything about it is just sub-par!
Mark Wahlberg and Chou-Yun Fat, two pretty good actors, are wasted in this "snooze" fest. They are two cops, who don't necessarily play by the rules and are asked to bring down some huge, Chinese drug kingpins. However, the close links in ChinaTown working with them are merely playing them. This results in back stabbings, constant profanity, drugs, prostitution, murders, boring gun fights, wasted talent, a car chase scene which shows gratuitous shots of innocent civilians getting gunned down ( that's just not right! ) and a real clunker of an ending which involves the death of Fat's character.
The main problems are mainly the script and the directing. Director James Foley, despite making some acclaimed films, just isn't at his best. There are several scenes of the same thing (vulgar shouting, gun fights, etc.) happening over and over again to the point where it's completely old. I know it's a cop film, but it's not a well-executed one. The writers add some suspense to even it all up, but the film comes off as nowhere close to being thrilling.
It's not a "beyond bad" film, but it's not really worth a viewing either.
Everything about it is just sub-par!
Mark Wahlberg and Chou-Yun Fat, two pretty good actors, are wasted in this "snooze" fest. They are two cops, who don't necessarily play by the rules and are asked to bring down some huge, Chinese drug kingpins. However, the close links in ChinaTown working with them are merely playing them. This results in back stabbings, constant profanity, drugs, prostitution, murders, boring gun fights, wasted talent, a car chase scene which shows gratuitous shots of innocent civilians getting gunned down ( that's just not right! ) and a real clunker of an ending which involves the death of Fat's character.
The main problems are mainly the script and the directing. Director James Foley, despite making some acclaimed films, just isn't at his best. There are several scenes of the same thing (vulgar shouting, gun fights, etc.) happening over and over again to the point where it's completely old. I know it's a cop film, but it's not a well-executed one. The writers add some suspense to even it all up, but the film comes off as nowhere close to being thrilling.
It's not a "beyond bad" film, but it's not really worth a viewing either.