Hong Kong cinema continues the trend set by Hollywood in glamourising violence, explosions crime and guns... some scenes look straight out of video games like Call of Duty. The action scenes are so violent, they took on an almost incredulous comical turn, Andy Lau's character was seemingly an immortal in disguise who survived more than a credible amount of car crashes, bomb/grenade blasts, direct gun fire and jumping out of high rise (sometimes exploding) buildings. There is a thinly veiled attempt to weave in a morality story about a pragmatic and too-late-to-repent criminal but it was a little simplistic, although the scenes were moderately salvaged by the strong acting of Chen Yao. Most interesting arc of the story was Andy Lau's portrayal of the obsessed cop forced to make ambiguous moral decisions in his search for justice. Unless you are the kind of person who really enjoys violence, guns, explosions and how the HK police force doesn't employ snipers to take down criminals in the open, then this film probably quite for you.
