Hard-Boiled

A striking yet overlong actioner, Hard-Boiled follows grizzled police officer Tequila Yuen (Chow Yun-Fat) as he reluctantly agrees to team up with an unstable undercover cop (Tony Leung’s Tony) to take down a vicious crime lord (Anthony Wong’s Johnny Wong). Filmmaker John Woo opens Hard-Boiled with a gripping and thoroughly exciting shootout that proves instrumental at instantly capturing the viewer’s interest, and there’s little doubt that one is subsequently forced to wonder if the movie has peaked at the 10-minute mark. It’s just as clear, however, that the film does suffer from a rather standard (yet surprisingly convoluted) cops-and-robbers storyline that’s been peppered with a variety of conventional elements (ie Tequila is chewed out by a furious superior), with the familiar atmosphere exacerbated by the pronounced lack of character development among the movie’s myriad of periphery figures. (This proves to be especially problematic in the case of central villain Johnny Wong, as the character never entirely becomes the fearsome, odious presence that one imagines he’s meant to.) Woo compensates for the less-than-engrossing narrative by throwing in one increasingly over-the-top action sequence after another, with the film eventually arriving at an almost insanely violent climax in which Tequila and Tony are forced to battle dozens of armed thugs within the confines of a crowded hospital. It’s a captivating stretch that perhaps goes on just a little bit too long – ie after a certain point, the relentless gunfire becomes mind-numbing – but Hard-Boiled is ultimately, for the most part, a picture-perfect example of what the ideal action flick should look like.

*** out of ****