The Heroic Trio is a superhero film with a fantasy element. A mysterious invisible kidnapper is stealing babies from hospitals, and police are powerless to stop them. It seems a trio of superhero women are their only hope. There’s Wonder Woman (not that Wonder Woman), a martial artist who’s really the wife of the police inspector; Thief Catcher, a gun-toting badass, and the Invisible Woman, who seems to be the very person kidnapping the babies. Turns out she is being coerced by an evil villain who lives underground, accessible through the sewers of the city. He’s looking for babies who could be future emperors, and the three women all have ties to him. However, they now must stop him and his powerful henchmen. It has a great cast, including Maggie Cheung and an early role for Michelle Yeoh (the film was released in 1993), but the movie is awfully silly. I can see the appeal though, especially for fans of 80s/90s B movie action flicks. ★★
Though I didn’t care for the first one, the sequel, Executioners, takes place in a post-apocalyptic world, and I’m a sucker for those films. It’s more of the same as the first, but does have less silliness, so that’s a plus. The fights are still goofy, but the story is better. After a nuclear war, drinkable water is rare, and controlled by one corporation. Most people scrape by on sips at a time, and the government seems powerless to secure more water for the population. The one water purification plant controls the pricing, and its owner has his eyes on the presidency. Our three superhero fighters will have to take him down and open up the water for everyone. The movie takes a little while to get going, but once a military coup breaks out, the shit hits the fan (in a good way). Leaps better than the first film, though I did admittedly have to rewind and rewatch a couple wildly zany fight scenes to see if I saw what I thought I just saw (and usually did). ★★★
Throw Down is from the same director (Johnnie To) but comes a decade later (2004), and this is finally a movie I really enjoyed from beginning to end. It begins on a young judo fighter named Tony, who has come to a bar to fight Bo. Bo was once a judo champion, but these days seems to only care for drinking and gambling. Tony isn’t going to take no for an answer, and starts trying to sober Bo up and motivate him into a fight. He is aided by a singer named Mona, who just wants to get a gig at Bo’s nightclub. And after awhile, we learn that Tony isn’t the only person who wants a piece of Bo; there’s another old champ who never got a crack at him either, and finally wants to get that chance. Lots of villains in this film, including pimps, money lenders, and downright crooks, but the film does a great job of showing the good side of bad guys and the dark side of good guys. Even the “main villain” shows that he has honor in the end. The plot is a little scattered, which at this point I just have to chalk up to the director’s style, but overall the story is really good and there’s some great, memorable scenes. ★★★½
A lot of moviegoers may not have heard of 2002’s Infernal Affairs, but there’s a pretty good chance you’ve heard of the American version that Martin Scorsese made based on it: The Departed (released 2006). While the movies are very similar, there are changes that I won’t go into. If you are new to it, it follows two diverging men, each a mole sent into the opposing organization. For the triads (Chinese organized crime), they send a young man to enroll in the police academy, and for the police, they recruit a young hotshot academy student off to infiltrate the triads. A decade later, each mole has excelled at his job. Chan has worked his way up in the criminal network until he is now regularly with the boss, and for the police, Lau has become a senior inspector with access to all of the police’s investigations. But now that they are each close to their targets, the danger level has ramped up, as one mistake can end in prison or death. They soon become aware of each other, and the race is on to discover their opposite’s identity. Outstanding film, filled with suspense and action in equal parts. I’d need to go back and rewatch The Departed to see which I like better, but this “original” version is definitely worth a watch. ★★★★
Mild spoilers below, since we have a direct sequel. There’s not much we can do moving forward with Infernal Affairs II, since Chan was killed at the end of the first movie, so instead, we get a prequel. This film shows Chan and Lau working their ways up their respective fields. We see the crimes Chan had to commit to get ingratiated with the crime lords, and on the other side, how Lau was able to move up in the police ranks, all while getting intel to the triads. We also see how Sam rose to a prominent role within the triads, and Chan’s and Lau’s individual roles in taking down the boss that held the position before Sam. There’s less action (though there are some mob hits) but more intrigue, and overall it’s a fantastic “how they got there” kind of story. Different actors playing the younger versions of Chan and Lau, but the rest of the cast is the same. I actually liked this one more! ★★★★½
Infernal Affairs III brings all the original cast back. It is told in present day (2003, when the film was made), after Chan’s death and what that fallout meant for Lau, and there are flashbacks to 6 months before that event, and some happenings leading up to it. More moles, more double-crossings, and honestly I got a little lost before it all came together in the end. The end is fantastic, really stressing the living hell that Lau finds himself in for the deeds he committed, and finally answering the question he’s struggled with since the first movie: can he still be a good person even if he committed terrible deeds? The ending saves the film, because there’s a little too much going on before that, but it’s a welcome and perfect final scene tying everything up together. ★★★½
- TV series recently watched: Furious (season 1), ST Strange New Worlds (season 4), Lioness (season 3)
- Book currently reading: The Gathering Storm by Jordan & Sanderson
