The Fire Raven
匿杀
China, 2025, colour, 2.35:1, 115 mins.
Director: Ke Wenli 柯汶利 [Sam Quah].
Rating: 6/10.
Serial-killer whodunit starts intriguingly and has a strong cast but goes completely o.t.t. in the over-stuffed, poorly developed second half.
STORY
Doma [Douma] city, an island in the Pacific Ocean, somewhere in Southeast Asia, 9 Jun 2025. In the middle of the night Taralah (Huang Yi), 43, drunkenly staggers back to her flat in Amber Apartments, where she is murdered by a cloaked figure wearing a traditional mask used during the island’s forthcoming Raven Festival 乌勇节. The island is wracked by civil unrest, especially because of the heavy air pollution due to the build-up of soot underground; the government has promised to deal with the problem but instead has imposed a ventilation tax that has proved very unpopular. Fang Tianyang (Peng Yuchang) is an orphan who has lived in Doma’s Under City – a vast underground area where the poor live – since leaving the orphanage as a boy under the care of older fellow orphan Fang Zhengnan (Zhang Junning), who adopted him as her “younger brother”, giving him her family name. Though losing part of a leg after arriving in Doma city, Fang Tianyang was born with exceptional eyesight and a photographic memory, and fancies himself as an amateur detective; he recognises Taralah from the TV reports as one of her little fingers is missing. (Fifteen years earlier, during the train journey from the orphanage to Doma city, for which Fang Tianyang [Jiang Yiting] had no ticket, Fang Zhengnan [Li Zhaoyuan] had told him to hide behind some baggage until the ticket inspector had gone past. While there, he had witnessed a series of murderous events during which Taralah lost a finger.) Fang Tianyang’s childhood sketchbook, which he’d accidentally left in the train compartment that day, had been found in Taralah’s flat after she was murdered. Because Fang Zhengnan is now a police detective, Fang Tianyuan is able to visit the murder scene as he knows the policeman there; but when the sketchbook is identified as his, he’s taken to police HQ, where he points out the pictures he drew while hiding in the train 15 years earlier. Much to the annoyance of detective Edward (Wang Xun) who’s officially in charge of the case, he also offers the police an explanation of how Taralah’s killer got into the building and cut off the power without being noticed. With the help of rookie detective Ruby (Xu Jiao), Wang Zhengnan realises the killer’s next victim could be sleazy cagefight promoter Shang Zhan (Aruna). She and Ruby try to save him during an event; but following the arrival of Edward and his team, Shang Zhan is murdered and the killer, wearing a raven’s mask, escapes. (On the train 15 years earlier, Fang Tianyang had witnessed high-school student Lin Xiaodi [Hou Yongxun] tricked by “casting director” Taralah, using the name Xia, into “auditioning” for a man in a raven’s mask for what she thought was a role in the film Angels of Doma 都马天使. When she had tried to leave, chaos had broken out, Taralah had accidentally lost a finger, and Lin Xiaodi had been stabbed. Taralah and two men had left the train at the next stop; and then a fourth person had later finished off Lin Xiaodi.) After telling the police all this, a man walks in and demands police protection – Tong Cai (Hao Ping), now president of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, who was in charge of security on the train that night and also knew both Taralah and Shang Zhan. Reckoning that Tong Cai is the killer’s next victim, the police draft in extra forces for the Raven Festival which Tong Cai is to officially open in Raven Plaza. Also due to attend are Cantonese councillor Ge Wen (Jiang Haowen) and his political rival Cai Min’an (Huang Xiaoming), a former policeman now campaigning vigorously on behalf of Under City people against the government.
REVIEW
Most of the faults in A Place Called Silence 默杀 (2024), the third feature by Chinese Malaysian director Ke Wenli 柯汶利 [Quah Boon Lip/Sam Quah], 40, are also evident in his fourth outing, The Fire Raven 匿杀, another serial-killer whodunit set on the fictional Pacific island of Doma that has a flavoursome cast, an intriguing (if messily structured) set-up, and a second half that goes completely o.t.t. and stays there, with lashings of visceral violence. Though it fails to measure up to the promise of its offbeat first hour, Raven earns an extra point for its fine mounting and a great action role for actress Zhang Junning 张钧甯, 43, who also got a plum (though very different) role in Silence. Compared with the hunky hawls of Silence (RMB1.35 billion) and Ke’s second feature, crime procedural Sheep without a Shepherd 误杀 (2019, RMB1.33 billion), Raven, released on the last day of 2025, took a much more modest (if still very nice) RMB512 million.
The Chinese titles of all of Ke’s features so far have been just two characters, of which the second has always been 杀 shā (“kill”). Thus, Shepherd literally means “Mistaken Kill”, Silence “Silent Kill”, and Raven “Stealth Kill” – the last a vague reference to the complex plot lying behind a series of murders all linked to the murder of a high-school girl on a train 15 years earlier. Said murder was secretly observed by a young orphan, aged about 12, while travelling with an older fellow-orphan who “adopts” him as her younger brother. He has incredible eyesight, as well as a photographic memory, and when, in 2025, he recognises a murder victim in an apartment block as one of the people on the train that night, he helps the police – among whom, conveniently, is his elder “sister”, now a detective – to solve the mystery.
The screenplay – by Ke, Pan Yiran 潘依然 (Cliff Walkers 悬崖之上, 2021; She’s Got No Name 酱园弄•悬案, 2025) and Silence’s two newbies Wang Zhizhi 王吱吱 and Wang Yimeng 王祎梦 – feeds a mass of information to the audience in the opening few minutes, including socio-political background on Doma city. It only really comes up for air in a five-minute flashback half-an-hour into the movie that clearly explains what happened on the train back in 2010. There then follows another twist, with a new character introduced, a big setpiece during which the killer is supposedly unmasked – and the film is still only halfway through, with a further hour of twists and revelations to come.
Like Silence, Raven is initially intriguing, with an offbeat approach to generic material; but it ends up as a way over-egged pudding that’s difficult to digest, especially when it suddenly turns into a bomb-on-a-speeding-train thriller for its finale. And then, just when it looks like the film is finally over, an eight-minute action coda is tacked on. Throughout, Ke seems determined for Raven to contain something for everyone, and hasn’t yet realised that less can be more. That’s a real shame, as the film contains some fine stuff along the way, not least a great action role for Zhang as a stern-faced police detective who won’t take no for an answer. It’s an unlikely role for the Munich-born, Taiwan-raised actress – who, with rare exceptions like Zoom Hunting 猎艳 (2010) and Dinner for Six 六人晚餐 (2016), is more often stuck in supporting roles of a non-action type (Tokyo Newcomer 初到东京, 2012; Girls 2 闺蜜2, 2018; Papa 学爸, 2023) – but here she’s totally believable and acquits herself with distinction, especially in the finale.
As her younger “brother”, the versatile, boyish-looking Peng Yuchang 彭昱畅, 31, is very good in the almost unbelievable role of a young man with a photographic memory, exceptional eyesight, a super-deductive brain – and a false leg. Top-billed, he manages to hold his own against a strong, experienced cast that, aside from Zhang, includes pin-uppy Huang Xiaoming 黄晓明 (who only makes a mark in the latter stages, as a slippery political candidate), comedian Wang Xun 王迅 (as a jealous fellow detective, a role that’s poorly developed), former child actress Xu Jiao 徐娇 (CJ7 长江7号, 2008; Silence) as a rookie detective, Hong Kong veteran Jiang Haowen 姜皓文 [Philip Cheung] as a loud-mouthed Cantonese councillor, and even Mainland actress Huang Yi 黄奕 (The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake 竞雄女侠秋瑾, 2011) still oozing mature sexiness as the opening murder victim.
On the technical side, the sole weakness is the pulsing electronic score that’s entirely characterless. The night-heavy widescreen photography by d.p. Liu Yizeng 刘懿增 (Lost in Russia 囧妈, 2020; Trending Topic 热搜, 2023), replacing Ke’s regular d.p., Hong Kong’s Zhang Ying 张颖, is fine, if not quite so oppressively humid and atmospheric. Quite what the film’s English title, The Fire Raven, means is anyone’s guess and, like many details in the over-stuffed script, that of the raven being Doma’s symbol is never explained or developed.
CREDITS
Presented by Guangzhou Maoyan Pictures (CN), Shanghai Hainan Film Group (CN), Huaxia Film Distribution (CN), China Film Group (CN), Emperor Film Distribution (Beijing) (CN), Tianjin Maoyan Weiying Cultural Media (CN), Shanghai Just Film (CN). Produced by Shanghai Just Film (CN).
Script: Ke Wenli [Sam Quah], Pan Yiran, Wang Zhizhi, Wang Yimeng. Story: Ke Wenli [Sam Quah]. Photography: Liu Yizeng. Second-unit photography: Wang Tao. Editing: Zhang Zhiyan. Music: Varqa Buehrer, Doudou, Xie Weirui, Zhao Se. Music supervision: Doudou. Art direction: Wang Shuo. Costumes: Wang Mingming. Styling: Tang Ning. Sound: Wang Danning, Li Tao. Action: Wu Gang, Liu Junwei. Visual effects: Liu Qin. Executive direction: Liu Bin.
Cast: Peng Yuchang (Fang Tianyang), Zhang Junning (Fang Zhengnan), Huang Xiaoming (Cai Min’an), Wang Xun (Edward), Xu Jiao (Lin Xiaosheng/Ruby), Xing Jiadong (Lin Hongyuan, detective), Aruna (Shang Zhan), Wang Chengsi (Letou), Hai Yitian (police chief), Shen Hao (Jin Minghao, detective), Hou Yongxun (Lin Xiaodi), Wang Shengdi (Jiaqi), Huang Yi (Taralah), Jiang Haowen [Philip Cheung] (Ge Wen, councillor), Hao Ping (Tong Cai, Chinese Chamber of Commerce president), Cai Genyan (female teacher), Li Zhaoyuan (younger Fang Zhengnan), Jiang Yiting (younger Fang Tianyang).
Release: China, 31 Dec 2025.