Faces in the Crowd
暴风
China, 2023, colour, 2.35:1, 101 mins.
Director: Chen Jiashang 陈嘉上 [Gordon Chan].
Rating: 5/10.
Wang Qianyuan’s playing elevates this standard KMT vs CCP period spy drama, which too often has a TV feel.
STORY
Wuhan city, Hubei province, central China, Apr 1931. KMT communist-hunter Wang Liwen (Wang Qianyuan) wipes out the CCP cell led by Lu (Liu Pizhong). The Party’s communications line is seriously distrupted, but in Shantou, on the east coast, important work carries on. Shantou city, Guangdong province, eastern China, 28 Jan 1932. Japanese warships enter the harbour to demand an apology for a local paper “insulting the Japanese emperor”. At the same time the Japanese have attacked Shanghai. Communications officer Jiang He (Wang Longzheng) arrives from Wuhan, where he managed to escape with Lu’s codebook. In Fengji teahouse he secretly meets a group of CCP operatives, including communications officer K (Sun Hongtao), to give them the codebook for passing on to CCP central commend. However, the police raid the teahouse and in the chaos of the gun battle young policeman Chen Jiadong (Chen Weiting) seems to shoot a communist dead. Wang Liwen, now head of a special communist-hunting group in Shantou, is also undercover at the teahouse. Afterwards he introduces himself to police chief Luo Kuan (Qian Bo) and invites Chen Jiadong, who turns out to be an old friend who did him a favour five years earlier, for a drink at an expensive club favoured by Japanese. Meanwhile, Jiang He, who escaped the gun battle, poses as a Hong Kong businessman and takes a room above Sam’s Cafe, whose proprietress is his onetime romantic partner Zhujun (Wang Zixuan). In Qilu Fortress Prison, young female staff from Fengji teahouse are locked up by police on suspicion of being CCP sympathisers. There, Luo Kuan questions and rapes one of them, pastry cook Lin Saiyun (Dong Fan). She is liked by rickshaw man Cizai (Ma Ke), who shares lodgings with Chen Jiadong, though she secretly prefers Chen Jiadong. Wang Liwen has asked Chen Jiadong to return with him later to Nanjing (currently the country’s capital) and join the KMT’s communist-hunting Central Party Affairs Investigation Division (CPAID); meanwhile, he invites Chen Jiadong to join him on the Shantou operation, which is dedicated to finding out where the CCP’s transmission station is hidden. Chen Jiadong drops by Sam’s Cafe, questions Jiang He, and searches his room. However, Chen Jiadong is not all he seems, and he gradually gets caught up in the Party members’ attempts to pass on the codebook, Wang Liwen’s ever-present suspicions, and the attempts of the jealous Luo Kuan to take over Wang Liwen’s operation. Meanwhile, Lin Saiyu has committed suicide after being raped by Luo Kuan.
REVIEW
A standard KMT vs CCP spy drama set in early 1930s southern China, Faces in the Crowd 暴风 does the job but too often looks and feels like a boiled-down version of a Mainland TV drama. Surprisingly, the name on the can is veteran director/producer Chen Jiashang 陈嘉上 [Gordon Chan], 63, a seminal figure of late 1980s and 1990s Hong Kong cinema who’s adapted to the new realities of Chinese film-making with mixed success. Though his offbeat rom-com Tempting Hearts 有一点动心 (2021), co-directed with Mainland writer Zhu Xuefei 朱雪菲, was okay, it depended a lot on the two lead performances and died at the box office. The last decent film on which Chen got a sole directing credit was China/Hong Kong co-production God of War 荡寇风云 (2017), a powerful costume drama starring Zhao Wenzhuo 赵文卓 and Hong Jinbao 洪金宝 [Sammo Hung] that also flopped at the Mainland box office. Faces is a respectable job, largely thanks to a good performance by lantern-faced Mainland actor Wang Qianyuan 王千源 as a ruthless Communist-hunter, but it doesn’t signal any great career revival by Chen and, at a weedy RMB39 million, took even less than God of War (RMB65 million).
It’s the first time Chen has taken the path of Mainland flagwavers already followed by other veteran colleagues like Peng Shun 彭顺 [Oxide Pang] (Towards the River Glorious 打过长江去, 2019; Flashover 惊天救援, 2023), Liu Weiqiang 刘伟强 [Andrew Lau] (The Founding of an Army 建军大业, 2017), Xu Ke 徐克 [Tsui Hark] (The Taking of Tiger Mountain 3D 智取威虎山, 2014; The Battle at Lake Changjin II 长津湖之水门桥, 2022) and Lin Chaoxian 林超贤 [Dante Lam] (Operation Red Sea 红海行动, 2018; The Battle at Lake Changjin 长津湖, 2021). That’s not to put them down, as Hong Kong directors’ energy and inventiveness has often put new life into traditional Mainland genres. Alas, that’s not the case here: Faces is pretty much by the book, with the feel of a contract job professionally done but no more.
After a brief intro showing Communist-hunter Wang Liwen (Wang) wiping out a CCP cell in Wuhan, central China, in 1931, the story shifts nine months later to Shantou, Guangdong province, just up the coast from Hong Kong, where a CCP cell is still playing a major role in the Communist communications network. Wang is in town with a special force to find the transmission station and wipe out the CCP cell and, after a shootout in a teahouse, finds that the young Chen Jiadong (top-billed Chen Weiting 陈伟霆), who helped him out five years ago, is now in the Shantou police force. He co-opts him into his special force and also tries to persuade him to join the KMT’s anti-communist division full time. Meanwhile, the city is seething with all sorts of spying and malpractice, some of it centred on a crucial CCP codebook that’s been smuggled out of Wuhan.
It’s all familiar stuff from dozens of TV dramas and movies, and the script by Hai Fei 海飞, a prolific, Zhejiang-born novelist/scriptwriter in his early 50s, keeps the viewer guessing who’s on whose side in a satisfactory but unoriginal way. (Apart from Faces, Hai Fei’s scriptwriting career has been entirely in TV.) The same goes for the action, and the TVD feel is further enhanced by the backlot look of Shantou’s streets and buildings, plus the well-laundered costumes. The standout performance is by Wang, 51, whose laidback look and offhand delivery conceal the Communist-hunter’s ruthlessness and perpetual suspicion as he tries to winkle out every single CCP sympathiser in the city. As the young Shantou policeman, Hong Kong actor-singer Chen, 37, is less metrosexual-looking than usual but is as weak a screen presence as in most of his Mainland pictures (L.O.R.D: Legend of Ravaging Dynasties 爵迹, 2016; Genghis Khan 战神纪, 2018; The Yinyang Master 侍神令, 2021) – and certainly no match for a veteran character actor like Wang. This weakens what is the film’s central relationship.
Among the supporting roles, Wang Zixuan 王紫璇 (The Yinyang Master; The Door Lock 门锁, 2021) is okay in the lead female role of a cafe proprietress and Wang Longzheng 王龙正 ditto as an enigmatic CCP agent and her onetime lover. The largely Hong Kong key crew turn in a professional job, with an above-average, atmospheric score by music supervisor Zhang Jiacheng 张家诚, who largely works in TV. The film’s Chinese title means “Storm Wind(s)”, which is very generic but, unlike the English one, at least has some connection with the movie.
CREDITS
Presented by Pearl River Film Group (CN), Foshan Culture Development Investment Management (CN), Kirin Movie Culture (Swatou) (CN), Shantou Tourism Investment (CN). Produced by Guangdong Pearl River Film Production (CN), Horgos One Touch Pictures (CN).
Script: Hai Fei. Photography: Zhang Dongliang [Tony Cheung]. Editing: Zhang Jiahui [Cheung Ka-fai], Sun Yiqun. Music supervision: Zhang Jiacheng. Art direction: Zhang Yinghua. Costume design: Wang Zixi, Sun Jia. Styling: Zhang Shijie [Stanley Cheung]. Sound: Chen Guang, Liang Zongwei. Action: Wu Yonghua. Visual effects: Wang Xinghui. Executive direction: Lao Jianhua.
Cast: Chen Weiting (Chen Jiadong), Wang Qianyuan (Wang Liwen), Wang Longzheng (Jiang He, CCP central communications Wuhan representative), Wang Zixuan (Zhujun, Sam’s Cafe proprietress), Yin Zheng (Shi’ershao/Master Chen), Qian Bo (Luo Kuan, Shantou police chief), Tian Xiaojie (Hu Ya), Dong Fan (Lin Saiyun, pastry cook), Ma Ke (Cizai, rickshaw man), Sun Hongtao (K, Shantou CCP communications officer), Liu Pizhong (Lu, Wuhan CCP branch representative), Ji Huanbo (Pingtou, Wang Liwen’s staff), Li Donghe (Qiang, Wang Liwen’s staff), Cai Qihao (Zhao Sanxiang), Peng Xu (Haizai), Chen Rui (Ling Jiawei), Cheng Fei (Ye Chengzhong), Shu Yu (Du Meifeng), Xu Xiaoshu (Xiaofeng, waitress at Sam’s Cafe).
Release: China, 14 Apr 2023.