Three Old Boys

三叉戟

China, 2024, colour, 2.35:1, 109 mins.

Director: Gao Qunshu 高群书.

Rating: 7/10.

Gruff, northern-style buddy-cop movie has no shortage of colourful characters but too often plays like a speed-edited version of the novel and TVD.

STORY

Qing’an city, Haidong province, somewhere in northern China, the present day. Twenty years ago, a hired killer, Geng Erdong (Liu Xiaohai), killed narcotics officer Jiao Xiongbing (Feng Xintian) in an alleyway one rainy night, before being shot by police officer Xu Guozhu (Jiang Wu). Today, one of Geng Erdong’s old pals, crazy Fan Zhiguo (Cao Weiyu), holds Guo (Dong Yong), head of the Economic Crimes department, hostage at knife point outside police headquarters, demanding the immediate release of Geng Erdong, who he thinks is still alive. He’s disabled by Xu Guozhu, who points out to Fan that it was he who shot Geng Erdong 20 years ago. Soon afterwards, Guo asks famed veteran investigator Cui Tiejin (Huang Zhizhong), who’s about to retire and is serving out his time as a gatekeeper at police HQ, to form a small team of elite investigators. Cui Tiejin chooses old friends Xu Guozhu and Pan Jianghai (Guo Tao), the latter a pre-trial investigator especially skilled at interrogation. Guo recommends young policeman Xiaolv (Su Xin), who’s good at tech, to be the fourth member of the team. They are assigned to an ongoing money-laundering case, which they soon crack, discovering a horde of RMB1.4 billion in cash hidden in a sealed lorry under the sea. The case is revealed to involve a total of RMB4 billion in laundered funds; multiple arrests are made, and various funds are frozen. The three friends become the heroes of the hour. Meanwhile, in a karaoke bar a cocky young gang leader, Xiaoqing (Ou Hao), gets into a dispute with another gang leader, Yellow Hair (Xu Li), when the latter’s girlfriend, Xue’er (Chen Duling), is harrassed by one of Xiaoqing’s men (Si Ligeng). Yellow Hair’s boss, veteran gangster Ghost (Xing Jiadong), arrives and sorts the argument out, pointing out that they all ultimately work for the same boss. Meanwhile, Chu Dongyang (Wei Chen), head of the Provincial Economic Crimes department, is transferred to the main Economic Crimes department, as political commissar. Unravelling the huge money-laundering case gets bogged down in bureaucratic procedure, so the three friends decide to carry out further investigations on their own. However, Xu Guozhu is privately warned by Ghost to stay away from the case, as it involves some very high-up and powerful people. Pan Jianghai is also bribed by an old high-school friend, Zheng Guangming (Zhao Longhao), a senior advisor at investment company D-Rongbao, to try to unfreeze some of the frozen funds. Then Cui Tiejun discovers that his son, Cui Bin (Hou Letian), has been implicated in the money laundering. And the methodical Pan Jianghai accidentally discovers that Jiao Xiongbing, the narcotics officer killed 20 years earlier by Geng Erdong, was Cui Tiejun’s elder half-brother.

REVIEW

Three middle-aged boys have a lot of fun in Three Old Boys 三叉戟, a buddy-cop movie full of northern-style gruff humour and a money-laundering plot of mind-bending compexity. Playing older than they are, actors Huang Zhizhong 黄志忠, Jiang Wu 姜武 and Guo Tao 郭涛 – all in their early 50s during filming – have an easy, entertaining chemistry as three old-timers on the verge of retirement who go up against the system. It’s the second feature by veteran director Gao Qunshu 高群书 (Tokyo Trial 东京审判, 2006; The Message 风声, 2009; Wind Blast 西风烈, 2010) to emerge in the space of six months, following his absorbing WW2 spy thriller Seven Killings 刀尖 (2023) – though like that film, which was shot in early 2018 and took five years to get a release, Three Old Boys was also shot a while ago, from late 2019 to early 2020. Despite its many positive qualities, it’s fared even worse at the box office than Killings, taking a measily RMB29 million.

Boys is based on a 2017 novel of the same Chinese name (which means “trident”) by Beijing crime writer Lv Zheng 吕铮 (see cover, left). When Boys was shooting, the novel had already been turned into a 42-part TVD, Trident 三叉戟 (2020, see poster, below left), directed by Liu Haibo 刘海波 and starring TV actors Chen Jianbin 陈建斌, Dong Yong 董勇 and Hao Ping 郝平, that began airing only a couple of months after filming on Boys wrapped. Though Boys has been thoroughly re-conceived as a feature film, it too often seems to have been made for people who’ve already read the novel and/or seen the TVD, as the plot is dramatically compressed almost to the point of incomprehension and some roles reduced to a pointless level. The strong cast and tight running time still make it watchable, and there’s a palpable tension to the drama that never lets up; but there are too many times when it feels like a speed-edited version of a much more complex, multi-dimensional tale.

Some of the best work of Gao, now 58, has been in crime movies with rough, tough northern types and hard-boiled plots: Old Fish 千钧。一发 (2008) with its unconventional cop who’s a bomb-disposal specialist, and the docudrama-like Beijing Blues 神探亨特张 (2012) with its plainclothes crime-hunters on the capital’s mean streets. Set in a fictional northern city (repped by Qingdao), Boys is in similar mode, though much more plot driven than, say, the freewheeling Beijing Blues. Opening with the murder of a narcotics cop 20 years ago that echoes down the ages, the script by Wen Ning 文宁 (The Monkey King 3 西游记   女儿国, 2018; The Trough 低压槽之欲望之城, 2018; Revival 回廊亭, 2023), Lv himself and Gao zeroes in on a case of money-laundering whose tentacles are gradually shown to spread right to the top.

The three “old boys”, who first bonded as regular policemen but are now close to retirement, have a confrontational friendship built on honesty with each other, even though they’ve moved into different areas of policing over the years. Rough diamond Xu Guozhu (played by Jiang at his gruffest) has gone back to patrol-car policing; crafty, complex divorcee Cui Tiejun (laid-back Huang, largely a TV actor) has forged a famous career in investigating economic crimes; and the methodical, canny Pan Jianghai (Guo, riffing on his comedic background) is a famed pre-trial interrogator. Their different personalities fuel the on-screen personal drama, as well several plot developments.

The film’s habit of starting scenes and only later explaining characters and background does become irritating, and doesn’t help as the plot becomes more and more tangled. Some characters are briefly introduced and then practically vanish: all the female ones, for instance, including Xu Guozhu’s trashy girlfriend (played by the notable Huang Lu 黄璐) but also others like the young member of the old boys’ team (Su Xin 苏鑫) and a onetime pupil of Cui Tiejun (none less than Han Geng 韩庚). As the crowded opening credits testify, the film is packed with name actors down the line, almost all of whom are highly characterful: Xing Jiadong 邢佳栋 terrific as a politely cool gangster who always plays by the rules, Dong Yong 董勇 (who played the Xu Guozhu role in the TVD) as head of the Economic Crimes department, and Zhao Longhao 赵龙豪 as a super-smooth banker whose smile conceals a dozen threats.

Standing out even above these, however, are Taiwan veteran Jin Shijie 金士杰 as the quietly ruthless gangster boss and, surprisingly, young Ou Hao 欧豪 (who’s gradually moving away from pretty-boy roles) as his psychopathic godson. The latter’s character grows as the film progresses, and forms a major component of the action finale.

The whole thing has a realistic, detailed look courtesy d.p. Tong Yijian 佟亦坚 (director of horror Haunted Road 怨灵, 2014) that doesn’t overdo its hand-held look, while plangent rock-guitar music by Deng Ouge 邓讴歌 adds a further touch of unconventionality. Action sequences have a highly visceral quality thanks to the use of a large number of South Korean stuntmen. The film shot in the coastal city of Qingdao, southeast of Beijing, over 93 days, from early Oct 2019 to early Jan 2020.

CREDITS

Presented by CMC Pictures (CN), Yanshang Pictures (Hainan) (CN), Shanghai CMC Pictures (CN), Shanghai Liwang Film & TV Culture Media (CN).

Script: Wen Ning, Lv Zheng, Gao Qunshu. Novel: Lv Zheng. Photography: Tong Yijian. Editing: Sun Xiao. Editing advice: Yang Hongyu, Zhang Jiahui. Music: Deng Ouge. Art direction: Li Jieyu. Styling: Li Zhuozhuo. Sound: Liu Linzong, Wen Bo.

Cast: Huang Zhizhong (Cui Tiejun/Dabeitou/Big Swept-Back Hair)), Jiang Wu (Xu Guozhu/Dagunzi/Big Stick/Big G), Guo Tao (Pan Jianghai/Dapenzi/Big Sprayer), Ou Hao (Geng Xiaoqing), Han Geng (Lin Nan, onetime pupil of Cui Tiejun), Wei Chen (Chu Dongyang, Provincial Economic Crimes section head), Dong Yong (Guo, Economic Crimes section head), Xing Jiadong (Qiu Jianjun/Lao Gui/Ghost), Jin Shijie (Huang Youfa), Zhao Longhao (Zheng Guangming, D-Rongbao senior advisor), Huang Lu (Hua, Xu Guozhu’s girlfriend), Chen Duling (Xue’er, Xia Biao’s girlfriend), Su Xin (Xiaolv), Xu Li (Xia Biao/Huang Mao/Yellow Hair), Hu Xiaoguang (Liu Gang), Binzi (Tieqiao/Shovelhead), He Dujuan (Xie Jingyi, D-Rongbao legal representative), Zhou Meng (Zhu Di, female bodyguard of Geng Xiaoqing), Chen Guoxing (Zhao, section head), Bao Bei’er (Pisan’er/Fart Face), Zhou Yunpeng (Liao Junfeng, bank clerk), Ma Yuke (Luo Yang), Sun Zhihong (Xie Chunbao, Juli Agency legal representative), Cao Weiyu (Fan Zhiguo/Crazy Fan), Liu Xiaohai (Geng Erdong), Bai Hongbiao (Guosheng), Zhu Hongjia (taxi driver), Wang Baode (Gang), Zhao Ziqi (Cui Tiejun’s ex-wife), Huang Xiaolei (Pan Jianghai’s wife), Zhang Gasong (street musician), Si Ligeng (Qian Duoduo/Moneybags), Hou Letian (Cui Bin, Cui Tiejun’s son), Tang Ke (slum boss lady), Feng Xintian (Jiao Xiongbing, narcotics officer), Ma Guowei (Deng), Xu Linsen (Xiaoli).

Release: China, 24 May 2024.