The White Storm 3:
Heaven or Hell

扫毒3   人在天涯

Hong Kong/China, 2023, colour, 2.35:1, 123 mins.

Director: Qiu Litao 邱礼涛 [Herman Yau].

Rating: 7/10.

The bar stays high on this series of unrelated drug-busting tales, this time with a scenery-chewing performance from actor Liu Qingyun [Lau Ching-wan].

STORY

South China Sea, south of Hong Kong, 30 Aug 2021. Several barrels containing a total 400kg of heroin are dropped from a helicopter and then retrieved by a gang led by Thai Chinese drugs trafficker Kang Suchat (Liu Qingyun). But as they unload the cargo in Tunmen [Tuen Mun], Hong Kong, the police arrive and a shootout starts. A trusted member of the gang, Mai Zhenrong, aka Rong (Gu Tianle), is revealed as an undercover agent and tries to stop Kang Suchat escaping. (Four months ago, during a drunken night out, another trusted member of the gang, Zhang Jianxing, aka Billy [Guo Fucheng], had saved Kang Suchat’s life when they were shot at in an underground car park. Xing had been wounded but recovered in hospital, where he, Kang Suchat and Rong had toasted each other with bottles of whisky.) As the huge shootout at the docks continues, Kang Suchat’s car finally manages to barge its way out through the police blockade. (Six months ago, gangster Liang Yongxiong [Lin Xue] had introduced Rong to Kang Suchat at a disco club. To test Rong’s fighting skills, Kang Suchat had turned Billy onto him. What he didn’t know was that Rong and Billy were both undercover cops who knew each other. Rong had infiltrated Liang Yongxiong’s gang as part of a separate mission, not realising it would lead him to Kang Suchat.) In the crossfire during the shootout, Billy is gunned down but is scooped up by Kang Suchat’s car and taken to safety. The two bullets are removed by a doctor (Yuan Fuhua) just in time and Billy is taken by Kang Suchat and the remainder of his gang to a container ship in international waters. Later, the Hong Kong police reveal the heroin was worth HK$300 million. They also track down the doctor who saved Xing’s life. The container ship arrives in Laem Chabang, Thailand, and local drug dealer Mee Noi (Xie Junhao) takes Kang Suchat and his men to the Golden Triangle for safety. (Three years ago, after arresting a criminal in a restaurant shootout in which Rong was injured, Billy had been transferred to undercover work, in which he was coached by Rong. One year ago, Billy had told his boss, chief superintendent Chen Shouren [Fang Zhongxin], that he’d finally made contact with Kang Suchat, a Thai Chinese trafficker who’d come to Hong Kong five years earlier. Billy says he wants to take Kang Suchat down.) In the Shan highlands, on the Thai-Myanmar border, Billy wakes up in a peasant’s hut where he’s cared for by Noon (Yang Caiyu), a young woman raised by her grandfather, on the orders of Mee Noi and Kang Suchat. The remote village has no electricity or communications, and is in the middle of a poppy-growing area. Noon shows Billy how opium is harvested from poppies. (Some time earlier, Chen Shouren had given Rong his new identity, Mai Zhenrong, and told him to infiltrate the gang of Liang Yongxiong, a trafficker. After Liang Yongxiong had been arrested, Rong had started working for Kang Suchat.) In Nov 2021, in the Shan highlands, the villagers are told by the soldiers of local drugs warlord Dai Jinrong, aka the Commander (Luo Jialiang), not to go to a nearby village where they are punishing the people for secretly making heroin for themselves. However, during the chaos of the fighting there, Kang Suchat, helped by Mee Noi, seizes the opportunity to steal some weapons for his own use. (Three months ago, Kang Suchat had told Billy and Rong that he was about to go to Thailand to conclude a major drugs deal.) In the village Kang Suchat hatches a plan to carve out a niche for himself. First he attacks one of the Commander’s convoys and then goes to him and offers to escort the Commander’s opium safely from the highlands. Meanwhile, Billy is desperate to get to the nearest town, Moe Sai, and send a message to Rong in Hong Kong. He suggests to Noon that they should go there on an outing one day, to have some fun together.

REVIEW

Partly thanks to a scenery-chewing performance by Liu Qingyun 刘青云 [Lau Ching-wan) as a Thai Chinese drug lord, The White Storm 3: Heaven or Hell 扫毒3   人在天涯 manages to keep the bar high on this series of unrelated drug-busting stories. This time Gu Tianle 古天乐 [Louis Koo] – the only star who’s been in all three movies – is teamed with Guo Fucheng 郭富城 [Aaron Kwok] as well as Liu in a fairly routine plot of undercover police agents battling traffickers in Hong Kong and the Golden Triangle. The whole thing, however, is made to seem fresher than it is not only by Liu’s barnstorming playing but also by a flashback structure that puts the audience ahead of some of the characters. Kitted out with plenty of visceral action (by No. 2’s Li Zhongzhi 李忠志[Nicky Li]), and with the super-prolific Qiu Litao 邱礼涛 [Herman Yau] again at the helm, the Hong Kong/China co-production surprisingly did only middling business (RMB285 million) in the Mainland this summer – about the same as the original The White Storm 扫毒 (2013, RMB238 million) but way down on The White Storm 2: Drug Lords 扫毒2 天地对决 (2019, RMB1.3 billion).

Unlike No. 2, which was put together with Qiu’s usual team of co-writer Li Min 李敏 and various technicians, No. 3 is written by Qiu alone and made with a mostly different crew. Qiu’s regular editor, Zhong Weizhao 钟炜钊 [Azrael Chung], does his usual classy job, and also on hand is music supervisor Mai Zhenhong 麦振鸿 [Brother Hung], with another anonymous score; but instead of regular Chen Guanghong 陈广鸿 [Joe Chan], the d.p. this time is Ni Wenxian 倪文贤, a longtime assistant/colleague of Chen, who this time does a sterling solo job on a wide variety of locations. Stylist was Hong Kong ace Yu Jia’an 余家安 [Bruce Yu], who died on 28 Jul 2022 and to whom the film is dedicated.

The film’s main structural conceit is regular flashbacks that throw extra meaning on the present-day narrative. The story starts in Aug 2021 as a large batch of heroin is picked up at sea by a gang led by Thai Chinese trafficker Kang Suchat (Liu) but is raided by the police as soon as they unload it in Hong Kong. During the dockland shootout, one of Kang Suchat’s trusted colleagues, Rong (Gu), is revealed as an undercover cop, and the film then flashbacks four months to show the brotherhood of Kang Suchat, Rong and their other trusted colleague, Billy (Guo), as they toast each other after Billy has taken a bullet for his boss. After returning to the dockland shootout – an amazing four-minute sequence of solid gunfire – the film then flashbacks six months to show Billy joining the gang and, more importantly, that he too is an undercover cop. This is just the opening 16 minutes, but the flashbacks continue, not only revealing other information that the baddies don’t yet know but also adding texture to the professional friendship between Rong and Billy.

After Kang Suchat somehow manages to escape the police ambush, along with (an again wounded) Billy, he and his gang make it to a remote village in the Golden Triangle, where (a) Kang Suchat rebuilds his business by conning a local warlord and (b) Billy tries to get a message back to Rong in Hong Kong. It all climaxes in another heavy-duty action sequence in the hills on the Thai-Myanmar border – this time a solid 12 minutes of bullets and explosions.

Aside from the flashback structure – which basically tweaks familiar formulas – the thing that really makes WS3 stand out a little from the action pack is the time taken with the main performances. In genre terms these are fairly nuanced, notably by Gu (not known for his acting subtleties) and Fang Zhongxin 方中信 [Alex Fong Chung-sun] as his police boss but especially by Liu, now almost 60, as the scruffy, bearded drug trafficker Kang Suchat. It’s the kind of extrovert role that fellow Hong Konger Ren Dahua 任达华 [Simon Yam], almost a decade older, often does nowadays, blowing everyone else off screen and having the time of his life while co-stars Gu and Guo are left with the more serious stuff. As the stranded undercover cop, Guo is just okay, but handles a formulaic romance with a peasant girl (sympathetically played by Thai Chinese actress-singer Yang Caiyu 杨采钰, Youth 芳华, 2017) in an unsappy way. Decorating the sidelines, Xie Junhao 谢君豪 is strong as a Thai trafficker and Luo Jialiang 罗嘉良 ditto as a Golden Triangle warlord. It’s the mix of these mostly strong personalities that drives the movie more than just the action. As the characters are created out of purely generic material, the dramatic focus gradually shifts to the friendship between Kang Suchat and Billy, and how Billy will have to betray him sometime if he’s to do his job as a drug-buster.

All credit should go to Qiu’s direction for this, especially across such an elongated schedule dictated by Covid restrictions. The film was shot, with long breaks, between Dec 2020 and Oct 2021, in Hong Kong and China. In the latter, Xishuangbanna in southern Yunnan province doubled for the Golden Triangle in northern Thailand; other material was shot in coastal Shanwei, Guangdong province, just up the coast from Hong Kong. The film’s Chinese title means “Drug-Busting 3: At the End of the World”.

CREDITS

Presented by Guanzhou Yingming Culture Communication (CN), Universe Entertainment (HK), Beijing Hero Films (CN), Lian Ray (Shanghai) Pictures (CN), AMTD Digital Media (HK). Produced by Universe Entertainment (HK).

Script: Qiu Litao [Herman Yau]. Photography: Ni Wenxian. Editing: Zhong Weizhao [Azrael Chung]. Music supervision: Mai Zhenhong [Brother Hung]. Art direction: Chen Jinhe [Raymond Chan]. Costume design: Guo Shumin. Styling: Yu Jia’an [Bruce Yu]. Sound: Tan Derong, Nie Jirong, Ye Zhaoji, Chen Huisi. Action: Li Zhongzhi [Nicky Li]. Visual effects: Lin Junyu, Huang Xinyan, Yu Guoliang.

Cast: Liu Qingyun [Lau Ching-wan] (Kang Suchat), Gu Tianle [Louis Koo] (Ou Zhiyuan/”Mai Zhenrong”), Guo Fucheng [Aaron Kwok] (Zhang Jianxing/”Billy”), Yang Caiyu (Noon/Xiaonong), Luo Jialiang (Dai Jinrong, the Commander), Xie Junhao (Mee Noi), Fang Zhongxin [Alex Fong Chung-sun] (Chen Shouren, chief superintendent of Hong Kong police), Chen Guobang (Su Ziliang, the Commander’s staff officer), Hong Tianming (Johnny), Liu Haolong (Xiaosi/Junior), Su Chenyu (Jie/Punky), Xu Weidong (James, Thai police operative), Qiu Zhanhui (Curry), Lin Xue [Lam Suet] (Liang Yongxiong/Brother Big), Yuan Fuhua (doctor), Zhang Songzhi (Shaqiang/Goofy), Peng Huai’an (Dafei/Speedy).

Release: Hong Kong, 27 Jul 2023; China, 6 Jul 2023.