Fire of Conscience

火龙

Hong Kong/China, 2010, colour/b&w, 2.35:1, 105 mins.

Director: Lin Chaoxian 林超贤 [Dante Lam].

Rating: 7/10.

Pacy, action-filled item puts Dante Lam back in the top league of Hong Kong action directors.

STORY

Investigating the death of a prostitute, burned-out detective Wen Fang (Li Ming) teams with yuppie narcotics cop Ji Shaoqun (Ren Xianqi), who is looking for a mobile phone stolen from a dead colleague. As both get drawn into a complex case involving a Mainland bomber, Huang Yong (Wang Baoqiang), and possible high-level police corruption – and one of Wen Fang’s team, Shu Xiang’an (Liao Qizhi), seems implicated in the prostitute’s murder by a DNA sample – Wen Fang begins to suspect Ji Shaoqun is not all he appears.

REVIEW

Though Fire of Conscience 火龙 is nowhere on the level of his Beast Stalker 证人 (2008) in either script construction or character tension, director Lin Chaoxian 林超贤 [Dante Lam], working again with regular writer Wu Weilun 吴炜伦 [Jack Ng], has come up with a largely gripping, restlessly shot police thriller that recalls the glory days of Hong Kong action cinema of the late 1980s and 1990s. In its use of the city’s main thoroughfares (largely during daytime, rather than neon-suffused night), the film strongly recalls the latter-day action dramas of Lin Lingdong 林岭东 [Ringo Lam], especially his 1997 Full Alert 高度戒备. Setpiece shootouts – in a teahouse, an apartment block’s staircase and even inside a moving car (recalling the lift battle in Lin Chaoxian’s The Sniper 神枪手, 2009) – often start within claustrophobic settings and then broaden out into chases, giving a real you-are-there feel for the city’s crowded streets.

These sequences are shot in a jittery, fast-cut style that’s very different from the rest of the movie, which uses two cinematographers – Beast Stalker‘s co-d.p. Xie Zhongdao 谢忠道 [Kenny Tse] and Peng Haoxiang 彭浩翔 [Pang Ho-cheung] regular Lin Zhijian 林志坚 [Charlie Lam] (Isabella 伊莎贝拉, 2005; Exodus 出埃及记, 2007), the latter more experienced but less known for action cinema. The division in style also extends to the script, which deftly sketches the main players’ backgrounds – in the case of the character of Li Ming 黎明 [Leon Lai], through b&w flashbacks to his dead wife – but doesn’t manage to integrate character and action in a fully satisfying way.

This is partly due to the underwritten female characters (especially the role of Taiwan actress Xu Ruoxuan 徐若瑄 [Vivian Hsu] as the fiancee of Li’s character) but also to the script’s failure to combine all its various threads: the tension between Li’s scruffy, burned-out detective and the smart, manipulative cop of Ren Xianqi 任贤齐 [Richie Ren]; the conflict between their private lives and their brutish professional ones, casually torturing or beating up suspects; and the larger story of high-level corruption within the police force. Wu’s script simply doesn’t have the structural tautness (and unexpected twists) that kept Beast Stalker so engrossing throughout its entire length, and Li (sporting a weird false beard) and Ren (with suspicious glasses) show no special chemistry together to compensate for the script’s weaknesses. At a character level, the cast’s Mainland contingent shows more personality: the devoted female cop of Ye Xuan 叶璇 [Michelle Ye], the bomber played by Wang Baoqiang 王宝强, and the thugs of Tan Kai 谭凯 and Yue Xiaojun 岳小军.

However, the gritty action is the main thing, and as staged by veteran stunt choreographer/actor Qian Jiale 钱嘉乐 and stuntman Huang Weihui 黄伟辉, it’s enough to propel the movie. Simply on a technical level, Fire of Conscience will be remembered for its hypnotic opening – a series of black-and-white, 3-D tracking shots through freeze-frames that are only explained later in the film.

CREDITS

Presented by Media Asia Films (HK), China Film Media Asia Audio Video Distribution (CN). Produced by Visual Capture (HK).

Script: Wu Weilun [Jack Ng]. Original story: Lin Chaoxian [Dante Lam]. Photography: Lin Zhijian [Charlie Lam], Xie Zhongdao [Kenny Tse]. Editing: Chen Qihe [Chan Ki-hop]. Music: Li Yunwen [Henry Lai]. Production design: Qiu Weiming [Alfred Yau]. Sound: He Zhitang, Nie Jirong, Zheng Yingyuan [Phyllis Cheng]. Action: Qian Jiale, Huang Weihui. Car stunts: Wu Haitang. Visual effects: Yu Guoliang, Li Wenjun, Lin Hongfeng (Free-D Workshop).

Cast: Leon Lai (Wen Fang/Manfred. detective), Ren Xianqi [Richie Ren] (Ji Shaoqun, police inspector), Wang Baoqiang (Huang Yong), Xu Ruoxuan [Vivian Hsu] (Ailin/Ellen), Liao Qizhi [Liu Kai-chi] (Shu Xiang’an), Ye Xuan [Michelle Ye] (Xi/May), Ying Changyou (Sen/Sam), Tan Kai (Dao/Blade), Liu Haolong (Hai), Tang Yan (Huang Yong’s wife), Yue Xiaojun (Xiaoke), Chen Guantai (Jian, Ji Shaoqun’s mentor), Yang Zheng (Wen Fang’s late wife), Luo Mang (tram witness), Jin Laiqun (Lao Er), Zhang Wenci (Shu Xiang’an’s wife), Huang Debin [Kenny Wong] (Huo Shui/Kerosene), Jiang Haowen [Philip Keung] (Zhong, police captain), Yu Jialun (Wu, police inspector), Wei Wei (Wen Fang’s mother), Huang Changxing (Chen Hong), Pan Yuanliang (Eddy, loan shark), Chen Jinglin (Tingting), Huang Xueyan (Gao Xue’er, Shu Xiang’an’s daughter), Luo Tianchi (Wen Fang’s colleague), Zhou Zhiqiang (He Yong), Liao Ailing (Wen Fang’s elder sister), Wu Weilun [Jack Ng] (Deng, doctor).

Premiere: Hong Kong Film Festival (Gala Premieres), 23 Mar 2010.

Release: Hong Kong, 1 Apr 2010; China, 1 Apr 2010.

(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 14 May 2010.)