TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Kailansorac Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Derek Childs (totalovrdose) Honor is a major aspect focused upon during this Chinese action drama, which visually conveys the integrity and competent nature of the Hong Kong police department's ability to wage war on crime, and efficaciously ensure the safety of the city's public.Out on the streets of Hong Kong one night, a van carrying five members of the police force, not to mention a wealth of tactical equipment, unexpectedly vanishes off the grid. The hijackers behind this daring plot immediately demand a ransom, and though the attackers are starting a war with the police, an equally hard battle is taking place between the investigating officers. Lau (Aaron Kwok) is Management's youngest Deputy Commissioner, while Lee (Tony Leung Ka-fai), an older gentleman, is the Deputy Commissioner of Operations, both with widely differing points of view.While Lau wishes to negotiate, Lee, whose son Joe (Eddie Peng) is one of the five officers held for ransom, is ready to bring the entire force of the Hong Kong police department down upon those who would dare assault them. The reputation of these high ranking personnel is on the line, and with the Commissioner soon to retire, one of these two men will be crowned the next leader of the Hong Kong police - and what happens over the course of this investigation will shape their history.The two aforementioned leads, alongside Gordon Lam as Albert and Chin Kar-lok as Vincent are strongly portrayed as dutiful officers. Moreover, Aarif Rahman as Cheung, the lead ICAC officer assigned to investigate the procedures taken to thwart the hijackers is deserving of being mentioned for his equally adept performance. At the same time though, I found his character to be rather unlikable due to his attitude, which seems awfully confident, to the point of being egotistically pretentious.The focus on these characters leaves little room for Charlie Young, who portrays Phoenix, the head of the public relation branch of the police, or Grace Huang, who plays probationary inspector May, despite their loyalty's been clearly outlined. Moreover, the inclusion of Ma Yili and J. J Jia as the wives of Lau and Vincent, both of whom had barely a minute's screen time, was unnecessary, although were clearly included to show an alternate familial side to these hardworking characters. If the developers adamantly wanted the wives to be included in the plot, I believe additional screen time and emotional dialogue would have beneficially increased the impact.Visually, Cold War is quite sublime, the film taking advantage of its setting, Hong Kong been visualized as the technologically powerful, secure environment the police claim it to be, with a number of great aerial shots revealing the grandness of the metropolis. Not only this, those portraying the officers in the film are accompanied by the luxurious attires they continuously wear, making them appear as competent and dedicated as they continuously seem.Despite the front cover's insinuation that Cold War is an action film, it is in fact a dramatic thriller. Despite the movie beginning with an explosive start that immediately catches your eye, the action scenes are incredibly infrequent, the most captivating aspects of the movie been its intelligent and thought provoking script, that is continuously twisting like a snake, as the characters attempt to unravel the conspiracy they have unwittingly fallen into. However, Peter Kam's score, much like the cover, offers a similar assumption regarding the film's genre, and despite its entertaining properties, the over the top orchestral soundtrack, when used in conjunction with events that are neither eventful or action oriented, seems unnecessary.As the film progresses and the antagonists behind the plot are slowly revealed, the lacking background behind what caused them to orchestrate the attacks is rather unsatisfactory in a film which contained such an effective build up. With the exception of the lead instigator, whose motivations we are able to comprehend, the film's finale is less wowing than I would have imagined from a film that really keeps you pinned to the screen, and rather, my attitude towards the end was more like 'uh, so that's how it is, eh?' Furthermore, at the film's conclusion, text appears on screen notifying the viewership that this is definitively 'the end', which contradicts not only the visuals, but the dialogue which suggests there could be more to come. This anti-climatic conclusion inevitably falls short of whatever expectations audiences would have acquired over the course of the film.Despite being entertaining and intelligent, with great acting all around, superb visuals, and the rare, but still well executed fight scene, Cold War is a movie that keeps you attentive, yet will leave you wanting a finale better fitting a feature of its caliber.

Paul Magne Haakonsen "Cold War" ("Hon Zin") is an entertaining movie, but it is far from the finest moment in Hong Kong cinema. And for a crime-thriller, well then it set out to do a lot of things, but it ended up looking as if directors Lok Man Leung and Kim-ching Luk had bitten off a bit too much and weren't able to fully bring it full circle.The story starts out well enough, and quickly picks up pace, but towards the last third of the movie it started to become forced and somewhat messy, making the movie suffer in overall coherency and enjoyment as a result."Cold War" does have some of Hong Kong's top actors in it, and Aaron Kwok does carry the movie quite well. It was a shame that Andy Lau wasn't given more screen time in the movie, but his appearance was great nonetheless.Personally I am not overly keen on crime movies such as these, and "Cold War" didn't really bring anything overly new or exciting to the genre.The movie was nicely shot and edited, and it is enjoyable for what it is. But even with my love for Asian cinema, then I doubt that I will be making a second viewing out of this movie. It just didn't have that much to offer.

dumsumdumfai All the way from the beginning of the film up to the point of the taking over of power from the 2 brass cops were fairly well done. Then the movie tries to get smart. Too smart.*spoilers ahead*The story is about an incident that triggers an internal power struggle between the .. shall we say... brains and bronze side of the HK police force. So that's setup, very fast pace, so fast that in the opening credit they distinctively shows you an org chart dividing left and right to make sure you see the split.Then the story twists into who is the behind it all and the resolution. But there are so many holes to this story it isn't funny. And the open ending asks for an sequel is pitiful.Holes: - the commish can't be reach in such an emergency? really? - how did the plotter know Aaron will override the case? - if they want to kill Aaron on the highway why bother with the plot? - if they have the guts to kill head of Treasury with car bomb, why not kill Aaron in the process as well? - why did Albert (a top brass himself) goes up with 1 hand gun, to the roof when there's a SDU gun fight with explosive ? - if Aaron don't want to blow this up, why all the cops near the end to capture the son?Man, the rooftop explosive sequence is sooooooooooooo unnecessary and badly filmed and choreography that it took me right out of the movie.It is more logical Albert is the devil behind the scene. Save him for the sequel for a second attack or revisit theSigh. Maybe 2 more draft of the script.

DICK STEEL And from the get go, we see Mongkok being bombed in a terrorist attack, before an EU squad mysteriously disappears from the police radar, together with five cops being held hostage for millions of dollars, threatening to blow this case wide open for the police, and become their PR nightmare. The safest city in the world is now under threat from forces and criminals unknown, and is now up to the highest echelons of the force to get their act together to crack the case, putting aside differences that have been festering for the longest time. The first third of the film has an extremely political slant to it, where internal bickering, testing of loyalties, and the protection of fiefdoms in organizations rear their ugly head. Anyone working in any private or public sector organization will be able to see parallels that both Lok Man Leung and Sunny Luk had drawn upon to set their characters in, with supporting acts from Lam Ka-Tung, Chin Kar Lok, Andy On and even Charlie Yeung playing various department heads, being drawn into the deep divisions, where on one side, Lee takes over in brash fashion, only to come up against the more brooding, thinking Sean, the latter plotting a coup de tat to wrestle control and to instill some semblance of reason. After all, Lee has personal conflicts of interest and Sean is banging on that to relief the former of his position.The second half becomes the Aaron Kwok show, with the police operations code named Cold War undergoing full swing, and the directors setting up plenty of action, with typical criminal- cop phone call conversations, and keeping things tight for the audience in wondering just who the perpetrators may be, in addition to rewarding everyone with a fairly realistic highway shootout scene. But the final act is where the prestige comes in, with the introduction of Aarif Lee as a fairly inexperienced ICAC officer who may have stumbled onto some secrets behind Cold War, and convinces his bosses to allow him to spearhead an investigations into the two deputy commissioners of police, turning the film into one investigative drama complete with red herrings and good old fashion police work.If only that was expanded upon, instead of speeding it through, which was what some quarters were restless about that Mainland China may have influenced the outcome of the film in some way, given that the good guys have to come up on top as a requisite. It's most unfortunate that the final act turned out to be its weakest, since it's never about the destination, but the journey in getting there, and there's where the screenplay fell through with gaping lack of information, perhaps primed for expansion in a separate film altogether, and a flow that was rather choppy, as if glossing over details had severely knocked the wind out of what could have been a very strong finish.But story aside, I felt that the perennial struggle between Scholar and Farmer was something that would be instantly identifiable with anyone in Singapore, where success with grades would guarantee being airdropped into a cushy job in any government organization. And clearly, Aaron Kwok's Sean Lau is one such scholar, promising and the youngest ever to be made deputy, and primed for the top job in what would be a railway ride to the top, barring any cock ups from this operation. This is clearly in contrast with one who rose through the ranks through sheer grit, determination and hard work in the case of M.B. Lee, being out there with operational experience with the men, versus someone brought into management and wielding presentation slides instead of risking his neck out there in the field. Debunking their respective stereotypes, is what made the characterization of both leading protagonists a joy to sit through and discover.While we are largely aware of Tony Leung Ka Fai's versatility, and looking quite the bad ass with his bald and bearded look here, I felt Aaron Kwok has really matured and aged well like fine wine, and with it came loads of improvement in his acting chops as well, charismatic to a fault in his portrayal of Sean Lau as we get put through which side of the fence this chap is really sitting on. Despite big names like Lam Ka Tung, Chin Kar Lok, Andy On and Eddie Peng, all of them were severely underutilized, which is a pity given the ensemble, with the likes of Charlie Yeung to balance the testosterone level in what would be a stereotypical role of being the PR chief for the police. Look out for Andy Lau in his few minutes, where he really chewed up the scenery as the secretary of security, primed and ripe for an expanded role if a sequel does come true.If only the ending wasn't so blatant as to leave it so open for a follow up film to be made, since it had left the door wide open to just how far the rot in the police force goes, despite being one of the safest cities in the world, that the organization tasked to keep the law and order gets bogged down by its own protocols, processes and power struggles. Still, as a first film effort, Cold War is still a very slick affair technical wise, with the leads propping the flimsy final act up on their shoulders with the promise of more. Recommended.