Brendon Jones
It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
Kaydan Christian
A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
Shawn McKenna
The idea behind this film was to get three of the best Hong Kong action/crime directors today working together. The result was each did one segment (around 30 minutes each) in chronological order with Tsui first, Lam second and To finishing it off. This would be done differently than a film like Four Rooms (1995) where each segment was basically a separate story. In this movie each director would continue after the other to move the story and characters along from what happened previously. Like many conceptual films this movie sometimes seems a bit forced, sometimes clunky, some plot angles hang, disappear and seem a bit confusing, but I still found the movie quite interesting and entertaining.Triangle (the Chinese title is The Iron Triangle) starts off with Tsui Hark creating the foundation for the plot. It is both good and bad that Hark creates tons of plot angles for the movie to go. It gives the Ringo and later To plenty of room to move with, but also will leave either a bit too much to be either ignored and some angles barely gone over that a tighter script would have just ignored. In fact it took me a few tries to get past the beginning.Simon Yam (PTU, Election) is Lee Bo Sam a former race driver who is friends with Fai (Louis Koo: Throwdown) and antique shop owner Mok Chung-yuan (Sun Hong Lei: Seven Swords). Fai is trying to get him to acquiesce to a driving job for a jewelry heist. If he does not Fai will receive harm from some local triad members. All three need money though. In the middle of the meeting between Fai and Lee a strange man gives those three a small gold piece and states where they can find the rest of this treasure. His motives for doing this are a mystery to the bunch. Meanwhile Lee's wife Lin (Kelly Lin: Sparrow) is having an affair with policeman Wen (Gordon Lam), states that her husband is trying to have her killed off and wants Lam to get rid of Sam first.When Ringo Lam takes over in the first film he has directed since leaving the production of Wake of Death (2004), he ups the psychological attitude of the film and enriches the characterization. The most effective change is how the love-triangle relationship between Lam, Lin and Sam no longer appears to be the stereotypical triangle in the beginning and takes on a new bizarre dimension. Ringo Lam does a homage to Reservoir Dogs which was based on his film City on Fire so you see a homage to an homage) by using a record player, a handcuffed cop and a few other scenarios in this middle segment of the film.The last segment belongs to Johnnie To and from the beginning where we see Lam Suet (Lam is in a lot of Johnnie To movies) we know who is directing this. Suet plays a drug addicted epileptic who causes flats in both automobiles and bikes and offers to fix them. The area where he is in has no cellular reception and a conveniently located eatery where they can wait while their vehicle is being fixed. However, Wen is there as well as the triad members who are there to purchase firearms. This is another use of the triangle in this film. To offers his normal use of "Team Spirit" themes and Mexican standoff action in this conflict triangle to make the last half hour quite interesting.While this film never fully jells together, some plot changes are just a bit bizarre like Lin's character change (or really non-use) in the third segment, I still ended up really liking this film. There are quite enough brilliant moments that make this movie a recommendation for fans of not only Hong Kong cinema and Johnnie To, but movie fanatics as well. You just have to get past the first 15 minutes.I have the Magnolia pictures R1 release that has two extra features: a "Making of" and a Behind the Scenes. The "Making of" is solely focused on Johnnie To's segment and ultimately not that interesting. It is mostly standing around, saying a few lines and more waiting. Behind the Scenes actually has the most information with interviews from several of the cast and crew. The region 3 release of this by Mega Star has deleted scenes, TV spots and trailers in addition to what the R1 has. I was most disappointed that the R1 does not have the deleted scenes, but it is still a worthwhile release.
goods116
If a movie can't hold your interest in the first 25 minutes, it's over as far as I'm concerned. This concept that you have to simply deal with a slow first third of a movie and be rewarded later is nonsense. A good movie has to start and end strong. It all seem interesting and some decent shots and lots of promise, but ultimately muddled and irrelevant. There are so many other movies from Asia to watch, many of which I am sure most of you have not seen, that I would really skip this one and look elsewhere. Why exactly does IMDb require a 10 line minimum for reviews? I said my piece and I hope this helps a few of you move on to the next film.
clyderay
Very good effort from the three directors. The story were made so compact that the movie appeared too short to me. Because I am not a fan for either of them, I could not really tell which part was made by whom. However, the movie has kept quite a consistency in style, to me it is already an achievement for the three.Great layout of stages and clues were provided to the audience. Some particular points may looked chance-medley, but there were also inevitability alongside (e.g. the crazy guy kept shaking his head seems odd, but he is the man who gives convincing enough reason to bring the wanted police, the three ghouls and the police officer together.).The blackout section was the most exciting and breath taking part of the movie. When all the forces came meet together with interaction and conflict of interests. Very dramatic and humorous, with a touch of personal loyalty for covering each other.There were also many choices available to characters, obvious one was when the antiquary guy throwing the treasure in the reed bush, when he had kill-or-not-to-kill option the moment before. Another example is when all 4 of them got out of the bush and looked back to the surrounded cop, they kept looking till confirming the cop is really good at shooting, and passed the option on to him.Overall, with the discussion of the human nature against survival, the movie made itself outstanding.
karmakallio
My clockmaker friend was not pleased. His rating system is such: If you look at your watch once, its a good movie. Twice is pushing your luck and three times and you're out of luck. ( No clock being the perfect movie ). He took 3 looks. Though having some decent scenes you sort of get a mixed bag of plotting, double-crossing and old style Tsui Hark slapstick. Still we found it worth talking about afterward a bit, so maybe its worth a look... Side plots aren't concluded and motivations aren't all too clear, the segmentation isn't really clear, you don't really see the 3 parts differentiate from each other. Still, could have fared worse since for a change the action was not the consuming theme, instead the few fights being portrayed in what i'd imagine to be a realistic fashion, won't tell more.. Some good comedy , good milieu, gotta be fair it had some OK content to it too.
