REVIEW: ‘Flash Point’ (2007)

9/10 – Hong Kong’s dynamic duo is back on track. After fumbling through the fantasy wire and CG mess that was DRAGON TIGER GATE, action directing superstar Donnie Yen and director Wilson Yip score with another hard-biting action thriller that builds on their initial success with KILL ZONE (aka SPL). It’s a powerhouse showcase for Yen’s newly developed MMA screen fighting and Yip’s maturing direction.

FLASH POINT follows the edgy crime themes that screenwriter Szeto Kam-yuen has been developing for Hong Kong cinema since his HK Film Award nomination for TOO MANY WAYS TO BE NO. 1 (1997). Prior to this release, Szeto notably followed KILL ZONE up with DOG BITE DOG and Johnnie To’s EXILED, both of which share the hard-boiled action of FLASH POINT.

Donnie Yen stars in possibly his best showcase role to date as a fiery-tempered police detective working with Louis Koo (ROB-B-HOOD), as an undercover agent, to bring down three violent Vietnamese brothers with their fingers in all sorts of violent criminal activity. When Koo’s cover is blown, he barely escapes with his life. As a key witness, Koo and his girlfriend (Fan Bingbing) become targets of the gangsters and Yen must bend the rules to get them out of harm’s way.

The film is basically a reworking of KILL ZONE with elements of Corey Yuen’s RIGHTING WRONGS and Donnie Yen’s LEGEND OF THE WOLF thrown in. Once again we’re presented with an officer going outside the law to seek justice. The justification for Yen to apply excessive force when taking on the baddies is carefully laid out to maximize the thrill of watching Yen punch faces in. It doesn’t get any better than when he chases down KUNG FU HUSTLE star Xing Yu in a build up to the epic action finale. In one of Yip’s few directing slips, he has Xing go over-the-top by dangling a helpless young girl upside down. When he throws her to the ground, we get Yen’s stunned reaction and the only excuse needed to accept Yen’s lethal response. This leads into the second of three outstanding fight sequences.

The first takes place at an indoor golf range and sets the tone for Yen’s ragged fight choreography and the brutal efficiency of Collin Chou, playing one of the three villains. Yen has usually been one to stray from the eloquent sparring of his mentor Yuen Wo-ping and the meticulously arranged routines of Jackie Chan and his stunt team. Yen represents a newer school of action choreography, one shared by Korean action master Jung Doo-hung where more rough and realistic sparring is displayed.

The first hour of the film only contains about 15 minutes of action smartly interspersed with fast moving direction and editing from Yip and splicer Cheung Ka-fai. Some might argue this isn’t enough but Yip maintains tight control the whole time and manages to flex his dramatic muscle with what ultimately acts as the ideal groundwork for the action finale which clocks in at nearly 20 minutes uninterrupted.

For Yen’s showdown with Chou and company, he seemingly draws on his experience with LEGEND OF THE WOLF, one of his few self-directed films that has earned equal criticism and praise for its turbo-charged action choreography. What Yen has learned in the years since is how to smooth out the rough spots and add more distinctive moves while maintaining the same level of intensity. In LOTW, Yen stages an impressive chase sequence on foot through a forest. A similar scenario in FLASH POINT plays out in a picturesque field as Yen has a running gun battle with Chou and his men after a prisoner exchange heats up and boils over.

Chan Kwong-wing, who previously scored INFERNAL AFFAIRS, KILL ZONE and THE WARLORDS, creates the perfect soundtrack for this finale. It goes from driving guitars to full orchestral and finally scales back to rapid percussion for the martial arts brawl between Yen and Chou.

Yen must have been keenly aware that a kickass fight sequence was needed for this film. Forget about the nonsense he performed in DRAGON TIGER GATE and SHANGHAI KNIGHTS. The sequence he had to at least match was his incredibly vicious brawl with Sammo Hung in KILL ZONE. Full respect to Sammo but if there was anyone capable of performing at the same level, at least in their prime it must be Collin Chou. He’s perfectly matched against Yen. The two deliver a knockout match that was clearly made for the fans.

In KILL ZONE, Yen dabbled with Mixed Martial Arts fighting for the first time against Sammo. Think of that as the teaser and his fight against Chou as the main event. MMA choreography in Hong Kong is rare but there have been numerous attempts by Hollywood to incorporate it. Thanks to its real-world popularity in the West, it’s become the new measure of gritty and realistic fighting skill. Once you add grappling and groundwork to a fight, there’s no going back. Those old school roundhouse kicks and crane stances work in the proper context but don’t work when someone knocks you off your feet, coils around you like a snake and tries to choke the life out of you. Action directors today who work on modern-day films can no longer ignore some form of MMA fighting and still consider themselves relevant. In this context, Yen is way ahead of the pack in the East and the West. Not only is he the first Hong Kong action director to fully embrace this fighting style but he has managed, in an eight minute sequence, to utterly destroy every other attempt to film anything even remotely related to MMA fighting. THE BOURNE IDENTITY, CRADLE 2 THE GRAVE and many recent low-budget films like BEYOND THE RING have been buried. Yen merges the high-impact choreography Hong Kong is already famous for with MMA fighting and produces some sparring that looks truly painful. You will see fists and kicks connect. Once again, Hong Kong does screen fighting better than anyone in the world.

Although lacking high-profile names like Sammo Hung and Simon Yam, this film still benefits from good supporting performances. As Chou’s cohorts, Lui Leung-wai and Xing Yu are every bit his match in menacing charisma. Xing stays away from showing off his fighting skills yet still gets to have the fun of being the film’s most despicably violent character. Kent Cheng has a terrific role as Yen and Koo’s boss. Louis Koo and Fan Bing-bing are the actors this film could have gone without. They’re obviously in place for their sex appeal. Both their characters seem to be forced into the script at times. Koo is completely out of place at the end when he makes a feeble attempt to help Yen.

FLASH POINT is a near perfect action flick. It’s lean, well shot, well acted, suspenseful, and explodes with some of the most intense and impressively staged martial arts and gunplay action that Donnie Yen has ever been involved in. Wilson Yip has come a long way as an action filmmaker and I’d say with this film he’s earned his place alongside Johnnie To, John Woo and other top-tier Hong Kong action directors. At this point, his success may be tied to Yen. The two have formed a potent partnership that will hopefully produce more works of similarly high-grade quality.

Related Topics: Donnie Yen, Flash Point (2007), gunplay, MMA