The best possible signpost to what kind of movie you're in for comes early in Flash Point, when Donnie Yen's hard-bitten cop Jun Ma is standing before the equivalent of Internal Affairs or some other review board. Apparently, one of Jun's more recent busts resulted in a perp with " ... three fractured ribs, a broken hip ... and anosmia. ..." It only took a second to translate the subtitled medical jargon and have it sink in: Donnie Yen hits melonfarmers so hard he slaps the very sense of smell out of their heads.
And after seeing Yen in action, you believe that; hell, you're amazed anyone he slugs even has a nervous system left. Yen choreographed the action in Flash Point for director Wilson Yip, and the Toronto Midnight Madness premier of Flash Point saw Midnight Madness program head Colin Geddes reading an e-mailed manifesto from Yen about how he's enthusiastically moving towards using 'Mixed Martial Arts" for better, stronger, faster fight scenes. I don't know what, exactly, 'Mixed Martial Arts" means, but having seen it, I know I like it. A lot.
Yen's one of a group of cops trying to take down a bloodthirsty band of Vietnamese 'brothers' led by crazy-mean Tony (Colin Chow) with the brutal-crazy Tiger (Xing Yu) as their enforcer in pre-handover Hong Kong; his partner Wilson (Louis Koo) is undercover with the group already. And the fun of Flash Point isn't in the plot, which is just a return to the classic Hong Kong action Woo-niverse of cops and crooks and conflicted undercover agents. It's in the fighting.
Bits and pieces for a lovely Tuesday:
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SCOOP: Spider-Man 4 and 5 Might be Shot at the Same Time!
Cinematical Seven: Disney's Awesome Live-Action Kid Adventures
