Violent Cop
A quick note to myself. In the future stay away
from Hong Kong films with this title. This is two Violent Cops I have stumbled
over and both had the charm of a broken bicycle chain.
A couple is having sex in a deserted building
when a third party silently approaches them with more than voyeurism on
their mind. The pickaxe and drill in the hands might give away the deadly
intentions if the couple were paying attention. The woman finally sees
the person approaching and shouts out “in the back, in the back” from which
the man assumes she is requesting a change of position! A few minutes later
and he has been decorated with a sharp piece of metal in his skull and
the woman has been drilled in a manner that she had not been counting on.
A psycho killer has struck again. Who could it possibly be?
The butch lesbian played by Pinky Cheung who doesn’t
like anyone messing with her woman, the woman in question (Anita Chan)
who seems to be tiring of the feminine touch and is seemingly looking for
something with a five o’clock shadow, the female police superintendent
who we keep being reminded has the same shoe size as the killer, the primadonna
actress who receives a heart in the mail, the quirky coroner with a bad
taste for perfumes or finally is it the investigating cop (Patrick Tam)
whose own sexual confusion has put him constantly on the edge of violent
behavior. Pick anyone out of a hat because when we finally learn
whom the killer is it makes so little sense that the director truly could
have selected anyone.
This is a dreadful film in which the actors look
to be mainly reading from cue cards when they have the energy to lift their
heads. Pinky who usually exudes energy like a power candy bar is lifeless
and bored and Tam simply looks disbelieving that he has found himself in
such a mishap. The producers apparently hoped that enough kinky behavior
and violence would keep the audience entertained (if they at all cared),
but it is done with so little style and flair that one wonders how this
same director (Kant Leung) could have made the enjoyable The Demon’s Baby.
On the other hand he also directed Sexy and Dangerous II. So from his first
film Demon’s Baby to S&D II to this film – not exactly a trend to be
proud of.
The silliest thing about the film is that they
try so hard to keep the identity of the killer a secret until the every
end – but they give it away on the DVD itself!
My rating for this film: 2.5
DVD Information:
Distributed by Universe
The transfer is ok - nothing more.
Letterboxed
Cantonese and Mandarin language tracks
8 Chapters
The subtitles are Chinese or English.
There is a trailer for this film - and also
ones for Killers from Beijing and Romancing the Bullet.
Star Files - Pinky Cheung and Patrick Tam.