Sting of the Scorpion
A few months back I picked up this film in the
bargain basement bin at the back of a Chinatown store in which the dust
was nearly as high as the VCD. Since they were practically paying me to
take it, I did and filed it away under the “likely never to be watched”
category. Even though it does have a picture of Anthony Wong on the cover,
the fact that I couldn’t even find it in the HKMDB made me think it must
be a real clunker. Then a friend who is writing up an essay on HK female
action films made mention of this little obscurity a few times and made
it sound pretty good. So I watched it and am glad I did.
It’s a solid action/drama that reminded me mood
wise a bit of She Shoots Straight with a much smaller budget. In many ways
it plays out like an average low budget cop yarn, but it has enough twists
along the way to keep you interested and an outstanding performance from
Maggie Siu. Maggie Siu is primarily a very popular TV star in Hong Kong
and I have not seen her in much, but as the film slowly shifts to her character
in the second half it takes on some real dramatic tension and intensity.
She also has a few action scenes in which she looks just fine and I am
looking forward to seeing the sequel to this one – Murders Made to Order
– in which she plays an undercover assassin.
The story is driven by corruption, betrayals,
guilt, murder and revenge – and all in the name of love. Three friends
– Anthony Wong, Cheng and Maggie Siu – go through police training together
and initially work under Johnny Wang. Cheng and Maggie are orphans that
grew up together and Cheng always expected they would marry. When he realizes
that she loves Anthony, he goes off the straight and narrow and begins
secretly working with a major triad figure, Eddie Ko. Cheng is one of the
fastest rising cops in Hong Kong and is soon a top inspector. Meanwhile,
Anthony has joined the Internal Corruption Bureau and Maggie is still working
under Wang. The three of them are seemingly still the best friends, but
this is soon to explode under a barrage of accusations and suspicions.
Anthony is given evidence that Wang may be accepting
bribes, but as he digs deeper he keeps unknowingly getting closer to his
friend Cheng. Maggie is being kept in the dark by Anthony and his actions
make her begin to suspect that he is corrupt as well – she turns to Cheng
who still loves her and wants to protect her – but he can’t allow Anthony
to get any closer to the truth. Eddie Ko then gives Cheng orders to silence
Maggie permanently because she is damaging his businesses. The first hour
of the film sets it all up – with some action scenes interspersed – and
this leads to a terrific last thirty minutes that have a few surprising
and nasty turns.
My rating for this film: 7.0