Zhang Lei (Sun Honglei) plays the stereotypically laconic captain of a narcotics team, who ends up arresting Choi Tin-ming (Louis Koo), a drug supplier who`s down and out on his luck for reasons to be revealed. Needless to say, Choi isn`t willing to cash in on the death sentence that comes as an occupational hazard for drug smugglers, so he ends up working with Zhang and his team on a large-scale bust of his former business partners.
For a movie about drug busts and narcotics, Drug War delivers exactly what one expects from the genre, ranging from factory raids to tense interrogation sequences to Truxican stand-offs. There`s a tensely drawn-out identity swap sequence, a crate load of gun fights, and a climatic payoff at the end of the movie that`s way up high on the fatality count, even for something from the shoot-em-up genre.
Louis Koo and Sun Honglei put in solid performances as the rat and the stoic police officer, although the cat-and-mouse drama that could have underscored their tenuous relationship could have been more evident. That being said, Sun gets the lion`s share of the juicy acting bits in this movie, hamming it up in the aforementioned identity swap sequences and proving to be generally enjoyable to watch onscreen.
Those elements are pretty much par for the course, but Drug War`s wintry lighting and gritty violence conceals the playful irrationality that underlies the proceedings. To wit: policemen trail suspicious trucks for days on end, a cocaine factory is manned by a deaf-and-mute family and an aptly named middleman cum port owner called Haha (Hao Ping) literally can`t stop laughing. It`s ludicrous beyond belief, and may try the patience of genre stalwarts, but the over-the-top elements of Drug War are undeniably refreshing.
Drug War isn`t exactly epic, but it does provide a ton of guilty pleasure for those of us jonesing for our next crime movie fix. You won`t develop a bout of cold turkey from missing this Johnnie To number, but if you`re looking for some drug-busting, gun-slinging action and a nicely-paced number, Drug War will prove to be a pleasing diversion.
Summary:A `wham-bang-thank-you-ma`am` number that`s more hit than miss.
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Raphael Lim