The Corruptor Review
by "Berge Garabedian" (drsuess AT microtec DOT net)March 15th, 1999
THE CORRUPTOR
RATING: 7.5 / 10 --> Very Good Movie
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Chow Yun Fat continues his ascent into the American action genre alongside BOOGIE NIGHT-man (8/10) Mark Wahlberg, who stars in his second film for director James Foley (This is Foley's follow-up to their previous gig FEAR (8/10)). They're New York city cops, there's bad stuff happening in Chinatown...have a blast!
PLOT:
As two rival Chinese underground factions fight the turf war in NYC's Chinatown, good-time cop Wallace joins the Asian Gang Unit of the 15th Precinct, under the watchful eye of top cop, Nick Chen. They must fight the bad guys, work the underground, respect the feds, and avoid the plethora of corruption running rampant on their streets.
CRITIQUE:
Is this an original idea for a movie? No way. Is this a good movie? You bet. I thoroughly enjoyed this film from beginning to end. There were no dull moments, lots of action, a solid story, a cool car chase scene, and plenty of grit to rub into your scalp. Admittedly, I still have a problem understanding every other sentence that comes out of Chow Yun-Fat's mouth, but hey, at least most of Wahlberg's whisper-talk made its way across. It's sad because I really do think that there were plenty of one-liners that were missed by the audience because of Yun-Fat's muffled English pronunciation. Having said that, I don't think it is the acting that draws people to go see a movie like this in the first place, it's generally the action, the interesting story line, and the capacity to keep you interested for close to two hours. This movie was able to keep me entertained for that period, and even tossed in some over-stylized direction for real Hong Kong effect.
This movie doesn't necessarily need to be seen on the big screen. It's one of those movies that would go down great on a Saturday night at home with your friends, beer and nachos. The plot is a little complex at times, but all in all, it goes down like a bottle o' salsa alongside your nachos. Slowly, but surely. There is a lot of corruption going on in this movie, there are some nasty bad guys, bad good guys, and everyone in between. Half the fun is figuring out who stands for what in the end. Think RONIN (7.5/10) by way of YEAR OF THE DRAGON (7.5/10) through the dirty dealings of SERPICO (7/10). Is this film gonna revolutionize the action genre and change your view of all films action? Not a chance! It just doesn't carry enough originality in its Chinese take-out box. But will it show you a good time, quite a bit of violence and a decent plot for a few pockets of green? It sure will! And if that's your gig, and you dig this kind of fun-junk, check this gritt-meister out! Either way, the title of this film is still pretty lame.
Little Known Facts about this film and its stars:
The actor playing bad-guy Uncle Benny in this film, Kim Chan, played a character with that same name in LETHAL WEAPON 4 (Courtesy of Rogert Ebert via the IMDb).
Infamous writer/director Oliver Stone acts as executive producer on this project, alongside Terence Chang, known to be director John Woo's right-hand on his films.
Chow Yun-Fat's name is actually Yun-Fat Chow. He is born on the 18th of May, 1955 on Nam Nga Island, in Hong Kong.
Word on the street is that Mark Wahlberg is apparently dating his co-star in his upcoming movie, THE YARDS, Charlize Theron. He's also known as musician Marky Mark.
The man who plays Mark Wahlberg's dad in this movie, also plays the character of Dr. Guggenheim in RUSHMORE.
This film is Robert Pucci's first full-feature script.
Review Date: March 14, 1999
Director: James Foley
Writer: Robert Pucci
Producer: Dan Halsted
Actors: Chow Yun-Fat as Nick Chen, Mark Wahlberg as Danny Wallace, Ric Young as Henry Lee
Genre: Action
Year of Release: 1999
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(c) 1999 Berge Garabedian
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
