China Strike Force (2000)

Coolio—he of the Gangsta's Paradise and the craaaazy hair—has a major role in Hong Kong action flick China Strike Force, which is enough to make any sane martial arts movie fan hesitate about watching; but even though the rapper's performance is as diabolical as one might expect, the film is simply too much fun to ignore. China Strike Force is also totally preposterous much of the time and requires a huge amount of suspension of disbelief, but it is precisely this bonkers 'screw logic' approach that makes matters so entertaining.The opening scene gives a pretty good indication of what we're in for: cop buddies Alex (Leehom Wang) and Darren (Aaron Kwok) are on a mission to save a hostage, and use their martial arts skills to pummel the enemy into submission. After much hard-hitting violence it is revealed that the whole thing is actually a police training exercise—one in which the pretend enemy are willing to take an awful lot of damage for the sake of realism (and in which Alex and Darren seem more than happy to risk blindness, the other cops content to shoot the good guys in the head with paint-balls!).After this daft intro, we get into the story proper: Coolio plays a drug dealer (also named Coolio—what are the chances?) trying to break into the Chinese market. Mark Dacascos is Tony Lau, Coolio's Shanghai contact, who goes against his uncle Ma's wishes by importing narcotics. Wang and Kwok are the policemen out to stop the drug smugglers, helped by beautiful Japanese Interpol agent Norika (played by the drop-dead gorgeous Norika Fujiwara). And that's really all you need to know about the plot, 'cos all the fun is in the fast, furious and far-fetched action…Marvel as one of the cops rides a motorbike onto the roof of a car, and then defies physics by leaping onto the top level of an open top bus. Watch in amazement as a racing car is driven underneath a moving lorry at high speed. Drool in excitement as Noriko does stretching exercises in a prison cell. Thrill to the sight of Kwok and Dacascos fighting on top of a pimped up, purple and yellow Rolls Royce suspended from the bottom of a helicopter. And stare in disbelief as Coolio, Noriko and Kwok battle it out on a plate glass window teetering like a see-saw hundreds of feet above ground level.Thanks to its death-defying stunt-work (check out the end credits to see some of the not so successful attempts) and director Stanley Tong's excellent handling of the action, China Strike Force manages to be a hugely enjoyable no-brainer—even with Coolio in it!

This was the best movie I've seen starring Aaron Kwok. He shows more involvement with his part, and this is the first time I've seen him look genuinely interested in the female lead (Norika Fujiwara). Norika Fujiwara might have been big in Japan, but with so many gorgeous Hong Kong actresses, she's with tough competition. What was surprising was how good Aaron Kwok looked in this movie. He might have found a niche that he excels in, but there aren't enough movie of this type made in Hong Kong. The action in this movie stretches believability a bit. Like in the motor cycle chase scene, the bike literally climbs up vertically on the back of the van, then launches off its roof on an angle to land on top of a double decker bus. Not likely to happen !The rap music used in this movie sounds very dated, and using them were a fad the year this movie was made. I liked the cinematography, and the way they selected the background for each of the scenes.Pretty experimental movie for HK, and not bad for a first try.

CHINA STRIKE FORCE is the poster child for the disastrous attempt the Hong Kong film industry made in the early 2000s to achieve more "international" appeal - notably to sell the film to US markets, which is why it is filmed in English, but you also have a Taiwanese singer and a Japanese model in the cast to try to appeal to those markets. This kind of calculated marketing driven film-making process is just not what Hong Kong film-makers do well (leave that to Hollywood boys), and the result is a grand disaster of a film that I can't imagine appealing to *anybody*, whatever their nationality.The primary culpit is the script, which fleshes out a paper thin and utterly generic plot with terribly inane dialogue, delivered in poor English by a cast for who the language is mostly not a natural choice (and I include Coolio in that :p). As a result it's hard for the acting not to be utterly dreadful, even if the cast *were* made of people who actually could act in their native language. I'm not sure how the spurious racism sprinkled through the script was meant to increase international appeal either.The film's one saving grace is the action scenes, which Stanley Tong *does* know how to direct. There's a few moments of greatness to be found in these scenes, especially the finale set atop a pane of glass precariously suspended hundreds of floors above the ground (for whatever reason). This scene is almost worth the price of a rental by itself. If the film had just been a string of action scenes like this it might have been a significant guilty pleasure, but unfortunately these scenes are too few to really redeem an otherwise awful film.

*warning- spoilers* The film is reasonably acted as far as Hong kong actioners go and this is the best non-chan, non- woo HK film I have seen. The actors are all okay ranging from adeqaute to moments of cheesyness or woodenness. Mark Dacascos is very good in this as the bad guy and he makes an excellent baddie in a limited part. His demise was also a let down, I felt there wasn't a big enough showdown between him and Aron Kwok. Mark was excellent in this as usual with his fighting, he did not look out of place infact his form and acrobats beat the others hands down and he did some impressive stunt work whereas say Van Damme would have been consistently doubled. The film has a good pace, Coolio is funny in an over the top way and there are some exceptional stunts. The fight scenes are first class although as far as Hong Kong goes I have seen better and some unrealistic stunts and wire work also look dodgy but overall I was entertained. Dacascos stole the show for me and his only weak moment was where he was smoking a cigar, it is obvious he's not really a smoker with his strict training he undertakes and the fact he looked like he was going to throw up, aswell as a sore sounding throat. Overall this is a good way to pass 90 or so minutes although the DVD I own has a bad picture and mediocre sound. 7/10