Console best movie i've ever seen.

Merolliv I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Leofwine_draca This modern-day Hong Kong thriller mixes together elements of the psychological human drama with a more conventional terrorist-mastermind type plot that seems very familiar in today's world of suicide bombers and terrorist bombings. With repeated shots of buildings exploding a la 9/11, this makes for a film that is sometimes uncomfortable and always unexpected. Sadly, the movie as a whole is let down by some indifferent acting, especially on the part of the lead, Daniel Wu, whose over-the-top gurning belongs in a pantomime. The good news is that it generally fits together well as an action-cum-thriller with plenty of shoot-outs, bloodshed, and martial arts battles to keep the machismo running over.Director Teddy Chan handles the action sequences with aplomb, revealing the true horror of what happens when the police battle on the streets with terrorist villains, as numerous bystanders end up getting caught in the crossfire and both sides taking heavy casualties. Although the toxic gas premise belongs in a sci-fi movie, things don't really get out of hand until the effects-laden finale in the sewers which actually happens to be pretty funny. Attempts are made to give this film a heavier plot that most, as it focus on various characters caught up in the proceedings, trying to get the audience to see what it would be like to be them.Out of the cast, the best performances come from Emil Chau as the by-the-book cop, who has a wholesome feel of goodness about him; I'd like to see him in similar roles in other films. Although Joan Chen is top-billed in her minor role as a police psychologist, she's actually on screen very little and makes nothing of an impact – I've always considered her to be overrated myself. Conversely, Josie Ho, an actress I've never heard of, who plays one of the female terrorists, is excellent, bringing heart to the role of a guilt-free killer and being very sexy with it – give this lady more roles! Much is made of white-haired Kwok-Leung Gan as the chief terrorist Soong, and he is decent as bad guys go, more of a silent brooding menace than a megalomaniac in this one. So, all in all this is a decent action flick, not a masterpiece or particularly rewatchable or anything, but different enough to be worth a go.

Jazzygilby This review is for the HK Legend DVD Region 2 Version for Purple Storm.Teddy Chan directs this relatively large budget HK movie with emphasis on Human emotions and action thriller. Mixing and matching, audiences are given a roller coaster ride of emotions, which works very well with Western Audiences such as heightening sadness immediately after an adrenaline pumping action sequence. This trick has always been a trademark amongst Hong Kong movies and has only been recently introduced to the West by the likes of John Woo and Hark Sui.Daniel Wu, an American born actor, is the main focus of the film as he juggles his emotions between loyalty and righteousness. Like with the rest of the cast, Daniel does not try to overplay his role with typical HK theatrical acting techniques. This is refreshing and also adds a little realism to the film. My only disappointment was with Joan Chen, who I admire as a first rate actress, but cannot speak Cantonese (Mandarin speaker), so throughout the film she has been horribly dubbed over with very noticeable speech non-synchronisation.The plot itself is interesting but was not clearly explained throughout the film (toward the end there were moments that I did not know what was happening and what to watch out for, namely the airport sequence). Furthermore, I would have rather preferred if the film eliminated some of its plot holes (e.g. Motivation from Todd and what happened to his son?) as character building was such an integral part of the film. Instead, the movie chooses to be driven by action sequences rendering the audiences of any plot anticipation. The action sequences is divided into 2 categories, gun shooting and hand to hand combat. The gun shooting sequences are not as good as what the big budget Hollywood offers which I thought was disappointing, however the highly praised hand to hand combat compensates the action sequences with realistic and very hard hitting moves. At this point, I would like to emphasise that this film is very violent (not for HK standard though) even for an UK 15 rating and some Western Viewers will be shocked when viewing this film. This film was clearly made with more effort and thought than the usual HK production. It has been highly praised by viewers in the Far East and rightly so. Western viewers will enjoy it very much as this style of filmmaking and plot is still relatively novel in the West. I would highly recommend this film to anyone in the world that loves thriller and action in its movie. The DVD is presented with a good selection of special features from a 20mins making featurette to an interview with the co-star Josie Ho. There is even a terrific film commentary with the writer of the script and Danny Wu, the lead actor. This DVD will not disappoint fans of the film.

Chris-773 This movie was recently released on dvd in England by Hong Kong Legends. I had seen the movie before on VCD but I can say without reservation that HKL have done a great job with it's debut on DVD.For fans of Hong Kong action cinema or viewers bored by the usual brainless Hollywood shoot-em-ups this film should make for a good evenings entertainment.

kurage Here we've got an intelligent mixture of typical hongkongmovieshootouts, worlddestructionthemes and intelligent filmmaking. Not that the script has not its big holes and a few specialeffects are a bit cheaplooking. But the cinematography is a optical treat and the soundtrack is first rate. The blend of fast actionsequences and colorful slow, sometimes nearly poetic parts, has no comparison in its kind of movie, so a classification is rather hard. The closest genre is a disaster or terroristmovie with deeper human and political notes than usual. Well worth to be seen worldwide in cinemas. But i am hoping this for so many other (mostly asian) movies before and nobody seems to believe me. Unfortunately.