Invisible Target (2007)

Wonderfully offbeat film!

Wonderful character development!

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

As this Hong Kong action movie opens a young woman is shopping for wedding rings but is killed in an explosion when robbers blast their way into an armoured car outside the shop; several police officers responding to the crime are also killed. Six months later the gang is back in Hong Kong and her fiancé Chan Chun, a police officer, is determined to get his revenge. Inspector Carson Fong Yik-wai who led the police on the day of the raid is also determined to catch those responsible. They are later joined by Wai King-ho; a rookie officer whose brother was undercover with the gang and is suspected of changing sides. Over the course of the film it emerges that the gang was helped by a serving officer who now has their stolen money. The gang want their ill-gotten money back and our trio of protagonists want to stop the gang... it will all lead to a dramatic confrontation in the police station.If you want full on action you could do a lot worse than this film. The action starts in the opening scene and is almost constant till the end. This action is a combination of exciting, well-choreographed martial arts, shootings and explosions. Nicholas Tse, Shawn Yue and Jaycee Chan put in really impressive performances as Chan Chun, Carson Fong Yik-wai and Wai King Ho respectively and Wu Jing is a lot of fun as the gang's leader. The story doesn't provide too many surprises; that doesn't matter though as it is still a solid story; besides it is all about the action. The numerous stunts a as impressive as one would expect from Hong Kong cinema; many of them look genuinely painful. Overall I'd certainly recommend this to fans of Hong Kong action or fans of full-on action in general.These comments are based on watching the film in Cantonese with English subtitles.

Good, but too long story of three different cops coming together to take on a band of really nasty robbers who like to blow things up. One cop wants revenge since his fiancé was killed in an earlier robbery, another is a hotshot cocky cop, and the third is a by the books guy who is looking for his missing brother. They are out for a band of bandits who know they are the bad guys and act accordingly, not hesitating to kidnap a bus load of kids or blow up a whole block of buildings to get away.The story is clichéd and you can pretty much guess how its going to come out. What is not cliché is the action sequences which are truly amazing and are amped up versions of the sort of stuff that Jackie Chan used to do, which isn't surprising since director Benny Chan is a close relative (I've read his brother and I've read his son I'm not sure which). The action is whats key here and its of the sort that induces you to say "Oh wow" out loud frequently while you watch it. You'll want to see it for the fight scenes (pick one) and chases (The roof top)that will amaze you didn't leave anyone broken or dead.If there is a flaw its that perhaps its too long at 120 minutes. The story isn't strong enough to support it and the final battle which good becomes almost too much of a good thing. Still this is one to search out if you like big action.

What can I say that the other rightly so positive reviewers haven't said? Not a lot really.This was such an enjoyable film. It was reminiscent of the days of old for an Hong Kong action flick....crazy stunts with a second replay (like the old Jackie Chan flicks), plenty of excellent martial arts, explosions and gun play. I felt as if I was watching an early 80/90's film.What impressed even more was that there was a very strong story to this film. Everything blended nicely. The main leads has good character development and were very likable. The bad guys.....they were bad!! No messing about, no morals...just downright bad.With some of the so called action movie tosh that America churns out today, the west should start looking to Hong Kong and Korea to take a leaf out of their book to see how things are done (Flashpoint was also very good).Watch this and you won't be disappointed.

There's nothing invisible about the target in Benny Chan's latest movie Invisible Target. And in actuality, it seems that the constant target for everyone in the movie here, be they the bad guys or the good cops, are the plenty of glass lying around, getting smashed into smithereens by hurled projectiles, or more frequently, human bodies. See that nice looking glass window? It'll be smashed soon. Or that double panel glass facade? Yup, as soon as you notice it, the next scene will show it in a million bits on the floor with a writhing body. It could be aptly titled Glass Target.But don't get me wrong. Invisible Target is still enjoyable, in that it brings to you the flavour of a typical Hong Kong action movie, with Benny Chan at the helm. As we slowly get nauseated by the frequent mole versus mole plots that Hong Kong crime thrillers formula usually adopted (no thanks to the success of you know what), I thought Invisible Target was reminiscent about an old John Woo movie Hard Boiled, except that it's minus the guns, and instead you get plenty of fisticuffs. A similarly long drawn out ending was a little too tedious to sit through, though it had its fair share of big bangs and segmented action sequences which tried hard to hold your attention. Teahouses remain perfect locales for fights to break out (as in Hard Boiled), and here, it serves as a male bonding moment for our three heroic cops Chan Chun (Nicholas Tse), Fong Yik-wei (Shawn Yue) and Jaycee Chan's Wai King-ho.But in between the action, are the woefully painful monologues that the villain Tien Yeng- seng (Wu Jing) and his merry gang of 7 (which includes Andy On as brother Yeng-yee) dish out, trying to philosophize their actions as "I'm a villain so I kill", and about justice-injustice in the world. Wu Jing again never failed to disappoint, as he has this charismatic aura around him which doesn't dissipate when he whups everyone's rear, hard! We've seen what he can do in SPL, now watch him do that with double the speed and intensity, and on thrice the number of victims. If anything, Invisible Target is a Wu Jing movie, and one in which I'm not surprised if many actually throw their weight of support behind him. It's a movie that the villain outshines the heroes easily.With three distinct cops, Invisible Target actually spends a considerable amount of time introducing them one by one. Nicholas' Chan is always brooding, and a reckless one in that he's mourning the loss of his fiancée. He's out to get Tien because she happened to be collateral damage. Shawn's Fong is arrogant, until he's made to eat lead (in a scene you have to see to believe) by Tien, and his bruised ego says he must take the villain down. And Jacycee's Wai is probably the wimpiest of the lot, being a by-the-books street cop who's investigating the disappearance of his brother (do a double take on that cameo!), who might have fallen into Tien's hands. It's no doubt too that all of them are skilled in martial arts, and at any time would prefer to holster their weapons.Nicholas and Shawn are no newcomers to action, having starred together in recent movies like Dragon Tiger Gate, and thank goodness they've ditched their long locks in that movie for contemporary shorter crop here. And while the two of them are relatively old hands in the industry, I can't help but wince each time Jaycee is on screen. For starters, he's the son of the legendary Jackie Chan, and in Invisible Target, I can't help picture it's a younger Jackie being beaten , battered and bruised. It didn't help that his character, the most naive and innocent of the lot, is in total contrast to the classic cop characters his father portrayed, and I surely think it was deliberate that he remains the least buff of the lot, with many goody-two-shoes scenes occasionally played out for comedy, or to reinforce that he's basically a cut above the rest of the good cops in terms of having a good natured character. Characters like his are hard to come by in an age where grittier cinematic cops roam the street.So while big brothers Nicholas and Shawn get some fantastical set action pieces to show off their mettle, Jaycee got the shorter end of the stick by being quite a deadweight at times. Oh, and what of Elanne Kwong's role? Sadly there isn't too much for a pretty lass to do since her character Leung works in the Police Intelligence department, and doesn't get directly involved when the going gets tough. A typical flower vase role unfortunately, for a combined screen time of less than 5 minutes.Despite its reliance on hard hitting action dished out by the actors themselves, and in all purpose are as realistic as they look with the obvious wire work seen in the trailers drastically reduced, a few noticeable continuity errors marred the enjoyment of the movie at times. Invisible Target had all the ingredients for a classic action movie, but the run time of more than 2 hours was due to an overindulgence with the slower moments which were fused with a couple of "I'm a cop" moments, and feel good messages rammed down your throat.And what do you know, Invisible Target still can't shake off the mole versus mole type plot line, unfortunately. If it could have been a little more compact, and gotten to the point faster than it did, it would have been a tad more enjoyable, given the wealth of cameo/ supporting talent at its disposal, like Sam Lee (Dog Bite Dog) and the evergreen Lam Suet, rather than feel the need to tie up all the loose subplots it introduced, and exposing some technical loopholes in some action sequences.