Without a Clue
Writer and director Wai ka-fai and his muse Lau Ching-wan take a detour to crazytown in a baffling, half-baked crime thriller.
detective vs. sleuths
Director: Wai Ka-fai • Writers: Wai Ka-fai, Ray Chan Wai-ban, Mak Tin-shu
Starring: Lau Ching-wan, Raymond Lam, Charlene Choi, Tan Kai, Carlos Chan, Kathy Yuen, Jeana Ho, Deep Ng, Timmy Hung, Stephanie Che, Bin Zi, Li Jing, Carmen Lee
Hong Kong • 1hr 42mins
Opens Hong Kong July 21 • IIB
Grade: C
Wai Ka-fai is not a hack, so can someone tell me what the hell is going on with Detective vs. Sleuths?
The writer, director and Johnnie To right hand is the mastermind behind minor gems Running on Karma and Mad Detective, and he’s produced some genuine Hong Kong crime hits, like Drug War and the underrated The Longest Nite. The man knows what he’s doing so there’s no excuse for the hot mess that is Detective vs. Sleuths | 神探大戰. The frantically-paced, nigh on indecipherable crime thriller has a compelling concept: A bunch of twentysomethings pissed at a lazy, corrupt justice system go on a murder-revenge spree, and the only cop that can see what they’re up to has gone out of his mind and is living under a freeway. This is Wai’s stock in trade, but he seems to be lost in a fog of censor-friendly IIB storytelling that leads straight to WTFery. Not even Wai’s preferred leading man Lau Ching-wan can save it, and Lau can save a lot. If ever there was a time and place for pulpy, grimy Cat III filmmaking it’s in something like Dvs.S, so it’s possible the soft rating resulted in a slash and hack job that excised great gobs of character motivation and logical plot progression along with the blood and guts. That said, it’s already grossed about HK$470 million in China, so maybe it doesn’t matter. Of course, it’s also possible Wai has finally cranked out a stinker.
This looks more exciting than it is
The story, such as can be parsed, begins with a recap of a string of murders years ago, often featuring a crying child sitting with their deceased parent, you know the scene. Cut to now, and a string of grisly killings hit Hong Kong. Are they connected? Of course! Each of the new victims was a suspect in the older crimes, now gone cold, and who for various reasons wiggled off the hook. A vigilante crew calling itself The Chosen Sleuths, made up of people who were denied justice the years before, are taking matters into their own hands and challenging the po-po for their ineptitude, recklessness or straight up criminality. (Okay, I see where the censors might freak out.) The cops respond by setting up a special squad to stop them, inspiring the retired, legendary and quite mad detective Jun Lee (Lau) to offer his unwanted services. The squad is made up of heavily the pregnant Chan Yee (Charlene Choi, looking roughly 14), who miraculously stays that way after falling off a roof, rolling down a hill and getting in a firefight among other shenanigans, and who is a key to a larger mystery, her snivelling husband Fong Lai-sun (Raymond Lam), and some eager young things whose names we don’t care about. The Chosen Sleuths leader is also a person of note, who for some reason doesn’t shoot Jun when she has him dead to rights in a stairwell. Does she feel bad for him because he’s clearly psychologically unstable and is using finger pistols? Could be. We find out why she’s important via some exposition-heavy dialogue screamed at the top of the cast’s lungs – no one speaks, or acts, even in distracting ADR – which takes care to outline the ludicrous plot twists (M Night Shyamalan is shaking his head) en route to a final showdown whose highlight might be a cargo tanker labour scene.
I know how you feel Mr Lau
Dvs.S spends its entire runtime writing thematic and narrative cheques it can’t cash, and it floats a flurry of ideas it won’t (or can’t) commit to fully exploring. If Wai and co-writers Ray Chan and Mak Tin-shu have something on their minds, they’re not saying, or it’s been removed, leaving the film with a clutch of dangling story threads. What is the root of Jun’s mental illness? Is it just his dead wife (mentioned in passing)? Did it affect his work? Does the department bear any responsibility for his illness? What do the Chosen Sleuths hope to gain, and why are they so angry? And no, “They were wronged” isn’t good enough. How are the vigilantes organising – and financing – their elaborate plans? And again, why is everyone yelling all the time?
I’ll confess to whining and bitching about running times these days, and how nothing featuring men in hosiery needs to be three hours long, but the breakneck pace Dvs.S sets is overcorrecting. A few minutes illustrating why anyone is doing anything would have been welcome. Wai and action director Jack Wong Wai-leung (who did some great work in The Empty Hands and HKFA-winner Limbo) toss in a couple of decent action set pieces, one in a tight Mong Kok tong lau stairwell and the subsequent Temple Street chase, but some noisy gunfire and exploding watercraft don’t cut it. No film should elicit a “What’s going on?” at regular 12-minute intervals. Detective vs. Sleuths isn’t entirely inept, for that you need to check out A Murder Erased, but its bewildering idiocy is disappointing given its pedigree. — DEK