Shark Busters
2002
Director: Herman Yau
Stars: Danny Lee, Lam Suet, Lawrence Wong, Ken Lo, Brian Ireland, Jamie Luk, Alfred Cheung
On first looks, Shark Busters appears to be your average Danny Lee cop movie. But it tries to be something a bit different, with more social commentary than viewers may be used to. While I admire the film-makers for trying to switch things up, Shark Busters is such a schizophrenic movie that it ends up being (you guessed it) another average Danny Lee cop movie.
The film tells the story of a squad of cops (under the leadership of Lee) who get into financial troubles from bad real estate deals that were financed by credit card companies. In debt, many of the squad turn to loan sharks which results in trouble when Lee's name is splashed all over the front pages as being a deadbeat. Taking matters into their own hands, the squad begins to turn the tables and use the loan sharks' techniques on themselves.
This might have been good stuff, but director Herman Yau tries so hard to drive home his point that the film loses something in the process. Yau mixed commentary and drama succesfully with From the Queen to the Chief Executive, but with Shark Busters the point of credit card companies being no better than loan sharks is dealt with in an obvious and heavy-handed way. There is also some strange comic relief dealing with a gweilo lawyer (Brain Ireland) who moonlights as a cop. Like a lot of the movie, I wasn't exactly sure what the point of his character or actions were all about.
There are some good things about Shark Busters, mostly from the actors' performances. Danny Lee does his usual solid job portraying a cop, and the supporting cast also does well. Of particular note is Lam Suet, who steps from his supporting roles in Milkyway productions and creates a good villainous character as the top loan shark in the area. But even though the actors do well, they don't seem to have much to work with, and Herman Yau's direction leaves them (and the viewer) a bit lost, and so I can't really recommend Shark Busters to anyone but die-hard cop movie fans.
RATING: 5
A review for the DVD of this movie can be found here
