Century of the Dragon (1999)



	Century of the Dragon		Return to Review Archive - C
	Year:	1999	Louis Koo
	Director:	Clarence Fok Yiu-Leung
	Producer:	Wong Jing
	Cast:	Andy Lau Tak-Wah, Louis Koo Tin-Lok, Patrick Tam Yiu-Man, Suki Kwan Sau-Mei, Anthony Wong Chau-Sang, Joey Man Yi-Man, Eric Wan Tin-Chiu, Lau Shek-Yin, Lee Siu-Kei, Ng Chi-Hung, Pau Hey-Ching, Lung Fong, Chung Yeung
	The Skinny:	Standard triad drama that hits its marks efficiently. However, one typically expects more from an Andy Lau film.
	Review by Kozo:	Triad action drama from Wong Jing features Andy Lau as Fei-Lung, an aging legendary triad who’s been straight for years. Shadowing him is his right-hand man, Sing (Louis Koo), who’s really an undercover cop assigned to watch Fei-Lung. As is typical with this stuff, Sing has developed a respect for Fei-Lung and doubts his current involvement in anything shady. However, everything is brought to a head when Hung Hing head Pao (Anthony Wong) is injured, leaving a void in the group’s top spot. The men all went Fei-Lung to lead them, but he doesn’t want back in. Enter Man (Patrick Tam), Pao’s son, who decides he wants Hung Hing to be his and proceeds to double-cross everyone to achieve his goals. Simultaneously, Sing is hounded by an embarrassingly evil new superior officer who proceeds to act like a complete idiot and threaten his own men at every turn. When certain terrible events take place, Fei-Lung must decide whether to go the triad route and wreak revenge on Man, and Sing must decide whether he can take down his own boss. This is an entertaining enough triad movie that succeeds due to the presence of Louis Koo Tin-Lok, who should forevermore be known as HK’s new triad leading man. His intensity and charisma serve him well in this role and he manages to overshadow Andy Lau, who turns in a relatively unremarkable performance. Wong Jing does his usual work with this genre, bringing us lousy police, evil bad guys, and affecting though hackneyed plot twists. For those who like triad movies this movie is a decent watch, but it doesn’t come close to the heights of A True Mob Story, which was actually directed by Wong Jing. Clarence Fok directed this one, and it’s competently done. There are much better movies all over, however. Century of the Dragon is mainly for genre junkies. (Kozo 1999)
	Availability:	DVD (Hong Kong) Region 0 NTSC Universe Laser Widescreen Cantonese and Mandarin Language Tracks Dolby Digital 5.1 Removable English and Chinese Subtitles

		image courtesy of Universe Laser and Video Co., Ltd.
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