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 icholas
Tse (Time
and Tide) stars as Chiu, the only cop in a department within the
Hong Kong Police Department designated "2002" that deals with
supernatural occurrences around the city. (Don't ask, I don't know
the significance of the title, and the movie never elaborates.)
Helping Chiu out is Sam (Sam Lee), Chiu's former partner who was
killed by Chiu during a shooting incident, and is now a ghost that
helps out on supernatural cases until it's his turn to be
re-incarnated.
After Sam leaves, Chiu has to seek
out a new partner. He finds one in Fung (Stephen Fung), a traffic
cop who, like Chiu, can see ghosts walking amongst them. Chiu isn't
too sure about Fung and he's reluctant to take on a new partner
since he's cursed and all those around him eventually dies (re:
Sam).
The duo's first assignment pits them
against a Fire Ghost (Anya) who is torching people at rave parties.
No sooner is the Fire Ghost dispatched by the paranomral cops does
her boyfriend, Water Ghost, appears to take revenge...
2002
is a mishmash of elements from various successful American
productions. Chiu and Fung have the natural ability to see ghosts
around them (Sixth
Sense) and they dress up in black leather as a matter of course
(The
Matrix), and are equipped with special weapons to take out the
naughty ghosts (Men
in Black).
2002
plays out like a comedy with spurts of action, and director Wilson
Yip uses an extensive amount of wireworks for the action sequences,
and has the budget to digitally remove all the wires from the film.
In a word, the movie's stunts look very nice. The whole look of
2002 is very slick and actually looks more like a 90-minute
trailer for a movie instead of being a movie itself. The actors pose
constantly and slow motion is used as if the technique is going out
of style. A deep movie 2002 ain't, but it's very nice to look
at and has a very good sense of fun.
Nicholas Tse
has a very firm grasp on his Chiu character. He knows he's in a
movie devoid of any substance and does all the required posing and
looks "cool" in his black wardrobe. Stephen Fung seems unsure if his
character is supposed to be the comical sidekick or an equal partner
to Chiu, and comes across as uneven as a result.
The film's
female lead is Danielle Graham, who plays a nurse name Danielle
(although the movie doesn't bother to identify her until the very
end) who likes Chiu and vice versa, but because of his curse Chiu
dodges her at every turn. Besides being a pretty face, I'm hard
pressed to understand what Graham is doing in the film. She has very
little acting ability and her character feels and looks like an
emotionless skeleton walking to and fro -- re: she's stiff
and unnatural. (One gets the
feeling Danielle Graham is, ahem, a "good friend" of someone
powerful and involved in the production.)
The special
effects in 2002 are very good. The movie's ghosts fly in
bursts of energy and natural elements (the Fire Ghost can turn
herself into fire and shoot fireballs, and the Water Ghost can --
what else? -- turn himself into water). Although a long, drawn-out
action sequence in a hospital swimming pool must have looked great
on paper, but is rather silly in execution.
The film also
suffers from quite a few bonehead plotting, but at the risk of
spoiling potential viewers the fun of pointing one out, I'll just
say that a character dies and another character has no idea he's
died, and let's leave it at that.
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