The leader of a group of Mainland Chinese thieves uses his residence in Hong Kong as a launching pad for a daring hit on a jewelry store. He and his gang members dream of striking it rich and returning home loaded with dough, but the reality of their plans is far worse. The cops on their tail are unscrupulous and determined as they are, and the ultimate price for a quick road to riches may be far more than they're willing to pay. Edit Translation
- English
- magyar / magyar nyelv
- dansk
- Norsk
- Native Title: 省港旗兵
- Also Known As: Long Arm of the Law 1 , Sheng Gang Gi Bing
- Screenwriter: Phillip Chan
- Genres: Action, Thriller, Crime
Cast & Credits
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Reviews
Brutally visceral
Brutally visceral from beginning to bloody end, Long Arm of the Law speaks volumes about its people and society, exploring how Mainland Chinese in the Bamboo Curtain era desperately desired better opportunities in the colonial-ruled Hong Kong, even if it came at the cost of losing their lives. Everyone has their own personal issues to work through, but this isn't a feel-good, fuzzy film about redemption and ultimate reconciliation. The characters are stymied or even undone by their disassociation with Hong Kong; their success and/or failure hinges on who they are. In the end, they don't affect the situation; it affects them. Every decision pushes the gang deeper into danger, and every attempt to regain control only accelerates their downfall. They are not glamorous antiheroes, but poor, opportunistic men chasing a fantasy of quick wealth, observed with a mixture of sympathy and brutal honesty. Arriving just shy of the heroic bloodshed boom that would soon dominate the landscape, many of the genre's defining traits are already here: desperate criminals, fractured loyalties, explosive violence and a city that seems determined to grind everyone down. Seriously, how on earth has Johnny Mak only ever directed this?! He paints Hong Kong not as a neon playground but as a crowded, chaotic landscape filled with cramped apartments, back alleys, cheap hotels and criminal middlemen. Favouring confusion, panic, and sudden eruptions of violence where gunfights are messy and frightening, while chases feel improvised and desperate. It's utterly mesmerising. Above all, the casting is the major key; from top to bottom, the actors are mainly amateurs, but their performances are starkly real, no doubt helped by the improvisational attitude to some scenes that lend them all a beautiful authenticity. There are no heroes here. There's only a society that loses. A tense, cynical, and deeply atmospheric portrait of men chasing a dream that was doomed from the start, few films feel as raw, influential, or unsettling as Long Arm of the Law.Was this review helpful to you?
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