Flash Point (2007)

I'm not sure when the law was passed stating that Donnie Yen has to be in every HK movie, but some time before 2007 I guess. FLASH POINT is another of his collaborations with Wilson Yip, who seems to have brought out or discovered a more mature Donnie Yen than the preener of old. Flash Point is a sincere effort to recapture the 'Golden Age' of HK cinema - the one in the 80's when people like Sammo Hung and Jackie Chan were defining a new style of modern day action and martial arts films.

There is a plot, of some description... good guys vs. bad guys, justice and revenge and all that, but it's barely important. It serves its primary purpose of giving a context to the action scenes well enough. And the action scenes are great - some nicely done gunplay, and some really impressive hand to hand combat scenes, with some brutal full-contact brawling. The finale, an extended brawl between Donnie & Ngai Sing is one of the best one-on-one fights that's been filmed in a while, despite a little too much undercranking (which Donnie has, thankfully, toned down in recent years most of the time).

It's not going to win any dramatic oscars, but for action fans it is certainly an essential view.