Singer and actor Richie Ren is no stranger when it comes to Hong Kong cinema, as he is best known for his stand out performance in Johnnie To’s “Breaking News” (2004) and later in “Trivisa” (2015). In “Fierce Cop”, a Mainland online film streaming on Youku video platform is his first venture into the martial arts genre.
Set in country M, somewhere in Southeast Asia, there lives Zhang Tu, a middle aged single parent with a young son, Xiao Jie, who is also a hard working detective. He always asks his boss for a promotion so he can be a better role model for his son who is everything to him. One day, his son comes back from school in pain and covered with bruises, obviously a victim of bullying at school. After finding out that a bunch of young adults are responsible, he sets out to teach them a lesson by beating them up. The humiliated bullies are actually human organ traffickers working for Dala, whose father runs the operation. Consequently, they return and kidnap Jie which results in the desperate detective searching all over the country looking for his lost son.
Story wise there is hardly anything that stands out; the movie is utterly formulaic and cliche ridden. But what is remarkable is how the filmmakers are able to transform Ren into a convincing martial artist. It looks like they really put him through some extremely demanding physical combat training. For someone who hardly has any training in martial arts and pushing towards sixty, his committed and impressive performances deserve high praise. However, he is less convincing during the parts in which is required to show emotions and cry at times.
Having the renowned stunt and fight coordinator Kenji Tanigaki as the action director sure helps to bring the action sequences to another level. There are plenty of MMA style hand-to-hand combats on display here, similar to the ones in Donnie Yen’s “Flash Point” (2007), “Big Brother” (2018) and “Raging Fire” (2021). He also includes a variety of items like beer bottles, sledgehammer, pipes, baseball bat and even the spiky durian fruits which are put to great use as handy weapons apart from the standard knives and cleavers.
Overall, the fights are fluid, creative and crisply executed and grounded and the absence of freeze frames and jerky techniques are also a plus. Although the opening fight and the extended nightclub brawl are fairly impressive, the most memorable action set piece is definitely the one with Ren and Dang Shan Pang who wields a pair of curved knives, near the end. It is a rhythmic encounter, brutal and frantic and masterfully shot to show that every blow counts.
It is not a surprise to see Chan Tai Lee eventually brunches out to direct an action movie after being the screenwriter for films like the “Ip Man” film series, “Wu Xia” (2011), “Special ID” (2013), “Raging Fire” (2021) and “Sakra” (2023). Unfortunately the resulting “Fierce Cop”, a film that kicks off on quite a high note but weights down by the melodramatic human trafficking theme that takes over, is not on the same level. However, it still works as an all out action film mainly thanks to the amazing action choreography of Tanigaki.
On the plus side, the film’s short running time of eighty seven minutes is a blessing. Strangely, the bright, glossy and colorful location shots which look more at home in a travel brochure are a mismatch for the much darker theme. Acting wise, Ren is surprisingly impressive as the unstoppable detective Zhang Tu with super power to match. Chen Yao, who plays Su Qin Mao, the nightclub girl who ends up helping him with his cross country search for his son is equally likable and resourceful. Elsewhere and almost unrecognizable, Waise Lee turns up as Zhang’s boss Meng Bacha. Yu Kang has a small role as the ringleader of the human traffickers but his end fight with Zhang is disappointing.
Overall, “Fierce Cop” is worth a watch due to its wonderfully designed and edited fight sequences. The only let down is the thin plot and the melodrama that tries a bit too hard trying to deal with the evil doings of the organ harvesters.
