Award-winning, veteran cinematographer-turned-director Anthony Pun presents “Cesium Fallout”, his third feature film following “Extraordinary Mission” (co-directed with Alan Mak) and “One More Chance”. The film has been boasting of being Hong Kong’s first nuclear radiation disaster movie as its unique selling point, and it has proved a box office success. Certainly, Pun’s extensive experience behind the camera on many visually stunning blockbusters, combined with a stellar cast of new-generation actors and beloved veterans, has certainly contributed to the film’s wide appeal.
Cesium Fallout is screening at Far East Film Festival
Simon Fan (Andy Lau) is an environmental protection expert with a dark cloud over his past. In the 1996 prologue, we first meet Simon as a bold and enthusiastic financial secretary on the verge of implementing a more libertarian trade policy, aimed at boosting Hong Kong’s economic growth and speeding up market efficiency. However, despite the good intentions behind his actions, his policy lowers the bar for health and safety controls, ultimately costing the life of his wife (Tong Yao), a brave firefighter responding to an emergency at the commercial port of Hong Kong. Ten years later, Simon is still haunted by the past. His career change is an attempt at redemption, but both his life and family remain deeply affected by the tragedy. His distant daughter and his resentful brother-in-law Kit Li (Bai Yu) — also a fire department officer — cannot forgive him for indirectly causing the catastrophe that shattered their lives.
When a fire breaks out at a recycling yard in Queen’s Hill, in the Northern New Territories, it initially seems like a routine job for the Luen Wo Hui firefighting unit. The team, led by Lau Siu Keung (Kenny Wong), includes Kit Li, Madam Chan Mei Yan (Louise Wong), Lai Kit Fung (Bai Yu), Chainsmoker (Tse Kwan-Ho), Water (Ho Kai-Wa), and Finger (Locker Lam). However, once on site, they realize something is off: the flames are being fuelled by highly hazardous chemicals disseminated throughout the waste. Moreover, when victims of the fire begin to show symptoms of radiation exposure, Simon quickly understands that an ecological crisis is unfolding. He is soon appointed to assist Acting Chief Executive Cecilia Fong (Karen Mok) in containing the situation. As the deadly Cesium is identified as the source of the contamination, things take a turn for the worse — a typhoon is rapidly approaching, and water could trigger a disaster capable of wiping Hong Kong off the map.
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Tapping into a range of collective anxieties, “Cesium Fallout” has all the ingredients of a classic disaster movie archetype, delivering an enjoyable ride. Apparently inspired by real news about e-waste pollution, surely, the tech-gone-wrong theme and the growing concern about the obscene amount of electronic waste being produced and its problematic disposal, makes “Cesium Fallout”’s plot both fascinating and terrifying for in a “What If” kind of way. This “nowness” of the theme helps mask a storyline that rests on the edge of credibility. Is Cesium really such a dangerous, world-threatening isotope? Does it even exist? (It does!) But, as we seat on the edge of our chairs we don’t care about plausibility, and we just enjoy the cinematic chaos, the mind-blowing special effects and the emotional release that the film delivers.
The film focuses on two parallel narrative lines and courses of action: on one hand, the politicians and government, safe in their boardrooms, dealing with the wealthy businessmen responsible for planting the seeds of the imminent disaster; on the other, a team of relatable, working-class individuals who put their lives at risk on the front line to save the day. It’s nothing we haven’t seen before, but here the firefighters’ narrative is particularly solid and engaging—if melodramatic at times, in good Hong Kong movie tradition—and Simon’s character, with his family ties and guilt complex, serves as the perfect bridge between the “upstairs and downstairs.” We all know Andy Lau is an excellent actor, even if his talent sometimes gets diluted by a frenzy of omnipresence. Here, he sets aside his more histrionic self and delivers an astonishing performance: humane, unusually restrained, and compelling, as a man tormented by guilt, searching for atonement, and fully aware that nothing will bring him peace. Karen Mok is also a welcome return, after many years away from the screen.
The recycling yard — the focal point of the action — is a highly cinematic setting, offering a variety of interesting textures and shapes: shipping containers, cubes of pressed cans, and mountains of old computer screens, all veiled for most of the runtime in a smoky red hue. That said, the wide night scenes of the city in flames are the most impressive and Pun’s visual command shines through. Also quite showstopping are some CGI renditions of “what could happen if,” where Hong Kong is depicted in post-apocalyptic fashion – a striking visual admonishment.
In the end, disaster movies are often about people coming together, and “Cesium Fallout” is no exception, with its brave and self-sacrificing firefighters standing in for the Hong Kong spirit. Yes, it’s rhetorical and corny—but hey, we love it.
