Well executed but ultimately unsatisfying, Breaking News centers its cops-and-robbers plot around a clever meta-media twist that nevertheless fails to transcend gimmickry.
Breaking News(大事件)
✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
Hong Kong · 2004
1h 30m
Director Johnnie To
Starring Richie Jen, Kelly Chen, Nick Cheung, Lam Suet
Genre Action, Comedy, Drama, Thriller
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When an ambulatory TV news unit live broadcasts the embarrassing defeat of a police battalion by five bank robbers in a ballistic showdown, the credibility of the police force drops to a nadir. While on a separate investigation in a run-down building, detective Cheung discovers the hideout of the robbers. Cheung and his men have also entered the building, getting ready to take their foes out any minute. Meanwhile, in order to beat the media at its own game, Inspector Rebecca decides to turn the stakeout into a breaking news show.
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What are critics saying?
An interesting idea comes over only half-formed in Johnnie To's Breaking News, an effective Hong Kong crimer that partly returns to the realistic style of some of his late '90s dramas, but never properly knits its theme of media manipulation into pic's punchy thriller format.
The Hollywood Reporter by Frank Scheck
Prolific Hong Kong lenser Johnnie To delivers another solid action picture with this latest effort, a cops and robbers yarn with social commentary mixed in along the way.
TV Guide Magazine by Maitland McDonagh
Taut, cynical thriller.
The New York Times by Manohla Dargis
It's a slam-dunk of an opener in a film filled with terrifically choreographed action and very little on its mind.
The movie is one of To's typically tangled meditations on the smearing of good and evil, in moments where instinct overcomes morality. And ultimately, To cares less about the motivations of opposing forces than about the spectacular collisions they produce.
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