A pawn shop owner befriends a young girl, who is then abducted. He objects, and decides to hurt everyone he meets until he finds her. It's a solid mix of Leon: The Professional and Taken.
The Good: Pretty much everything here is good. The acting from our hero and the little girl seriously impressed me, and the action sequences were stylish and brutal. In general, the story is well told and I really found myself pulling for the guy, even as he was beating up cops and stabbing gang members repeatedly.
The Bad: The movie could afford to cut down a little on the melodrama, but it wasn't awful. The only things truly bad were the comic relief characters, which seem to be required in Asian films, no matter how out of place.
The Ugly: Despite several savage fight scenes, the child-organ-harvesting ring wins.
Points Pondered
-I can't imagine business is very good at his pawn shop. It seems a bit out of the way, and he exudes "you don't want to talk to me."
-I really like the build of not showing him commit any violence in person for the first half of the movie or so - all we get to see is the resulting carnage he creates.
-Our guy runs down a hallway, jumps through a window, smashes the glass, hits the ground a story below, rolls and keeps running - the camera follows him THE ENTIRE WAY. Not quite sure the specific way they did it, but it's awesome.
-He definitely looked a lot more suspicious when he put a hat on to hide from the police. Really, anyone wearing a suit and a baseball hat is going to seem a bit odd.
-Yes, the knife fight at the end is truly cool. Cutting out the soundtrack during the scene is a nice touch.
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