Red Wolf

The US has been trying to imitate Hong Kong action movies for some time; films like The Matrix have tried hard to capture the frantic, hard-hitting fights that HK films are famous for. Turn about is fair play; why wouldn't Hong Kong want to imitate Steven Seagal's biggest movie, Under Siege?

A better question would probably be why would Yuen Woo-Ping want to imitate anything Steven Seagal has ever done, but I can't answer that question. (Dear Woo-Ping, I’m pretty sure everyone who has ever seen this film is curious.) I can only tell you that he did make Red Wolf, which is basically Die Hard on a large boat. Or the Hong Kong version of Under Siege.

Take one cruise ship inexplicably transporting uranium, a security officer named Alan with a broken heart (Kenny Ho), a cute pickpocketing waitress who sings horribly and talks to lobsters (Christy Chung),  hordes of bad guys with automatic weapons,  and an evil lounge singer (Elaine Lui), and Red Wolf is apparently what you get.

Why is a cruise ship transporting uranium, you ask? So that the bad guys can try to steal it and our broken-hearted hero can try to stop them. Don't be silly.

Kenny Ho is not a good actor, but it doesn't matter much because he spends 90% of the movie jumping through glass windows, doors, over railings, onto ice sculptures... the movie could practically be renamed "Kenny Ho Jumps While People Shoot At Him". Half the budget was probably spent on breaking glass. Kenny does stop to kick the hell out of people from time to time, which is a nice change of pace from all the jumping.

There are some good fights and action set-pieces. Woo-Ping directed it, after all.  He may have no sense of story or characters beyond some generic cliches but he does know how to choreograph a fight.  It’s always nice to see Collin Chou in a fight scene, too.

When the action isn’t happening you’ll be treated to comic relief from Christy Chung. I wasn’t kidding about the singing and talking to the lobster. During her brief attempt at singing Madonna's Like a Virgin I found myself praying for Kenny to get back to jumping through a window before I threw myself out one.

Red Wolf isn’t a great film but if you’ve got a craving for some hard-hitting action where a lot of glass shatters, the bad guys aren’t afraid to shoot up some hostages, and the plot makes absolutely no sense, you might enjoy it.