Review | The Fatal Raid film review: girls-with-guns fun gives way to corny revenge tale in unofficial Special Female Force sequel
- Fans of Hong Kong cinema will delight in seeing Patrick Tam, Michael Tong and Jade Leung in meaty roles in police melodrama, albeit it is full of nonsense
- Film starts with botched police operation in Macau 20 years ago, then fast forwards to the present and elite female police officers fighting some baddies there
2/5 stars
What does justice mean to a Hong Kong policeman who has made huge sacrifices during covert operations but is denied compensation in any shape or form? It’s a question mulled over, but answered in the most superficial manner, in The Fatal Raid, the second feature by former music video director Jacky Lee Chi-lun (Lives in Flames).
The story starts with a botched operation in Macau some 20 years ago which left several Hong Kong police officers dead and saw Madam Fong (Jade Leung Chang) accidentally shoot her colleague Hei (Michael Tong Man-lung) in the heat of the moment. To add insult to injury, none of the dead officers’ families were entitled to compensation because, we’re told, the mission was classified.
In real life, such a matter would probably be settled in court. In the contrived scenario concocted by Lee and his two co-writers, however, Hei’s surviving buddy Inspector Tam (Patrick Tam Yiu-man) plots bizarre revenge.
Fast forward to the present, and a mission to escort the Hong Kong Police deputy commissioner to a Macau event is disrupted by a trio of drug-addicted anarchists. Hong Kong policewoman Alma (Jeana Ho Pui-yu) and Interpol intern Zi Han (Lin Min-chen) must work with two Macau cops (Hidy Yu Hiu-tung and Jadie Lin Linqi) to stop the bad guys. Meanwhile Fong is reunited with a ghost from her past.