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Du Jiang as firefighter and information officer Han Kai, in a still from “Flashover” (category IIB, Mandarin), directed by Oxide Pang.

Review | Flashover movie review: Chinese firefighting thriller by Hong Kong director Oxide Pang fails to ignite or engage its audience

  • Oxide Pang’s return to the firefighting genre is spoiled by underdeveloped characters and a poor plot
  • Too much emphasis is put on the pyrotechnics, and the firefighters get second billing in this action thriller that fails to spark

2/5 stars

A decade on from the Towering Inferno-like disaster movie Out of Inferno – which starred Hong Kong heavyweights Louis Koo Tin-lok and Lau Ching-wan – director Oxide Pang Chun returns to the genre, albeit without brother Danny, with the similarly incendiary Flashover.

Also set on the Chinese mainland, the film follows a company of rookie firefighters who risk their lives to battle a huge blaze that has consumed a chemical industrial estate.

As with its spiritual predecessor, however, Flashover prioritises perilous pyrotechnics over plot and character development, leaving audiences struggling to care about the fate of its one-dimensional protagonists.

Playing like a poor man’s alternative to the ostentatious heroes-in-helmets blockbusters of fellow Hong Kong filmmaker Dante Lam Chiu-yin, Flashover confines its drama to a single smouldering location.

When an earthquake ruptures a fuel line at a large chemical park, it sparks a furious inferno that threatens to engulf not only the entire complex, but also the surrounding residential areas.

Han Xue as teacher Zhang Hong (centre) in a still from “Flashover”.
Viewers will be reminded of the spectacular and catastrophic scenes of the 2015 Tianjin container port explosions, which were doubtless an inspiration for Yang Daiyuan’s screenplay.

The speed with which the fire spreads means it falls to local fire chief Zhao Yingqi (Wang Qianyuan) and his troop of inexperienced youngsters to be first on the scene.

Among their number is Han Kai (Du Jiang), the station’s information officer, better suited to videoing his colleagues rescuing cats from trees than battling a life-threatening blaze.

Both men are given nominal romantic interests in the form respectively of Han Xue and Tong Liya, who also manage to get themselves caught on the wrong side of the flames before the threat can be extinguished.

Tong Liya as chemical safety expert Ye Xin, in a still from “Flashover”.

Beyond Zhao and Han Kai, the rest of the firefighting troop are left woefully underdeveloped. Wang Ge, for example, plays the only other memorable firefighter, whose defining attribute is simply that he’s a bit overweight, which by default also makes him the crew’s resident comedian.

Suffice to say they must all work together if they are to save the day, but if a few die along the way, audiences probably won’t notice.

With its full complement of training montages, stirring speeches, and “leave no man behind” heroics, Flashover veers uncannily close to a military thriller, only missing a foreign adversary to demonise.

Wang Qianyuan as local fire chief Zhao Yingqi in a still from “Flashover”.

Even that is remedied somewhat in the closing voice-over, which features vows to round up and hold accountable all those responsible for causing such disasters. Whether that includes the filmmakers in this instance remains to be seen.

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