Review | Bursting Point movie review: Dante Lam’s first Hong Kong crime thriller in years, starring Nick Cheung, is a gallery of gruesome deaths

Crime thriller Bursting Point marks Dante Lam’s return to filmmaking in Hong Kong after almost a decade of churning out patriotic blockbusters in mainland China

The film pits a police inspector and a drug-trafficking-gang boss against each other and is packed with enough violence to warrant an adults-only rating

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Nick Cheung in a still from “Bursting Point” (category III, Cantonese), directed by Dante Lam and Calvin Tong. William Chan and Isabella Leong co-star.

Published: 4:15pm, 6 Dec 2023

3/5 stars

Hong Kong cinema fans who like their crime thrillers brutal and over-the-top are in for a treat with Bursting Point, which marks celebrated action film director Dante Lam Chiu-yin’s return to local filmmaking after almost a decade of churning out patriotic mega-blockbusters in mainland China.

Co-directing with first-time filmmaker Calvin Tong Wai-hon, Lam – who came up with the story and served as producer – has presumably left all his vicious ideas out on the screen.

His film’s sadistic penchant for burning characters alive must have contributed to its Category III (adults only) rating from Hong Kong censors.

Telling an extraordinarily convoluted story that never slows down for long, Bursting Point opens with a narcotics officer’s gruesome death during a drug bust and sets senior police inspector Bong (Nick Cheung Ka-fai) and drug-trafficking-gang boss Young (Shaun Tam Chun-yin) up as nemeses for each other.

Fast forward two years, and Bong is again carrying out an operation against Young’s illegal drug business, this time with help from strong-willed undercover police officer Ming (William Chan Wai-ting). Things get personal on both sides when Young’s brother dies in the aftermath.