POWERFUL FOUR is a Hong Kong police drama set in the 1960s, charting the rise of four allies who would fight against endemic corruption and the territory's heroin problem. It's worth watching alone for the ensemble cast - Danny Lee, Waise Lee, Simon Yam and Kent Cheng, all favourites of mine with very long careers - but the story is intriguing too, favouring character over showy action and theatrics. It's quite the slow burner although it does have a handful of Woo-inspired 'heroic bloodshed' fights. Quietly compelling, this one.
3 Reviews
HK Neo Reviews: Powerful Four
webmaster-30171 February 2012
Powerful Four is a good film because it never takes itself too seriously without being mindless, while at the same time delivering an entertaining action drama about the serious issue of police and society corruption in the 1950s. With a strong cast of Danny Lee, Simon Yam, Waise Lee and Kent Cheng, Powerful remains afloat for the majority of the duration, until a predictable finale that nearly undo-s all the hard yards made for a good three quarters of the film. What surprised me is how easy to watch this film remains to be, despite viewing it exactly 2 decades onwards. Such is the HK cinemas in 90s, at the height of its production peak, most films started well but finishes in a flourish and Powerful Four does not fall into any exception.
What Powerful Four feels like is fast food – quick, convenient and cheap. The problem with this film is that you never really feel for the characters, as everything seems to be happening at a pace. When an arm is being cut off, the director moves to the next scene or shot too quickly for the audience to decide to feel sorry or not. Perhaps director and producer David Lam is trying to show all that is happening in the limited screen time, but every issue seems shortened, suddenly solved or wrongly invested.
All in all, Powerful Four is by no means a bad film, in fact in terms of quick fire 90s entertainment, it is probably more on the upper scale than not. The acting of the four big names is certainly helps, but none of the characters are fully explored. Kent Cheng is especially criminally wasted and Waise Lee seems to cover up any kind of clue as to his true intention. Of all the characters, only Danny Lee is given some weight, but then again, it is not hard at all for Lee Sir to convince anyone for that matter if he is a cop or not. For me, this film is really another case of a premise that promise a lot, but delivers the bare minimum. A decently good film that never lifts above its genre conventions
Neo rates it 7/10
What Powerful Four feels like is fast food – quick, convenient and cheap. The problem with this film is that you never really feel for the characters, as everything seems to be happening at a pace. When an arm is being cut off, the director moves to the next scene or shot too quickly for the audience to decide to feel sorry or not. Perhaps director and producer David Lam is trying to show all that is happening in the limited screen time, but every issue seems shortened, suddenly solved or wrongly invested.
All in all, Powerful Four is by no means a bad film, in fact in terms of quick fire 90s entertainment, it is probably more on the upper scale than not. The acting of the four big names is certainly helps, but none of the characters are fully explored. Kent Cheng is especially criminally wasted and Waise Lee seems to cover up any kind of clue as to his true intention. Of all the characters, only Danny Lee is given some weight, but then again, it is not hard at all for Lee Sir to convince anyone for that matter if he is a cop or not. For me, this film is really another case of a premise that promise a lot, but delivers the bare minimum. A decently good film that never lifts above its genre conventions
Neo rates it 7/10
The Powerful Four was powerful enough
jordondave-2808517 June 2023
(1992) Powerful Four
(In Chinese with English subtitles)
ACTION DRAMA/ BIO
Produced and directed by David Lam, another film where the film takes one-time actual characters and then slightly exaggerates for entertainment purposes. The movie is a straight forward story line about how four actual Chinese police officers during the British rule once were called the "Powerful Four", the characters are played by well known veteran Hong Kong actors, starting with Danny Lee as No Head, Simon Yam as Lui kit, Waise Lee as Yiu Hung and Kent Cheng as Fatty B.. The only downside is that upon reading pre-recorded Laserdisc copy. It was hard to make out some of the English subtitles and may require the right state of mind to read all it since they're more talking than action.
Produced and directed by David Lam, another film where the film takes one-time actual characters and then slightly exaggerates for entertainment purposes. The movie is a straight forward story line about how four actual Chinese police officers during the British rule once were called the "Powerful Four", the characters are played by well known veteran Hong Kong actors, starting with Danny Lee as No Head, Simon Yam as Lui kit, Waise Lee as Yiu Hung and Kent Cheng as Fatty B.. The only downside is that upon reading pre-recorded Laserdisc copy. It was hard to make out some of the English subtitles and may require the right state of mind to read all it since they're more talking than action.
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