Naked Weapon tells the story of Charlene, a young Eurasian girl who is taken from her family at a young age by the ominous Madam M and raised as an assassin, while training she meets Katherine, whom she develops a sisterly bond with, six years later they are dispatched into the real world to use their skills as Madam M sees fit.
Soon a police detective who has been searching for Charlene for ever since she disappeared but soon an mysterious figure who has a personal vendetta with Madam M and her syndicate appears and both Charlene and Katherine must use the skills they have learnt to defend themselves.
This movie began it's life as a follow up to Wong Jing's cult classic Naked Killer but as with most of Jing's projects, the finished product is different to what was originally conceived.
So I'll begin with the film's plot, it's your average Wong Jing affair, two dimensional characters and some bland dialogue backed by some uneven acting, this is essentially an action movie, so really there's little need to care for the characters or the situations they find themselves in. Though, there where a lot of films with plots similar to this made in the 1980's when the Hong Kong film industry was at it's peak in terms of quality and amount of releases.
The acting, like I said, is uneven, Daniel Wu and Anya are the only two which give notable performances, I would say the same for Maggie Q but unfortunately her performance dips into melodramatic a couple times, though her performance overall is very good. There's no denying both Maggie and Anya are two extremely beautiful women so if the plot doesn't grab you, the leading ladies' good looks will.
The directing is competent, Ching Siu-Tung, who also did the film's martial arts sequences, did a good job, his talents can also be seen on the Steven Seagel sleeper hit Belly Of The Beast. the visuals are very good, that sheer will of the directing alone gives this film a high recommendation. though there is one particular sequence which should have been cut down or at least completely removed but alas this is a Wong Jing produced film so what can you do?
The action scenes are brilliant, Ching did a great job making anybody who threw a punch or a kick look like martial arts machines, don't expect anything realistic, that's not his style, it's very over the top but for a movie such as Naked Weapon, it works.
So overall I highly recommend this to Hong Kong film fans as it recalls itself to the glory days of HK film in the 80's when films being released like this where the norm and not over-stuffed pop vehicles like the industry seems to more interested in now.
For you DVD junkies I recommend the Region 2 double disc platinum release, it's chock full of great extras.
