Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.5

Raging Fire Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 1, 2021

Well Go USA's streaming service Hi-Yah! has frequently offered typical video on demand fare, which means that many of their offerings (to pun horribly) were not all that demanding. Things may have changed at least a bit with regard to Raging Fire, a viscerally exciting if undeniably rote outing that was famed director Benny Chan's last film before he sadly died from cancer last year (the film features a dedication to him in the closing credits). This "exception to the rule" may be due at least in part to the fact that Raging Fire evidently was not produced as a straight to video feature and evidently did have a rather successful theatrical release where it raked in some considerable box office receipts. There is absolutely nothing in Raging Fire that most Asian action film aficionados will not have seen in other films, but the pace here is often frenetic, and Donnie Yen is his stalwart best as yet another honorable cop, this time named Cheung Sung-bong, who is surrounded by corruption and who has the misfortune to be personally targeted by a former acolyte named Yau Kong-ngo (Nicholas Tse) who has gone over to "the dark side" and is out for revenge.

Raging Fire introduces any number of hoary tropes into its supposed "ripped from the headlines" approach toward gritty gang life, and there's no denying that everything from the "former follower turned enemy" to the potential of a pregnant wife becoming a damsel in distress is milked for just about every cliché opportunity available, and yet the film still manages to deliver a generally involving tale. A lot of this is due to Yen's patented gravitas, but it is also aided and abetted by a kind of furiously feral performance from Tse. The set pieces are delivered breathlessly and involve everything from shootouts to good old fashioned smackdowns.

Raging Fire Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Raging Fire is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Well Go USA with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. Perhaps appropriately for a film with this colorful title, Red cameras were utilized, with a 2K DI (both data points courtesy of the IMDb). I haven't been particularly shy about expressing my preference for Red captures, at least when compared to some Alexa captures, and that preference continues apace with this presentation. Despite a surplus of rather dimly lit and in some cases extremely aggressively graded sequences, there's little to none of what I've termed "Alexa murk", though to be fair there are a few passing instances of iffy shadow detail and even a bit of crush in the darkest moments. But the palette is really beautifully suffused a lot of the time, as can hopefully be made out in several of the screenshots I've uploaded to accompany this review. Interestingly, a kind of detour through a court case is almost desaturated, emphasizing beiges and grays (see screenshot 1). Detail levels are quite appealing throughout. There are just the barest hints of banding in some of the fadeouts (the film fades to black regularly at the end of various sequences), but considering what I've seen on some other releases from Well Go USA, I'd personally term it basically inconsequential.

Raging Fire Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Raging Fire has three really great sounding audio options, Mandarin and Cantonese in Dolby Atmos, and a relatively effective DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track delivering an English dub. I toggled back and forth between the Mandarin and Cantonese tracks for the bulk of my viewing, and I noticed no substantial differences between the tracks in terms of overall mix and amplitude. I'm frankly not enough of an expert in various Chinese dialects to be able to tell which actor may have been speaking what during filming, since lip movements often can be kind of comically out of synch with the sounds emanating from them in either language. That said, dialogue is always rendered cleanly and clearly. The Atmos tracks offer really fun engagement of the "traditional" surround channels as well as good vertical placement in several of the action sequences. The propulsive score also spreads through the side and rear channels. Optional English subtitles are available.

Raging Fire Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Making Of

  Behind the Scenes 1 (HD; 2:00) is the first of two fun montage pieces that play to music. Both show behind the scenes footage, including some interesting renderings for CGI effects.

  
  

  Behind the Scenes 2 (HD; 1:13)

  
  

  Donnie Yen Commentary (HD; 1:53) would have probably been more accurately listed as an interview.

  
  

  Nicholas Tse Commentary (HD; 2:25)

• Teaser (HD; 1:47)


• Trailer 1 (HD; 2:00)


• Trailer 2 (HD; 1:18)


• US Trailer (HD; 1:56)

Note: As tends to be the case with Well Go USA Blu-ray releases, the disc has been authored so that supplements follow one another automatically (so that clicking on Behind the Scenes 1 under the Making Of menu is essentially a Play All button. The disc is also authored to automatically move on to trailers for other Well Go USA releases after the U.S. trailer for this film plays. Those trailers for other Well Go USA releases also play automatically at disc boot up.

Raging Fire Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Raging Fire might be thought of as the movie equivalent of comfort food, at least those who like to "snack" on Hong Kong action flicks involving stolid cops and nasty villains, in an urban environment teeming with sense of moral turpitude. There's frankly nothing in this film fans of this kind of movie will not have seen before, but this is a slick, engaging production with decent performances and some really fun fight choreography. Technical merits are solid, and Raging Fire comes Recommended.