6.5 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
An Anglo rookie is partnered with a world-weary Chinese detective in NYC's corrupt Chinatown.
Starring: Chow Yun-Fat, Mark Wahlberg, Ric Young, Paul Ben-Victor, Jon Kit LeeCrime | 100% |
Thriller | Insignificant |
Drama | Insignificant |
Action | Insignificant |
Mystery | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
German: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0
Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 2.0
Japanese: Dolby Digital 2.0
Spanish=Latin & Castilian; Japanese is hidden
English SDH, French, German SDH, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 3.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
The Corruptor was the second American film made by Hong Kong star Chow Yun-Fat (after The Replacement Killers), and it begins with a bang, literally. Because the film contains several major shootouts and a protracted car chase through the narrow streets of downtown Manhattan, the marketers at New Line Cinema tried to make it look like the John Woo-directed action extravaganzas that had made Chow an international star. But The Corruptor doesn't resemble such ballets of violence as The Killer or Hard Boiled, despite efforts to suggest otherwise in the trailer. The script by actor Robert Pucci has more in common with Seventies dramas in which no one is what they seem and everyone has secrets. Director James Foley had never seen a Hong Kong action film before he read Pucci's script, and he wasn't interested in making one. What attracted him to The Corruptor was the characters and their moral dilemmas. Perhaps because The Corruptor wasn't what Chow's fan base was expecting, it did poorly with both critics and audiences, but the film is overdue for rediscovery. Pucci's story was based on real gang wars that had rocked New York's Chinatown in the early Nineties and prompted the creation of a special task force by the NYPD. Despite extensive research, however, the writer maintained his focus on the plight of individuals caught in webs of intrigue and forced to choose repeatedly between the lesser of two evils. As Foley observes in his commentary, the two cops at the heart of The Corruptor are constantly on the run, barely able to keep up with events around them, never able to step back and assess where their choices are taking them—until they find themselves at the mercy of a cheerful villain (the "corruptor" of the title) who has the power to destroy them both.
The Corruptor was shot by Spanish cinematographer Juan Ruiz Anchía, who had previously shot At Close Range and Glengarry Glen Ross for director Foley and would later reunite with him for Confidence. (Anchía is also a regular collaborator with writer/director David Mamet, most recently on the HBO original film, Phil Spector.) In his commentary, Foley describes the visual strategy that he, Anchía and production designer David Brisbin developed for heightening the realistic texture of The Corruptor into something resembling a "fever dream": bold, bright colors, without departing too far from reality; bright shafts of light cutting through spaces; narrow streets, alleyways and halls wherever possible. One of the fortunate side effects of Anchía's lighting for The Corruptor is that it creates sharp contrasts that transfer well to video. Warner/New Line's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray sports a sharp and detailed image with beautifully saturated and often intense washes of bright color, especially in Chinatown's night life. But even in such seemingly ordinary settings as a police awards ceremony, the sea of blue uniforms is more intensely blue; or when a cab get smashed up during the big car chase, the taxi is slightly more yellow. Everything is brighter, sharper, exaggerated, with the occasional exception of a scene where one can barely make out figures in the darkness, e.g., when the cops discover smuggled Chinese illegals being held captive. Nighttime blacks are solid and dark, all the better for the boldly illuminated city to stand out against them. The film's grain pattern is visible but extremely fine. Warner/New Line has placed The Corruptor on a BD-50 but, as is customary with Warner Home Video, left much of the space empty; the total disc image is 29 GB. The film has been mastered with an average bitrate of 26.25 Mbps, which is on the high side for Warner and not at all bad, even for a film with The Corruptor's major action scenes. Certainly the video quality did not appear to suffer, other than some minor aliasing on one aerial shot of the city.
The Corruptor features a powerful, aggressive and immersive 5.1 surround mix, which has been encoded on Blu-ray in lossless DTS-HD MA. The opening attack by the Fukienese Dragons doesn't hold back sonically, as bullets fly and an explosion reverberates. Chen is introduced with equal ferocity, as he battles a group of Dragons in a local lamp store, where shattering glass adds counterpoint to the roar of gunfire. The extended car chase is a symphony of screeching tires, sudden impacts, weapons fire and horrified screams. The climactic shootout, which occurs in a ship's interior, adds echoes, creaks and the clank of chains and maritime machinery. Quieter moments are also noteworthy, especially where Foley and the sound team mute background noise to emphasize a line of dialogue. (Foley points out one important example in his commentary.) The precinct, Lee's bathhouse headquarters and Wallace's apartment are notable examples of environments with subtle but specific ambiance. The score for The Corruptor is a distinctive mix of original music by Carter Burwell (in the DVD's additional commentary, Foley calls it "the first melancholy action movie" score) and driving hip-hop songs from such artists as Mobb Deep, Spice 1 and Mystikal. The latter was used because hip-hop was the signature music of the gang on which the Fukienese Dragons were modeled. It is unfortunate that the DVD's isolated music track has not been ported to Blu-ray; the blending of these two disparate styles is truly unusual.
The Corruptor was released on DVD in 1999 as part of the New Line Cinema "Platinum Series" and some, but not all, of the extras from that DVD have made it to Blu-ray. Omitted is an isolated score track, an extensive gallery of production and concept stills, DVD-ROM features (including the screenplay) and a useful index to director Foley's commentary track. Portions of Foley's commentary have also been omitted. Commentary tracks are often edited together from more than one session, and the producers of the Platinum Series DVD chose to include an additional forty minutes of commentary on a second track, which was available from the commentary index. Topics included "Why I Want to Work with Actors"; "A Line Cut out in the Massage Room"; "Any Film Has a Number of Mistakes"; "Why MPAA Cuts Are Bugging Me"; and "The Score". None of this additional commentary has been included on the Blu-ray.
Among its many virtues, The Corruptor is the only film from Chow Yun-fat's brief career in American movies to capture the unique screen presence that electrified fans of his Hong Kong films. It turned out to be an advantage that James Foley wasn't overly familiar with Chow's previous work, because he was able to take the actor at face value and let him "play" freely. (Foley has said that he wanted to work with Chow from the instant he met him.) Above all, he gave Chow the freedom to invent the odd comedy beats— what Foley latter described as the "clown" hiding a secret pain—that make his Det. Nick Chen so unpredictable and compelling. Watch, for example, how he handles the two senior officers who reject his protests about Wallace being assigned to the task force; Chen turns it into a joke, but it's a joke that feels like a threat. Playing multiple thoughts and feelings at the same time is the hallmark of a great actor, and Chow is one of the best. He elevates The Corruptor in every scene. Highly recommended.
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