Time and Tide

     “Time and Tide” is the latest action flick to come out of Hong Kong, and although it can be heralded for its high speed pace and amazing action sequences, its overly convoluted story line made it very difficult to follow and almost impossible to care for any of the characters. This movie whizzes by with immense fury, yet we can’t help but feel a bit left behind.

Tyler (Nicholas Tse) is 21 years old and has just got hit by the possibility that he might soon be a father. Feeling somewhat responsible for the unexpected pregnancy and wanting to take care of his child, he gets a job as an underground bodyguard. Here he befriends Jack (Wu Bai), a ruthless mercenary with the talents of James Bond (maybe more). The two initially find themselves working for the same team, until slowly they drift apart and find themselves on opposite sides.

The action/fight scenes in “Time and Tide” are the best ones I’ve seen since “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”. They are so exhilaratingly choreographed that one can almost overlook the film’s many flaws. One exceptional sequence, set in some tenement buildings, stands out and was just totally out of this world. Bullets zipping by every which way, guys flying out of windows left and right, camera shots that make you wonder how they did it and a well-made freeze frame of a gas explosion. I also liked the cinematography and visual tricks used by Hark, which highly compliments the fast momentum of the film.

However, the story gets lost behind all the commotion and turbulence. I wasn’t even sure whether I got the entire plot right. Characters just pop out of nowhere, and we have no idea what their relationships are to any of the others or what their purpose were for being on screen. I was reduced to categorizing people into good guys and bad guys, and even then I was sometimes guessing. Events are so convoluted that I lost interest in the characters. I just didn’t care for any of them anymore.

“Time and Tide” had a great adrenaline rush, cool visuals, but not much of anything else. It has a promising story that could have been handled a lot more tactfully, but the plot gets lost in Hark’s indulgences. Fight sequences are memorable, but characters are forgettable.

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