Cold War (2012)
Directed by Sunny Luk and Longman Leung, starring Aaron Kwok, Tony Leung Ka-fai, Charlie Yeung, Aarif Rahman Lee, Gordan Lam, Chin Kar-lok, Terence Yin, Eddie Peng, Andy Lau.
A slick Hong Kong flick, one of the best I have seen this year, Cold War oozes a sense of intensity, right from the beginning, till the very end. The intensity is not just the action and story, but as well as performances by all the actors. I was utterly impressed by these first time directors. Their ability to control their actors (such top notch ones like Tony Leung Ka-fai) is amazing. The surprise for me, personally is the suppressed performance by Aaron Kwok here. I have never really thought that Aaron was a great actor until this film. I guess as one ages, one tends to be more subtle in your approach, but I believe it has a lot to do with the directors and how they wanted to approach the film. The plot twist is to say the least, exciting, but definitely worth following how the story unfolds. You would naturally feel for the characters, especially the character of Aaron, Sean K.F. Lau, has to go through to shoulder such great responsibility for the Hong Kong Police Force. One of the best scenes, amongst many others, for me is the scene when Tony Leung's character, M.B. Lee, Deputy Commissioner of Police was being interrogated by Billy (played interestingly by Aarif Lee) in the interrogation room. Tony's performance was immaculately powerful and precise. Awesome acting there. it is intriguing to see how the power struggle between the characters gradually being revealed. Well, the film has great combination of psychological thrills, action, anchored down with human emotions and turmoil, and how greed and power struggle can change everything in this modern capitalistic world. A great watch indeed. 
