Chuen zik dai do

I rented The Group more because I'll watch anything from HK I can get my hands on, than the story which didn't fill me with confidence; A group of orphans raised as children by father Martin, a gentle and loving man who they all respect, when he's killed 'The group' decide (in a very Robin Hood 'Take from the Rich, give to the poor' way) to get a shedload of money to help the kids Father Martin was looking after overseas before he was killed.

It seems that the quickest way to get a lot of cash is to rob a casino, not exactly legal but they don't seem too bothered, strange in a way as one is Lawyer heh. It struck me that that they might have some spare cash lying around themselves as one of the group is a movie director, and another claims to own 10 x more surveillance equipment than the HK government, but when do movies like this let things like that get in the way of action :)

Cue a clever robbery, involving filming a very public gun fight in the streets by the director to disguise what's really going on, and the usual cat and mouse games with the cops that follows, concluding in the bog standard all guns blazin' showdown, there's nothing new here and I didn't even find it that fun to watch, it'd be hard to recommend this to anyone but a serious HK movie fan, it's no surprise this hasn't receive m(any) votes as I write this.

So a let down in pretty much all departments, but it's biggest flaw for me was having Anthony Wong in and totally wasting him, true he's been in some poor films (just a few!) but he has given some electric performances throughout his career (Beast Cops springs to mind) and he is always worth watching, though sadly not in this

A disappointment, passable at best