Cold War 2

Horrific, incoherent hack job of a film. Greedy producers bank on the finest actors in the region, and completely neglect the more important aspects of a film (eg. captivating story, interesting and diverse characters, logical process of events etc.). If anything, the music composer should have his license taken away and be sent to Bollywood. The abysmal, grotesque agglomeration of computer-generated french horns, generic clave rhythms, boring string ostinatos and a sound effect selection that is stubbornly stuck in the 80's. The amount of cliché and cringe in this film is overwhelming to the point that I wanted to disappear down my shirt collar. Famous actors mean f**kall when the writers have no idea what they're doing. The tragic part is, being a sequel to a much better film, this movie will likely do just as well, if not better, than its seasonal competitors, allowing producers to cry into more, thicker wads of $1000 banknotes as they scroll down the review section. AVOID at all costs

I can understand many got loss in their arguments, the plots, etc This movie cannot be fully appreciated with just 1 watch.

I have to watch it about 5 times, replay certain parts to know what they are saying because the acting by the actors were truly amazing!

Please hurry the next sequel

The plot is excellent. The acting was 100% real I am just waiting for the next sequence, Cold War 3 !!

Please hurry up

While I really enjoyed the first film in this series, this follow-up isn't anywhere near so good. It follows straight on from the first one but brings back characters whose arcs were already complete for a new story that feels like it was made up on the spot. All of the major players return (Andy Lau excepted) with newcomer Chow Yun Fat playing the role of a lawyer eager to prosecute corrupt cops. What we get is a needlessly complex, laboured and occasionally histrionic story that has a few cool action sequences (dodgy CGI aside) and very little else. The actors are fine but but the screenwriter not so...

I very much disagree with the people here saying that the first film was better and strongly disparaging this one (such as the review by 'Uhungmax') Yes, in the first movie, technically, there was a lot more 'stuff' happening. And, in a sense, although it was indeed engaging and exciting, after it was over I felt that some of the key plot elements and character actions did not really make a lot of sense.

However in this 2nd film, although the plot is much more direct and simple, to me personally I thought that the story was much more tightly plotted and a lot better constructed. Here you didn't have the apparent twists and turns of the first film, usually an element that I like very much. But, like I said, AFTER watching the movie and thinking about it, there were certain character motivations and actions that didn't quite add up to me. Whereas with this movie, the story itself seemed to flow much more naturally. In my lowly and wretched opinion, I honestly felt that as a FILM in and of itself, it was put together and executed in a more streamlined and believable manner. Not that I mind AT ALL when movies are complex, or seemingly disjointed, or non-linear. I DO very much like that ***IF*** everything is well thought out and put together in such a way that it fits the internal logic of the film, and as a WHOLE all the parts work together.

I think the tricky thing about comparing the two films is that the first one had a LOT more going on and was more complex. NORMALLY, that would be something that would be very appealing to me. But in this movie, I had more of a feeling that I was being carried along by the story and much more involved in what was happening, and therefore the overall effect had more substance, and I felt that the tension of the story was much more compelling. It's like with the first movie they were almost trying to be TOO clever with the twists and turns of the story where maybe it at times had the effect of almost stumbling on itself. Don't get me wrong... I liked the first film and it was quite good. But, I feel that this one was better...

These 2 films seem somewhat different for movies coming out of Hong Kong in the sense that you normally would expect them to be a LOT more Action oriented. But, both films dealt more with inter-departmental politics and connections with highly placed officials than they were on action. But, with that said, there is ONE action scene in the middle of film that was quite effective and will blow your socks off (so to speak...)

So, that is why I feel that on the SURFACE some people may get an impression that the first film was better with more 'going on' and more twists and turns. But, I honestly feel that this one was put together in a much more cinematic way with better internal logic (being a simpler story) and more believable character interactions that had a more substantial impact in the long run...