In the 80s and 90s, director John Woo would cement his reputation as a master of action films with classics like A Better Tomorrow, The Killer and Bullet in the Head. This would culminate in 1992 with the release of his masterpiece Hard Boiled, the hyperkinetic, hyperviolent exemplar of the Heroic Bloodshed genre.
Chow Yun-Fat (City on Fire) stars as Tequila, a gung-ho cop working to bring down Johnny Wong (Infernal Affairs), the villainous triad boss who maintains a stranglehold on Hong Kong’s illegal gun trade. Johnny attempts to recruit Ah-Long (Bullet in the Head), an assassin from a rival syndicate, just as the insubordinate Tequila gets taken off the case. Taking justice into his own hands, Tequila tracks Ah-Long down and uncovers an intricate web of deception that threatens to boil over into all-out war.
With a fiery coalescence of electrifying performances, elaborate narrative and operatic gunfights, Hard Boiled has been exalted as the undisputed champion of Hong Kong action films.
Introduced by Ti Singh, producer of the BFI FAN ‘Art of Action’ season and co-director of Forbidden Worlds Film Festival.