Wong Kar-Wai's first film is an enjoyable gangster thriller which
deals with themes of loyalty and betrayal. It's heavily indebted to
Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets in its fatalistic portrayal of two
smalltime Hong Kong hoods way out of their depth. Most of the time it's a
conventional genre piece, although we can already see trademark Wong
flourishes which mark the film as idiosyncratic and different to the
usual Hong Kong gangster fare - occasional digressions, or
reshufflings of formulaic narrative patterns. It's minor Wong but
that still puts it in a different league to most.
