Review | The Brotherhood of Rebel movie review: Hong Kong gangster drama – the purported ‘sequel’ to 2012’s Triad – is surprisingly watchable
- Terry Ng’s gangster movie charts the downfalls of Bosco Wong, Louis Cheung and Carlos Chan’s flawed triad members as they navigate the criminal underworld
- The character-driven movie largely forgoes the genre’s usual resort to hero worship, with Ng displaying a deft directing touch
3/5 stars
Most people don’t watch gangster movies for their ingenuity. Which is why Triad, the 2012 Hong Kong film directed by Daniel Chan Yee-heng, was considered good fun even when it left no genre cliché untouched in its story of three blood brothers rising through the ranks in the criminal underworld.
Notwithstanding a confusing Chinese title that misrepresents it as a sequel to Triad, The Brotherhood of Rebel tells an unrelated story with a different director (Terry Ng Ka-wai), two new screenwriters (Ronald Chan Kin-hung and Leung Chung-fai) and an almost completely different cast.
While that earlier effort delivered its thrills via the dramatic ascent to power of its young protagonists in a crime syndicate, Ng’s film is refreshing in the way it makes light of this part – before its title card appears – and spends the rest of the duration charting its characters’ slow but inevitable downfalls.
Having pulled off the assassination of a rival gang leader in the opening scenes, Chai (Bosco Wong Chung-chak, an actor for Hong Kong broadcaster TVB), Kam (Carlos Chan Ka-lok) and Mao (Louis Cheung Kai-chung) are the fastest-rising members of a triad faction headed by their amiable leader Yau (Kenny Wong Tak-bun).
Everything changes when Mao takes up a dubious freelance gig as a gang driver – only to discover on the scene that it is a hit ordered on his own boss. Chai and Kam soon capture their hapless buddy on the run, but the former believes in Mao’s innocence and helps him go into hiding.