Movie Digest
‘The Rescue’ is the follow up movie to the movies Operation Mekong and Operation Red Sea. In ‘The Rescue’, the story revolves around the rescue unit in the Chinese coast guard. How the rescue missions impact the lives of the personnel who take up such missions and overcome the internal differences is what this movie aspires to bring to the audience.
The Feel Good Part
Gao Qian is a widowed father to Cong Cong. Qian is personnel in the rescue unit of the Chinese Coast Guard. ‘The rescue’ is Lam’s follow up film to the previously released Operation Mekong and Operation Red Sea. While the films released prior to this were more focused on the law enforcement angle, Lam in the production of “The rescue’ is this time showing the bravery of the personnel in the Rescue unit while they save lives risking their own in return. With near death misses, and daring rescue scenes and portrayal of bravery at the cost of own life drives the viewers to the edge of their seat. Dante Lam’s direction and creative view is influenced by the direction one would witness in the movie ‘Hell fighters’. Qian and his team show extreme daring feats in order to save lives. We have Fang Yuling who is the female pilot of the helicopter the rescue team operates. Between the daring, mind blowing rescue missions, we are introduced to the background of the main cast. Yuling is a pilot in honour of her father and Qian has a son who depends on him. These details make the viewers sympathise more with the characters and their convictions of saving as many lives as possible. Cong Cong is endearing in the way he tries to strike up romance between his father Qian and the pilot Yuling. Dante Lam is a celebrated director with his mettle in the filmmaking industry being compared to the style we see in Hollywood films. The frames in the film and the cinematography do justice in showing the near-miss deaths of the personnel. This film notably tries to highlight the relevancy of Chinese coast guard.
The Disappointing Factor
This albeit has some very good shots, the action sequences is extremely predictable. There are a lot of movies with incredible action and stunts in them. This movie is purely relying on its stunts and actions but at the end of the day that makes sense. Entertainment media has too much over-saturated tropes circulating from a long time. It feels like this was made just to garner A box office hit. Another disappointing factor is the female lead Yuling. Apart from the stereotype of cold, all business no prisoners attitude her character had nothing else to offer and seemed very conventional. Her role despite holding a substantial rank in the rescue unit still reduced her potential to a romantic interest for the main lead. The scenes in between the missions were choppy and did not seem to have a smooth transition. Only the scenes that had high action were given due prominence in storytelling the other scenes in between the missions seemed dull saved only by the acting mettle of Cong Cong, Qian’s son. Its movie that it is clearly made for mass market approval rather than garnering genuine sympathy for the service members who go through risks to save lives.
In-Depth Analysis
This film is one of the highest grossing films in China and it took nearly 5 years in production. Dante lam has put considerable energy into this and it is evident in the movie’s explosive action scenes. But that is exactly where this film fails, after a while the explosive action scenes become too repetitive and the barely their transitions make it seem as if the series of fights were just simply meshed together into a 2-hour long movie. This factor especially makes it seem like all this movie wanted to achieve was mass approval. It has scenes where the director has not shied away from showing graphic imagery of how disaster affect humans. It’s a good watch to enjoy with your friends or maybe when you want to run a Netflix marathon.
Star Power
Eddie Peng as Gao Qian had a supreme physical appearance almost Adonis like, and the same can be said of Xin Zhillie as Fan Yuling also did a pretty amazing job. Zhang Jingyi as Cong Cong was adorable on the big screen.
Overall Opinion
Dante Lam can always be trusted to big on scenes involving action, part of this commitment ot his craft is also visible in how they moved the shoot to Mexico. Eddie Peng has previously appeared in the Operation movies and has always had a box office hit in his collaboration with Lam. From gigantic cranes to renting an airplane, Lam spared no costs in making sure his viewers were satisfied with the real thing not simple editing. The movie would fare well for those of you who love action packed films, there are some poop jokes involved and other corny scenes, all in all it’s a good watch.
