OI ZOK ZIN

When their car is stolen and a trip to Europe is called off, Yui and Ching head different ways. Yui soon spots the missing car at a factory building’s carpark but gets kidnapped by the gang that stole it. As a nurse, he is forced to tend to their gunshot wounds and serve as driver. Ching finds out that her boyfriend has been taken hostage, gets on the trail with no help from the police and gets caught in the drama herself. Extreme with emotions and ambitious in scope, Love Battlefield builds compelling characters on both sides of the law, with Yui and Ching launched with enough backstory to establish their fragile relationship and a theme of taking things for granted is eventually hammered in through their story. The mainland gang members come across as a tightly knit family under a husband and wife team and are never written off in crude stereotypes. Like in his earlier horror movies Horror Hotline... Big Head Monster and New Blood, Cheang shows his flair with strong atmospherics, presented here with a largely blue-tinted palette as tension builds fast. Intriguing editing adds to the appeal, including an odd recurring feature of crime scene snapshots inserted ahead of killings. (Tim Youngs)