Review for Invisible Target: Ultimate Edition (2 discs) (Review)
Saturday, 7th August 2010, 17:42

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Introduction
How long has it been since you last saw some high quality nuttiness from Hong Kong cinema? There was a time, usually during the classic Jackie Chan era, that Hong Kong cinema delivered action on an unprecedented scale, awesome fight sequences, insane stunts, and a total ignorance of life insurance. But it wasn't just the stunts. These films would have something for everyone, there would be a fair to decent story, melodrama, comedy, and did I mention the action? These would be films like Police Story, Project A, and Millionaires' Express, with lavish (for Hong Kong) budgets and production values, and stars that could act and kick arse too. That age ended when Hong Kong cinema diversified, making films for specific audiences instead of packing everyone into one cinema. Also, the current generation of stars come from pop music and teen idol backgrounds, and haven't necessarily had the training to allow for insane kung fu antics as there once was. I have to admit that I miss those good old days of knockabout action comedy drama. And then Invisible Target belatedly turns up for review.

A simple armoured truck robbery gets out of hand when explosives wreak havoc in a busy shopping district, and a shootout with the police turns lethal. Six months later, the mercenary thieves return, looking for their money. They were double crossed, and now they won't stop at anything in their desire for vengeance, and the police don't faze them either. Yet it will be three, unconventional cops who are thrown together by fate and circumstance that will have to bring the gang down. Detective Chan Chun's life was perfect, until they day his fiancée was killed, during the armoured truck heist. Since then, he's become a burnt out maverick of a cop, and he's been looking for the robbers ever since. Now that they've turned up, he's not liable to let something as trivial as the law get in his way. Inspector Carson Fong Yik Wei had the world on a plate, leading a crack team that dealt with crime efficiently and stylishly. He was the definition of a playboy supercop, until the day that he ran into the robbers, and was duly humiliated, his team utterly beaten. Now he's looking for some payback. Then there is the rookie Wai King Ho, the epitome of an honest, hard working cop. Except for his brother, also a cop, who has been missing for years. Now his brother's picture has resurfaced, and he's apparently a member of the robbers' gang. Now his superiors are questioning Wai, he's suspended from duty, and he's torn between his loyalty towards his brother and his duty as a cop. The rookie, the playboy and the maverick, versus the most brutal, unrelenting, vicious gang that Hong Kong has ever seen; all hell is about to break loose!

Picture
Invisible Target gets a 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer, which as befits a recent film is more than acceptable at first glance. It's clear, it looks sharp, and the colours are represented faithfully, on top of which it is a native film to PAL transfer. There's no print damage, and compression artefacts are absent. It's only on closer examination that you may notice odd moments of softness, and conversely the sort of aliasing that comes from a smidgen of edge enhancement. It's never really enough to make a definitive judgement either way, but it is enough for this not to be one of the top-notch DVD transfers. But, you won't be bothered by the transfer when you watch the film, as the action comes across clearly enough, and the sight of just one nutty stunt is enough to put cares and worries about the transfer out of your mind. Invisible Target is also available on Blu-ray if you want extra definition.

Sound
You get the choice of DD 5.1 English and Cantonese (with a smidge of Mandarin thrown in), along with optional English subtitles. The dialogue is clear throughout, the surrounds are put to good use conveying the action and the subtitles are free of error and timed well. It's a film that delivers on the action when it comes to the audio. There are plenty of fight sequences, gunfights, car crashes and explosions, but I must say that the sound design was a little generic. There was a gunfight scene that certainly paid homage to Heat, with the robbers facing the police in an exchange of automatic weapons fire. But while Heat's gunfight was a scene that stuck with audiences in large part because of the sound design, Invisible Target's action sounds like just another gunfight. The best thing I can say about the English dub is that I tried it, and I lasted for more than five minutes.

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