movie poster

The Suspect

1998

Director: Ringo Lam

Stars: Louis Koo, Simon Yam

Louis Koo plays an assassin who wants to go straight after getting out of prison, so he turns down a job from his former employer Simon Yam to kill a politician. Yam carries out the hit himself and manages to frame Koo for the crime, who then must run from both the cops and criminals as he tries to clear his name.

The Suspect starts out well, with a high level of tension and some good action scenes. However, the second and much of the third act is wasted with overuse of political grandstanding and symbolism, which really grinds down the movie down. By the time the finale (which is actually pretty good) hit, I had lost most of my interest in the characters, and I'd wager you'd feel the same way. If Ringo Lam had managed to keep the story in check and pump up the action and suspense a bit, this could have been a really good movie in the vein of The Fugitive or Lam's previous film, Full Alert. As such, this is a good movie that gives a decent night's entertainment, but not much else.

RATING: 6.5

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