A great beginning to the Young and Dangerous series with charismatic acting from Ekin Cheng and Jordan Chan as well as from Francis and Frankie Ng. Although a couple of the members have short-lived roles, the comradeship between the friends is evident and well portrayed. An adorable Gigi Lai is also good as the stuttering girlfriend of Chan Ho (Cheng). Excellent plot as well with a nasty Francis Ng bending all the rules of triads and pushing his weight around to gain power. He does a great job of making you hate him enough to allow a rousing finale when he gets his comeuppance. The director, Andrew Lau, also adds a stylistic twist by incorporating the oringinal comic strip on which the movie is based into the cinematography. Frames from the comic are mimiced exactly and made to come to life by the actors. On the other end of the spectrum, there are some typically great guerilla film-making crowd reactions to action scenes in the film. It's always fun to watch the people's reactions on the Hong Kong streets to a camera crew filming. Not sure it deserves the oft-used "Godfather of Chinese films" moniker, but it is a very good crime and triad film.

8/10