Marko Mak has been highly touted for his first two directorial efforts. Having been not that impressed with his latest, Replacement Suspect, I finally decided to check out COAM to see what all the fuss was about and I have to say I felt a bit underwhelmed. The movie is solidly lensed, and does try to offer a fresh perspective on this rather tired genre, but it can't hide the fact that it's working with an average script dolled up through fancy camera work that sometimes borders on being pretentious.

Daniel Wu is a good-looking guy, but not an actor with a lot of charisma. He tries hard to inject some sinister menace into the slow transformation of his character from being a naive cop to an undercover agent a little too enamored by the lifestyle of a triad gangster, but in the end his performance remains rather bland. Same goes for Suki Kwan, who I think is over-rated. Only Eric Tsang as the seemingly warm-hearted triad boss with a certain physical disfunction manages to create a modicum of viewer interest for his performance.

The script surprises by revealing the main character's fate right at the beginning, and then slowly unveiling the events leading up to the final scene, but never manages to sustain the interest spiked by the opening scene.

Perhaps I'm being a little too harsh - the movie does try hard, and it certainly stands above most of the B-movie fodder coming out of HK these days, but still, I was hoping for something a little more engaging but was left wanting. Check out Beast Cops instead...