Rindiana This trashy Taiwanese-American cooperation tries to mix all stereotypes of U.S. police buddy-movies/serial-killer thrillers and Asian supernatural horror films into one brew... unfortunately, its taste is revolting.Mind me, the technical aspects and even some of the otherwise typically hammy acting is okay, but the convoluted plot kills it all, particularly after confusing Taoist prophecies, silly modern killer monks and, most annoyingly, lofty melodramatics are introduced. And I won't even speak about the ridiculous finale.I seldom cared less about a thriller's outcome.2 out of 10 lethal air conditioners

Kashmirgrey This film had an engaging premise. A murderer is shooting pellets laced with a mite-bearing, extremely hallucinogenic mold into air conditioners of intended victims. The victims then destroy themselves in a manner orchestrated by their killer.Now here is the disappointing part... The film could not decided if it was going to remain a mystery or a supernatural thriller. Unfortunately, by the time the credits rolled, I really didn't care.There are several different sub-plots traveling straight together in the first half of the film. Tony Leung Ka Fai plays a cop failing to cope with the attempted murder of his daughter and the suicide of a corrupt fellow officer he helped bring to justice. His daughter won't speak and his neglected wife is seeking a divorce. Amid the murders, Leung Ka Fai learns that a FBI agent specializing in behavioral science and assigned to work with him, has been summoned by his superiors for show. One of his fellow detectives alludes to this and that the government might have a malevolent purpose behind this. The investigation points towards supernatural forces, and we are led into a temple where we witness a murder take place in the midst of what appears to be a Taiwanese Satanic ceremony.All this flies straight together, but then each veers off in a separate direction, and in order to make sense and keep up with the story line, the viewer needs "double vision."

Libretio DOUBLE VISION (Shuang Tong) Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Panavision)Sound formats: Dolby Digital / SDDSFollowing a series of murders in which the victims died under mysterious circumstances (one drowns on the top floor of an office complex, another is disembowelled in his sleep, etc.), Taiwanese police engage the services of an FBI agent (David Morse) who joins forces with a disgraced cop (Tony Leung Ka-fai) and traces the clues back to a murderous religious sect...Produced by the Asian wing of Columbia Pictures, DOUBLE VISION is a beautifully-made bore. With its moody visuals and stately pace, Chen Kuo-fo's torturous film aspires to something more upmarket than your average 'slasher' movie, and the results are pretty mixed, to say the least: Too 'arty' for the multiplex crowd, and too commercial for Art-house audiences, DOUBLE VISION swaps atmosphere for action at almost every turn, save for a violent massacre toward the end of the film and a confusing climax which suggests a supernatural explanation for the murders before going off in a different direction altogether. In fact, Chen's kid-glove treatment of the established 'serial killer' formula - a series of outrageous crimes, followed by an investigation in which an assortment of details lead to a final confrontation with the killer - suggests an aversion to the material that extends all the way down to the murders themselves, few of which are especially graphic, except for a couple of CGI-enhanced eruptions early in the movie, and the narrative suffers accordingly.On the plus side, Morse and Leung (not to be confused with Tony Leung Chiu-wai, star of Wong Kar-wai's HAPPY TOGETHER) are well-matched as cops from opposite sides of the world, forced to set aside their cultural differences in order to track the killer to his/her lair. Morse is OK, as usual, but Leung has the showier role, playing an honest man whose life is in turmoil following a recent tragedy in which his young daughter was taken hostage by an officer whom Leung had accused of corruption. Rene Liu (FLEEING BY NIGHT) plays Leung's wife, a lost soul struggling to cope with the fall-out from her husband's guilty conscience. Grim stuff, in every sense of the word. The uncensored director's cut - available on DVD in Asia - adds more gore to the proceedings, but little else. Gorgeous production values, expansive widescreen compositions and a busy soundtrack aside, the movie is a wash-out.(Mandarin and English dialogue)

dromasca I am not a fan of Asian action movies, and I was concerned when I rented this film. It actually proved to be something very different - a mix of many well known themes with exotic (for us) Taiwanese culture flavor, and all is quite well done. We have a lot in this film - the righteous cop who pays for his integrity with the cost of his family life, the cop partners who hate one another, and learn later to work together and respect each other, the clash between the American and local (in this case Taiwanese) cultures, the X-files like conflicts between science and super-natural, between believers and skeptics. It is like the Taiwanese movie industry (which I know very little about) tried to catch back with all these themes in one single film. Surprisingly it works not bad, mostly because of a director who know how to keep the balance, and to direct the actors in this maze of themes. At the end the films fails to be memorable not because it is over-charged, but because the ending plays too much tribute to the mode of the openness to bizarre and as in many other films recently it is too long and too elaborated. However, it is worth seeing, and a different experience for the mystery-action films fans. 7/10 on my personal scale.