Operation Red Sea

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

One of the best war action movies, I have seen for a long time. It outclassed Hollywood movies which have so many liberal and unpatriotic tones to tell young audience that soldiering is bad. Dante Lam definitely emulates much of the Hollywood action genre and willing to finish the story in a justifying manner that good will always triumph against the evility of men. It's great that Lam put his foot in China and this will perhaps assure a generation of Chinese that the world needs a willing and capable Chinese force that's ready to protect the world.

前半部份拍的还是可以的，直到反迫击炮伏击战之后，8人小组有人受伤还带着一个拖油瓶，没有后勤补给，没有情报与重火力支援的情况下，潜入一个拥有重装甲重火力，150人全副武装的恐怖份子营地并且还将对手团灭，不得不说这就有点扯蛋了

A surprisingly good (if viewed as an action movie) modern war film from a country still not well known for this genre. Though it claims 'based on a true event' this really stretches the factual basis (a totally peaceful historical event becomes Ramboesque). It is also very clearly intended to both promote and highlight China's new military reach and ability to conduct overseas operations, but to be fair, half of US-made war movies tend to do the same thing. It's refreshing too to see how a different state approaches the topic and the film largely succeeds in suggesting to audiences, domestic and foreign, that China can give the US a run for her money in all aspects of modern warfare. This is a high profile addition to a growing genre (Chinese modern war films) and while future entires could benefit from slightly more realism (all the good guys are virtuous heroes, all the bad guys have stormtrooper aim) and less predictability in the plot, its stands as a solid effort in its own right.

I know so little of Chinese culture, movies like this are a window of sorts. This has a very Top Gun feel. The photography is very well done, more practical effects and miniatures than cgi. It is interesting to see modern Chinese navy. It does look like a recruitment commercial, enough to wear me out about 30 minutes in. Decades of action movies made me a connoisseur, I rarely like them anymore. It felt like Bruckheimer or Emmerich, just not my interest.

Main focus of this film seems to be a promotion of the ingenuity and acumen of the Chinese Navy and Special Forces above all else. Overly long, at well over 2 hrs.,the movie contains extended battle scenes, that can get quite bloody and gory, and which became to me very tedious and repetitious. Can't recommend.