Taking a step away from the norm, I watched the Chinese movie Infernal Affairs. I only pay attention to Asian movies when they garner Caucasian attention, and it was because I heard random people mention it on a website i frequent that I picked this one up.

It’s about two peers in police cadet training who take different career paths. One is “expelled” in order to go under deep cover into the triad while the other becomes a star officer who is also a turncoat for the crime lord the former is working for. So naturally, their paths cross and it becomes a strategic game to see who can help their superior win.

It sounds like a thriller but it is also deep with character development, mainly the characters have to decide for themselves who they actually are. It comes to a dramatic conclusion about an hour into the movie but that is hardly the ending, there is a long denoument before the stories finally resolve themselves.

I’m hesitant, but this movie may deserve five stars due to the multitude of layers and suspense. Typically though, movies that I don’t see in theatres seem to get less criticism and a better rating, but I still think this was a really good movie. So five stars, or at least four and a half stars.