Scare Out Review: Zhang Yimou Goes Modern Spy…And Forgets To Look Like Zhang Yimou

Scare Out (NC16)

Starring Jackson Yee, Zhu Yilong, Song Jia, Lei Jiayin, Yang Mi

Directed by Zhang Yimou

A traitorous PRC citizen leaks vital stealth-fighter secrets to Mandarin-speaking ang moh spies in China. Doesn’t say who these foes planting dirty-tricks micro bombs are. Must be American.

The mainland national security team hunting the traitor discovers that there’s a mole amongst them too.

Suspicion falls on two close elite agents, Huang Kai (Lost in the Stars’ Zhu Yilong) and Yan Di (The Battle At Lake Changjin’s Jackson Yee). They’re investigated by female chief spook-hunter, Zhao Hong (Shock Wave’s Song Jia), even as they pursue their target, Li Nan (YOLO’s Lei Jiayin).

Right from the opening chase sequence involving guns, drones, surveillance cams and even a lethal arrow, the patriotic pair proves their mettle. We’re sure Zhao must be wrong.

Plus, dig this. Big-name beaut Yang Mi pops up as Bai Fan, an enemy honey trap committing high treason between the sheets to ensnare and compromise one of the good dudes who's unfaithful to his spouse. Not saying which one as we wonder — Is this possible? China’s national security hangs on some guy cheating on his wife?

Here’s the deal. You see this contemporary espionage pic that’s apparently advised by China’s Ministry of State Security, you forget that it’s a Zhang Yimou film.

Because it doesn’t look like one.

Quick aside. The political treachery depicted here is death penalty high-stakes. The way turncoat Li lists his demands to the evil foreigners — money, safe passage out, university education for his daughter — turns this movie into a big warning lesson for a billion people.

Scare Out is billed as 75-year-old Zhang’s first foray into a present-day spy thriller. Actually, it’s also possibly his first time making a truly urban flick set in a big, modern pride-of-China city. No mention of which place. It looks like Shenzhen.

Thing is, the acclaimed director seems kinda uncharacteristically lost and somewhat ordinary out of his comfort zone. No mainstays of a classic Zhang visual feast are here. No historical buildings. No colourful fabrics. No ancient irony to unmask. Not even an old village well. Since this is a show that highlights China’s current adversarial systemic threats instead of long past conflicts.

Don't get me wrong. It’s fast-paced and any Zhang Yimou film is still compelling and very watchable.

But the man seems unable to get a firm grip of his new pristine, exhibition-standard surroundings looking too antiseptically clean and gleaming to inject effective shadows and tension into his shadowy tale of cat-and-mouse intrigue, duty and betrayal.

Instead of the rundown imperial-era labyrinthine alleys seen in Full River Red, the spy-trailing subterfuge here plays out on big roads, wide pavements and youthful faces too unweathered to be really interesting.

You know that Zhang is visually bored because he keeps re-using the same overhead shot of awesome, brightly lit circular highways to move his tale along. With one further weakening. This twisty catch-the-traitor-and-expose-the-mole plot seems too far-fetched and clumsily convoluted with highly trained people doing highly unlikely things. A John le Carré-style kicker scene is slapped on right at the end that's clearly motherland-customised.

Take away the landscape differences, though, this story is still a typical Zhang deal. Like Cliff Walkers set amid high-rise buildings. People don’t know who to trust, with uncertain loyalty straining the brotherly bond between agents Huang and Yan. Which is another Zhang fascination about the human condition being tested with one best pal forced to track the other from a distance. “The best move is not move at all,” goes the expert reasoning.

There’s palpable fun here in watching competent stars Zhu, Yee and Yang deceive and evade one another in a sort of menace-à-trois.

Two stupid questions arise. Why do these secret undercover folks tail their suspects in very obvious all-black outfits like door guards from a nightclub? Don’t they get a car, like CIA spooks, instead of flagging down cabs to chase somebody?

And oh, here’s one more smarter query.

Would director Zhang consider some Hong Kong expertise in filming his next modern urban thriller?

Heard that they're not bad at making them. (3/5 stars) in cinemas now

Photo: mm2 Entertainment