action, Andy Lau, Guo Xiaodong, High Forces, Jiang Chao, Jiang Mengjie, Liu Tao, movies, Oxide Pang, Qu Chuxiao, reviews, Wang Longzheng, Zhang Zifeng
November 1, 2024
by Carla Hay
Directed by Oxide Pang
Mandarin with subtitles
Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed city in China and mostly on a Chinese airline jet, the action film “High Forces” features an all-Asian cast of characters representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: An international security expert ends up on the same plane as his ex-wife and their teenage daughter, and the plane is hijacked by criminals who want a $500 million ransom.
Culture Audience: “High Forces” will appeal mainly to people who don’t mind watching mindless movies about airplane hijackings.
“High Forces” is generic and utterly forgettable cinematic junk about a hijacked plane where the hero’s family is in danger and the action scenes are ridiculous. All of this unimaginative predictability adds up to a very mind-numbing film. It might be easier to take if “High Forces” had some self-aware comedy about how idiotic everything is in the movie, but “High Forces” takes itself way too seriously for a movie of this low quality.
Directed by Oxide Pang, “High Forces” (formerly titled “Crisis Route”) was written by Sun Chan and Bai Yu. The movie completed filming in 2021, but “High Forces” wasn’t released until 2024. It’s usually not a good sign when it takes this long for a completed movie to be released. No amount of post-production editing or reshoots would be able salvage this stinker movie because almost every scene that takes place during the hijacking is actively terrible.
“High Forces” (which takes place in unnamed areas of China) begins by introducing the movie’s protagonist: middle-aged Gao Haojun (played by Andy Lau), an international security expert. Haojun has bipolar disorder, which causes him to have manic episodes of uncontrollable rage. About 10 years ago, something happened during one of these manic episodes that permanently changed his life and the lives of his immediate family members.
The movie doesn’t reveal right away what happened during this life-changing incident. But eventually, a flashback scene shows what happened: About 10 years ago, Haojun was married to a woman named Fu Yuan (played by Liu Tao), and together they were raising their 8-year-old daughter Gao Xiaojun (played by Zhang Zifeng) during a time when Haojun was not getting treatment for his bipolar disorder.
One evening, Haojun was driving on a busy street, with Yuan and Xiaojun as the car’s passengers. Haojun had a manic episode where he experienced road rage. His road rage caused him to drive recklessly through a red light, which resulted in a car accident where another vehicle crashed into Haojun’s car. During this accident, Xiaojun was immediately blinded by shattered glass.
Now, 10 years after the accident, Haojun and Yuan have been divorced for several years. Xiaojun (who was raised by her mother after the divorce) is now 18 years old and has extra-sensitive hearing due in large part to her blindness. Haojun still has tremendous guilt for the accident that caused Xiaojun’s blindness. He is also taking prescribed doses of lithium carbonate, a drug that is often prescribed to treat bipolar disorder.
Meanwhile, the fictional HanYu Airlines is gearing up for the launch of a new luxury Airbus A380. Xiaojun and Yuan are on HanYu Airline’s maiden flight of this aircraft. And what a coincidence: Haojun had a last-minute cancellation of an assignment, so he’s on this flight too, but he’s seated in a different part of the plane,
Because most viewers of “High Forces” already know that this plane will be hijacked (this hijacking is shown in the movie’s trailer and is the majority of the film’s plot), there is very little surprise when it happens. The hijacking leader is named Mike (played by Qu Chuxiao), who poses as a polite and mild-mannered customer on the plane. In reality, Mike is the most ruthless and heartless of the hijackers.
The hijacking is weirdly staged. Before the hijacking happens, Mike is sitting next to a drunk and aggressive man (played by Wang Longzheng), who rudely demands that a flight attendant named Fiona (played by Jiang Mengjie) keep refilling his wine glass. Mike tells the man to stop harassing the flight attendant. In response, the man smashes a wine bottle on Mike’s head, leaving a bloody gash on Mike’s forehead.
Fiona informs the cockpit that there’s a disruptive customer on the plane. It turns out that the drunk guy is really one of the hijackers, and this fight was staged to be a distraction. The armed hijackers soon make their presence known and take over the plane. Mike really did get a bloody injury in staged fight, but it seems like a stupid plan to deliberately injure the leader of this operation. In total, there are 12 hijackers, some who are disguised as crew members.
Because there’s no WiFi on the plane (the movie never explains why), Haojun somehow communicates with Xiaojun through a hidden two-way device. Yuan has to be Xiaojun’s eyes and act as a sight translator when they talk to Haojun. And they have to do all of this without being noticed by the hijackers, who are watching all the captive people on the plane—except for Haojun, who is able to sneak around in the tightly enclosed plane without being seen by the hijackers. It’s as ludicrous as it sounds.
The worst parts of the movie are when a plane door opens during a fight scene and certain people are hanging out of the plane (holding on to a parachute rope) while the plane is in motion, thousands of feet in the air. In real life, people hanging out of a flying jet would be instantly killed by the sheer velocity from the jet that would fling people out of the plane and plunge them to their death. “High Forces” is not supposed to be a science-fiction film where people have superhuman strength. However, too many moronic scenes have people surviving things that would kill people in real life.
Meanwhile, on the ground, there are not-believable-at-all negotiations for the hijackers to get the ransom money. At no time is there any sign of any military or law enforcement coming to the rescue. There’s someone who’s the head of the emergency operating center (played by David Wang), who is ineffectual because the movie wants Haojun to be the chief hero. Let’s not forget that Haojun is a hothead whose bad temper might come in handy when he’s fighting the hijackers, who outnumber him but somehow he takes them on by himself.
The CEO of HangYu Airlines is Li Hang Yu (played by Guo Xiaodong), who tells the hijackers that he can’t get access to the $500 million immediately because HangYu Airlines is a public company. But then, Mike reminds Hang Yu that Hang Yu is married to the heir of Lius Air, the original secret name of Hangyu Airlines, so this wife has a private fortune. She’s the one who bears the burden of getting the ransom money transferred to a secret account. A HangYu Airlines official named Chen Jie (played by Jiang Chao) is an adviser to the couple.
Lau, who is one of the producers of “High Forces,” does an adequate job with his acting performance. The other cast members give serviceable performances too, but the personalities of these characters are very shallow and uninteresting. The Mike character is a two-dimensional villain with no backstory. The biggest problems with “High Forces” are the movie’s screenplay and fight scenes, which are so relentlessly mindless, no amount of good acting could save “High Forces,” which is a disaster movie because of how bad it is.
Universe Films Distribution released “High Forces” in select U.S. cinemas on October 25, 2024. The movie was released in China on October 10, 2024.