The Prosecutor (誤判, 2024)

Director: Donnie Yen

Cast: Donnie Yen, Julian Cheung, Francis Ng, Kent Cheng, Michael Hui, Michael Tin Fu Cheung, Adam Pak, Kang Yu, Locker Lam, Liza Wang, Mark Cheng, Ray Lui

A poor young man is wrongly charged with drug trafficking after being deceived. An ex-cop turned prosecutor investigates the case, uncovers a corrupt lawyer team’s scheme, and restores justice despite obstruction from evil forces. – IMDB

Directed and lead by Donnie Yen, The Prosecutor is inspired by a real Hong Kong legal case that explores the world of the courtroom especially through the side of the prosecution as a new cop turned prosecutor embarks on his first trial. The film makes the effort to section the film through its courtroom process to also educate its audience of the various stages of court process from its beginning trials to its retrial procedure in the Hong Kong justice system. At the same time, it highlights the key purpose of prosecution that in the film seems to have blurred as well as the changes in certain elements pre and post Hong Kong Handover in 1997.

While I am unfamiliar with legal cases in Hong Kong myself so how true to the real story this one is will require a lot more digging, the screenplay here does present effectively an engaging case from the beginning moments of what motivates Fok Chi-ho (Donnie Yen) to become a prosecutor to embarking on this first case where he butt heads with the Grand Judge (Michael Hui) and the chief prosecutor (Francis Ng) as he gives his all to dig out the evidence to help an innocent young man’s trial and retrial, taking an unusual path. The story itself doesn’t hide behind a lot of twists and turns. Its a straightforward look at presenting the story with less fringes but more on the hurdles of being a prosecutor and how some have lost sight of what its righteous purpose is.

While Donnie Yen turning to a lot more of these roles with slightly more variety in career (like Big Brother) and characters that use more reason than action and almost like an attempt as he gets older to step down a little but bring out some new talent, this film achieve it even though a lot of the big action scenes does fall on Donnie Yen’s shoulders. However, the film does bring out some younger actors like Michael Cheung Tin-Fu who delivers some exceptional action sequences despite achieving his stardom as a singer, among the stacked acting veterans in both supporting and cameo roles like Francis Ng, Kent Cheng, Ray Lui, Liza Wang and of course, Michael Hui who also recently acting in The Last Dance which has been receiving a lot of praise upon its release.

If you are looking for deep characters, this one probably won’t offer it. It is in the most direct way an action thriller/courtroom drama. The characters here are presented to do their jobs and they don’t have any emotional back story which works in this film because the investigation doesn’t necessary need it so much but rather hints of the character’s life from a trunk full of toys to the little details on the walls. The downside of this is that its becomes a film that sometimes feels like its on rails to build up the big action scenes but also making its villain played by Julian Cheung underused and one-dimensional. Julian Cheung has been in the business for a while and does a decent job with what his character is offered and hopefully will be an avenue to have more chances to do more villain roles.

With that said, the heart of The Prosecutor does lie in its action thriller elements. Its not surprising considering it is Donnie Yen’s bread and butter as right from the get-go, the opening action sequence features a well-executed first person shooting sequences almost like if you were watching a video game in real life. Its always tricky to execute these types of action scenes and yet this one does feel smooth with its gun angles and motions. Another big fight scene featuring a lot of people on a outdoor scene using an aerial drone shot was a visually appealing moment especially as it showed the grandeur of that scene before actually seeing the variety of the different forms of weapons and combat that came into play for that sequence. To be fair, we could sit here and talk about those great action moments like the parking lot chase sequence and the finale MTR sequence that was pretty fun to watch and felt a lot like watching SPL or Flash Point which makes sense as the action choreographers were all part of the Flash Point team. The action here is top tier Hong Kong action and stunts and there’s almost a grandeur to the whole film that deserves a lot of praise.

Overall, The Prosecutor is an exhilarating action thriller with memorable action sequences. Some of which feels like Donnie Yen paired his own Hong Kong action background with his experience on the John Wick 4 set and created this action film. The courtroom drama does have some over acting at parts but there is a show of restraint on the melodrama for the most part as it focuses on showing the case and investigation on hand. The film executes the story trying to balance the courtroom drama and the action thriller with some nice humor inserts from Kent Cheng and Michael Hui. It definitely feels like The Prosecutor has its heart in the right place. There are some shortcomings but also shows that Donnie Yen isn’t just an action star but has great vision as a director. It’ll be interesting to see what other projects he has planned for the future.

The Prosecutor is currently available in theatres as of January 10th, 2025.

*Screener received by Well Go USA*