Country: China

A personal story told on a grand scale ‘Assembly’ is as good as war flicks get, finding a near perfect balance between a personal journey and large scale combat.

Only recommended to war completists and those who find overt sentimentality and propaganda pushing easier to swallow.

Despite the odd dip into cheesiness, lethargic storytelling and over earnestness, ‘Night Raid’ is still an enjoyable slice of war action with an intriguing story and some likeable characters at its core.

This is only for the war history (and propaganda/sentimentality pushing) completist out there. Those wanting a war combat fix best look elsewhere.

‘Badges of Fury’ cannot decide whether it is merely an abysmal spoof of cop films, an action comedy or a gaudy pantomime.

‘Beijing Blues’ is occasionally frustrating, but acts as an interesting anathema to the usual portrayal of police work as gritty or glamorous.

‘Black Coal, Thin Ice’ is one of those films that are encountered once in a while that are much easier to admire than feel warm and fuzzy about.

‘Bleeding Steel’ starts with promise and then refuses to flesh out any of the plot details, leaving us bewildered shortly after our interest had piqued.

Not a complete waste of time as it does provide some basic gangster movie stylings but ‘Blood Brothers’ is just that: an exercise in style and a style that has been done much better by other films.

Much of the story could have been padded better, with the format really revolving around getting to the next action sequence when more depth to the characters would have been far more beneficial.

The result is a good big-budget action film though enjoyment will rest on how much Chinese flag-waving you can sit through.

Director Fan Haolun seems to be more concerned with playing with flashbacks and flash-forwards than he is with constructing a story of any real depth.