3.5/5 stars

The blockbuster prequel Cold War 1994 delivers exactly what it promised. Viewers come for the ridiculously overstuffed cast but stay for the relentlessly – almost ostentatiously – convoluted tale of power, corruption and betrayal.

While you may not find its plot realistic, it is undeniably entertaining throughout.

The new release opens with a quick recap of Cold War (2012) and Cold War 2 (2016), before moving six months forward to Hong Kong in 2017. Louis Koo Tin-lok’s new character, Adrian Yip, is the chief executive-elect, while Tony Leung Ka-fai’s former deputy police commissioner, M.B. Lee, goes missing from his home.

When police chief Sean Lau (Aaron Kwok Fu-shing) and senior counsel Oswald Kan (Chow Yun-fat) dig into M.B.’s classified 1990s background file for clues, however, their only observation of note is that his record appears far too detailed to be authentic.

The furiously paced film then spends the rest of its runtime in the good old days of 1994, when policemen and gangsters could still become best buddies, Britain was the natural “big bad”, and screenwriters did not feel obliged to dedicate their mega-budget action spectacles to praising Hong Kong for upholding the common law system.