Is there a “Police Procedure” app for your iPhone? You know, one that opens up to suggested scenes like “hunting a lead” , ”talking with IA” , ”checking out a donut shop.” I ask this because the very hands-off Chinese police procedural Scare Out feels like it was made by a computer app.
“Computer, what we need here is a tracking shot for the city.” Good, good. “Ok, now how about we do one of those things where the camera is overhead, but a superimposed square isolates the surveillance subject?” Excellent!
The film starts in a public square at night. It is the city, a city in China, but it’s completely empty, you know, like most modern cities in China. An exchange is going down. The only people present are the couriers and the police. That’s it. No crowd to get lost in. Gee, bad luck for the bad guys, huh? Luckily for them, an archer is up a level and takes out two cops tracking the exchange before people realize that guns are a thing. Naturally, the bad guys are caught. This is China, after all, and it seemed like it might be bad PR if the villains got away initially. It’s worth note that the villains almost certainly would have gotten away if the plaza were crowded, like any plaza in any Chinese city, at any given time.
In the aftermath, it is revealed that there’s a bigger conspiracy involved and one of the perpetrators might be A LEADER! [Cue dramatic music app] This sets up endless conversations in the one indoor setting they had with a view. I swear, this film shot five or six long scenes from this one vantage point. Sure, call
it “Internal Affairs” and keep filming there, fellas. The app will do it.
What this film really could have used was a car chase; was that app broken on the iPhone in question?
Wiki tells me this is the first film made by the Ministry of State Security. Yeah, it looks it. The sets are clean and polished as if daring one to sully them. The film has some data intrigue, but no characters of note and no real soul. This really feels like what happens to entertainment when the machines take over. I’m not a fan.
I’m going to need a technology tutor
To make a film entirely by computer
Shouldn’t take an hour
Long as the phone has power
And I’ll finish on the train as a commuter
Not Rated, 104 Minutes
Director: Yimou Zhang
Writer: Liang Chen
Genre: Movies made by app
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: People who speak Mandarin
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: People who have seen countless police procedurals
