Divergence (2005)

• Year: 2005
• Released: 28 Apr 2005
• Country: Hong Kong
• Adwords: 5 wins & 5 nominations
• IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455195/
• Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/divergence
• Metacritics:
• Available in: 720p, 1080p,
• Language: Cantonese, Mandarin, English
• MPA Rating: R
• Genre: Action, Crime, Drama
• Runtime: 101 min
• Writer: Ivy Ho
• Director: Benny Chan
• Cast: Aaron Kwok, Ekin Cheng, Daniel Wu
• Keywords:

5.9/10

Divergence Storyline

This thriller has Suen chasing some gangsters around Hong Kong. One of his key witnesses is assassinated after being extradited from Canada and that puts an end to the prosecution’s case. Meanwhile, Suen is still struggling with his girlfriends disappearance 10 years ago. A pair of assassins fill out the third plot chain. The gangsters, Suen, and the assassins intersect often as they try to solve the crimes and find out what happened to Suen’s girlfriend.—poco loco

Divergence Photos

Divergence Torrents Download

Divergence Subtitles Download

Divergence Movie Reviews

A Nutshell Review: Divergence

Divergence is the latest crime thriller to come out of Hong Kong’s film industry, and all films of this genre will nonetheless be compared with the grand-daddy of them all – Infernal Affairs, which set a very high bar. Given that this film is produced by the same team, you’d expect the same high standards. While production values are similar, I’d leave it to you to decide the end verdict.

If you’re expecting a strong cops and robbers storyline, then you might be disappointed. This film is heavy on relationships between the characters, their degrees of separation, and their duality. Which may not be a bad thing, but I find the dwelling on sappy moments and flashbacks a bit overboard, and at times, the audience was laughing at the improbability of these moments.

This movie unites Aaron Kwok and Ekin Cheng together for the big screen after the comic fantasy movie Stormriders. Kwok plays a cop who lost his girlfriend under mysterious circumstances 10 years ago, and in the first 10 minutes, lost a key witness to a sniper, played by Daniel Wu, who always seem to be playing nothing but baddie roles these days. However, Wu’s sniper character knows that in his career, he is both the hunter, and the hunted, and at times want to prove to Kwok that he makes a better cop. Ekin Cheng’s a lawyer who defends the innocent, or so it seems. While he’s aware that his clients are sometimes guilty, is he idly standing by? Thrown into the mix are characters like Cheng’s wife, played by the lovely Angelica Lee, who bears a strong resemblance to Kwok’s girl, and thus making him a stalker of sorts, Eric Tsang as an underused pathologist, Ning Jing (the only movie I saw her in was the remake of Shanghai Grand) as a bald assassin agent, and Lo Kar Leung as Cheng’s client who has shady underworld links and a pop star son, who gets kidnapped.

At times you might feel that the movie plods along, while you might already have been able to unravel the mystery mid-way. This could be due to the sappy moments I mentioned earlier, and taking centerstage is how Kwok’s cop character refuses to give up looking for his girlfriend. You can understand how the character feels if you’re in the same shoes – loving someone so deeply, and yet having zero closure. And when you think you see her again – is it really her, or had amnesia played a part, or has she deliberately forgotten the past? While the audience found the scene of revelation and Kwok’s reaction to it funny, I felt the opposite – sometimes when the truth is revealed and you can’t handle it, you shut down. Really. Trust me, I know. So if I were in his shoes, that’ll probably be what will happen to me too.

However, this film does have moments which can iconify it (sort of like the Tony-Leung-pointing-a-gun-at-Andy-Lau’s-head moment in Infernal Affairs). The “long run to the fish market” scene is tense, and so is the finale where 3 characters have a standoff, which actually yanked the rug off my feet.

I felt that if this film focused tightly on the plot, and lose some peripheral characters, it might just live up to its potential, and I don’t think we’ll see any sequels to this one.

Goes through the motions but without any heart.

Divergence tells the story of three men: A reckless hit-man simply named Coke (Daniel Wu), Suen Siu-yan a police officer whose fiancée has been missing for 10 years (Aaron Kwok), and Barrister To, a lawyer (Ekin Cheng) who works for a mobster. While conducting a routine witness transfer Suen Siu-yan feels the wrath of the hit-man Coke, after barely escaping with his life he starts further investigation into the case, the prize being Barrister To’s gangster boss. At this point, three seemingly unrelated lives converge into a hailstorm of bullets and bloodshed.

If it sounds like typical Hong Kong action flick thats because it is. Everything about this film, at a cursory glance, is typical. The Acting is well-done, and the cinematography and Direction is also good, and the action is good too. But there is still something lacking in Divergence. I had to watch this film twice to figure out what was missing. On the second viewing I figured it out. This movie has no heart. It has everything that makes a good action film but in the end, you just don’t care about the characters. The film makes all the stops and covers all the bases, and it should be a great film. But sadly, it’s not, I was hoping for a great gunkata thriller but I was sadly disappointed.

Nothing extraordinary here…

“Divergence” (“Saam Cha Hau”) is a fairly average action thriller from director Benny Chan. So don’t expect any major revelations or eye-poppers here.

That being said, then “Divergence” is still a good movie, because it takes a well-used formula and manages to get something good out of it, and the movie is entertaining.

The story is about policeman Suen (played by Aaron Kwok), assassin Koo (played by Daniel Wu) and lawyer To (played by Ekin Cheng) whose paths are intertwined and get trapped in a race against time.

Initially, there is nothing new to the story, but Benny Chan still manages to tell a story that is entertaining and thrilling. And there are some pretty good visuals throughout the movie.

As for the acting, well Daniel Wu really carried the movie here, and far outshone both Aaron Kwok and Ekin Cheng. As for Aaron Kwok, then he really didn’t shine through in this movie and sort of just seemed to be running on autopilot. And Ekin Cheng wasn’t really given enough time on the screen to fully make an impact.

“Divergence” is good entertainment if you enjoy action thrillers, just don’t expect to get dazzled.