Infernal Affairs II
See also:
Infernal Affairs (Uncle Cliff)
Infernal Affairs III (Uncle Cliff)
Departed, The (Uncle Cliff)
Infernal Affairs II is a completely different film to its predecessor. Set before the events of the first film, it almost feels like it may have started life as a completely different movie altogether, a dormant script that was perhaps just tweaked slightly to fast track it as a sequel since the first film was so very successful.
The first Infernal Affairs could easily confuse the apathetic viewer. If that was the case with you, then it's probably wise to take a few aspirins before attempting the sequel, because it's even more of a headache. Right from the onset things are complicated further with the revelation that Yan, the good cop from the first film (the one who has been undercover in the mob), was actually blood with the family that ran the Hong Kong underworld before the emergence of Sam, the villain from the first movie. This raises all sorts of questions, primarily, how exactly did the brother of the former triad boss join police school (?), especially without his well-connected moles-on-the-inside mob family ever knowing (???). Luckily to make things slightly less confusing the actors who played the young versions of Ming and Yan, who only had briefly cameos in the first film, have returned here to flesh out this period in their characters' lives.
Infernal Affairs II is a film with most unsubtle Godfather ambitions. It's all about the family. There's an awesome sequence where all the current mob bosses are dispatched from the inside, one by one, that seems ripped straight out of Coppola's masterpiece saga.
The real reason why this film feels so vaguely related to the original is because there is no sign of the original theme of the murkiness between good and bad, the typical John Woo thematic exploration of heroes and villains being two sides of the same coin. This film is primarily concerned with depicting the power shifting from one mob family to another, much like the Hong Kong changing of the guard handover of 1997 that supplies the backdrop. Like I said, it badly wants to be the Chinese Godfather .
Infernal Affairs II is like the prequel movies for Star Wars – it adds an interesting back-story but ultimately it is highly unnecessary and does nothing to enhance the other films.
While I do enjoy this series and its characters, if you watch the first film and are hungry for more you could really just skip to the third instalment and would not be missing much.