Infernal Affairs

A blockbuster in Asia, and later the source for Martin Scorsese’s The Departed, the first part of Andrew Lau and Alan Mak’s groundbreaking policier saga traded the high-octane ballistics of earlier Hong Kong films for a cooler, crisper style and a head-spinning plot full of twists that forever changed the genre. After being thrown out of the police academy, Yan (Tony Leung) is buried alive in the criminal underworld as a long-term undercover cop, his grip on identity pushed to the breaking point. Recruited by the triads as a teenager, Ming (Andy Lau) is the mirror image: a mole inside the police department’s Criminal Intelligence Bureau. Co-written by Mak with Felix Chong, Infernal Affairs draws symmetrical lines of action between mob and police, capturing with precision the swelling pressures as each man hunts the traitor who is, in fact, himself. A sleek, visually exacting thriller for two great stars, Infernal Affairs is also one of Leung’s defining roles (shot the same year as Hero), channeling the gravitas of his art-house work into one of modern crime cinema’s most quietly devastating performances.