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Like a high-tech version of the Christian apocalypse tale Left Behind with a skeptical skew, Gordon Chan's Armageddon (not to be confused with the Bruce Willis giant asteroid adventure of the same name) haphazardly combines end-of-the-world prophecies from various faiths with a murky X-Files-like mystery. The world's greatest scientists spontaneously combust after receiving a cryptic note ("You Have No Choice"), and communications genius Andy Lau (Savior of the Soul) is roused from mourning the death of his fiancée to investigate. Anthony Wong (Hard-Boiled) costars as his buddy and bodyguard, a shaggy, sloppy street cop out of place in the high-tech environment, and Michelle Reis (Fong Sai Yuk) is the dead girlfriend who steps out of his flashbacks and into his life, like a ghost providing him with clues. The darkly handsome film is more tech noir than action thriller, with a spiritual undercurrent, a serious tone, and a slow, moody buildup. Chan breathes some excitement into the otherwise somber film with some intriguing effects and a striking climax, but he never really clears up the cryptic mystery. Still, he got the jump on Hollywood. Produced and released in 1997, when the fear of Hong Kong's return to China was investing everything from gangster movies to costume epics with a rumbling, paranoid sense of confusion, his millennial thriller is at least as interesting as the U.S. attempts that followed (End of Days, Stigmata, Lost Souls) and certainly more fun. --Sean Axmaker
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