LIFELINE (1996)

Starring: Lau Ching Wan, Alex Fong, Carmen Lee, Lau Chung Yan, Wong Ho Yin

A kind of Backdraft rip-off sees firefighters from Tsiwanshan fire station in their daily duties helping the local citizens from all sorts of trouble. There are several story strands: a senior firefighter (Lau Ching Wan) falls for a female doctor (Carmen Lee), while officer Cheung Man Kit (Alex Fong) has to come to terms of being reunited with the daughter he had never seen. Another female firefighter has to choose between her career and her unborn baby, while a newcomer (Wong Ho Yin) finds it difficult being a firefighter. Things become extremely hot in the finale when they have to enter a huge factory on fire to save innocent lives.

Before Lifeline came out, you'd be forgiven if you could not name another film about firefighting, because well, I couldn't think of one either. To be honest, firefighters have one of the most thankless jobs in the world - they are sent off to battle walls of unbearably hot flames, and sometimes losing their lives in the process. Some job.

Prior to this, you would think why no other filmmakers would attempt to make a film about the heroics of firefighting. The reason being is that it is pretty boring. Unlike police dramas, where cops are off hunting down criminals, and solving homicide cases, firefighters, well, simply go off and fight fire, and sometimes help people in dire straits, but it is not terribly exciting to watch on-screen, even though it is more exciting in real life.

And that is the problem: seeing firefighters tackle a huge fire is not very exhilarating, but it does add to the overall drama. You just have to look at it from a different perspective. Firefighters are very heroic, and they usually put their lives at risk on the job, so fire helmets off to them. One of the most powerful images of the film is seeing these tired, dirty, just escaped with lives intact firefighters, get up and immediately go to another situation, hoping to save more lives.

If the film tried to make the public more aware of what firefighters go through, then I think they have succeeded, but ultimately, the film fails because it is not terribly exciting to watch. The ending is predictable, and there is relatively little plot to speak off.

RATING

6 / 10