Directed by Dante Lam, Operation Red Sea stars Zhang Zi, Huang Jingyu(Johnny Huang), Du Jiang, Hai Qing, and, Henry Prince Mak. Feng Ji wrote the script to the war film which became the the seventh highest grossing film of 2018 in China and was deemed the first modern naval film. It also won best film at Beijing's international festival.
A Chinese naval assault team is sent to rescue Chinese citizens from Yemen's southern port of Aden.
Operation Red Sea keeps every ounce of the film a hundred percent truthful throughout the entire film. There's more than just a little hint of realism, audiences get the whole raw uncut presentation of war. Not only war, but also the experiences of the solider and citizens involved. It was a bit surprising how to script was wrote in a way that was faltering yet unflattering to the Chinese army at the time. Keeping to realism must have been more important to the writer than keeping up appearances. Operation Red Sea is loosely based on the events from 2015 where the Chinese naval force rescued six hundred Chinese citizens from Yemen during the Yemeni civil war. Considering leaving all the uncensored events out on the table would be a good idea but the director and writer didn't have to do that if they didn't want to. Maybe watching a film of the Chinese army just having the day like making cherry pie wouldn't have been appealing to an audience that knew better. The Yemeni war was some of the most dangerous acts of war that have ever been seen on the earth. So Operation Red Sea capitalized on the riveting fact that War brings about loss in the face of human sacrifice. This film doesn't slow down on the action as it seems that the battle never stops until the closing credits. I was very interested in the mindset of the army when going to rescue civilians. The army was original there to ONLY rescue Chinese people. Meaning that all the other people were as good as rubble on the ground. Most races care about their own and its even more apparent in East asian races such as Chinese, Japanese, and, Korean. There will be times that you will care more about someone who looks like you however, never forget that at times of occurrences that affect more people than just your race, we should all come together in order to help everyone. You can see the shift in a colonized racial mindset that realizes more than just their own race needed help. This was one of the qualities that I enjoyed the most about Operation Red Sea's script. I just want to let you know that this film can be VERY graphic so don't watch if you have a weak stomach or you don't like graphic scenes of violence.
This film was defiantly one of the best looking war films out of China that I have seen in a long time. Those explosions kept the tension high for viewers and the slow motion effects of bullets flying into the air made me feel sorry for the person getting shot at. I though I was playing an old school James Bond shooting game, then remembered that I wasn't….. Do those games even get made anymore?
I honestly watched this film for Johnny Huang because I never watched him in anything else outside of Addicted(Chinese Web Drama). The actors and actresses energy levels should be praised instead of their acting…. It must have been hot as hell filming in the dessert wearing all the equipment. They all had to learn basic techniques for the war scenes too. The acting was good for what they had to work with…. Not award winning in my opinion. Johnny should have gotten an award for Addicted but China banned the drama.
Lovers of war films should give this film a watch. The story is pretty honest without be super patriotic toward China. I'm going to have to find out what else Johnny has been up to.
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