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70At its plainspoken best, the U.S.-and Thailand-shot film is an eye-opening history lesson more than an atmospheric thriller. It's nonetheless chilling as it exposes the machinations between countries with no official relationship.
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While it is captivating stylistically, and the primer on the China/Taiwan relationship is great fodder for political geeks, even in its deepest moments of intrigue and pathos this is a cable TV movie at best.
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70A decent political thriller set in Taiwan with the requisite Western-market-friendly lead and a determinedly pro-independence message embedded in a formulaic but diverting tale of intrigue and oppression.
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Despite the righteous indignation that is so clearly fueling the film--much of its $8 million budget was raised from off-island Taiwanese--the movie is a sturdy entry in the paranoid-thriller genre, and raises some interesting issues about our relationship with the country we used to call China.
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63Begins rather awkwardly, but ends by making a statement that explains a great many things. One question left unasked: Why did we promise to defend Taiwan with nuclear weapons but refuse to recognize it as a sovereign nation?
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63As a political thriller, Formosa Betrayed has enough suspense and intrigue to pull viewers along willingly. It doesn’t try too hard, which is refreshing.
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63It's deliberately difficult to untangle the crossed allegiances of the people that Kelly interviews, and it's melodramatic that he tries to smuggle Ming and a surrendered assassin onto a plane bound for the United States. But dramatizing such a complex situation is a necessary evil.
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60Mr. Van Der Beek, manlier than in his “Dawson Creek” days, gives an able performance in a movie whose Asian actors tend to overplay the intrigue in an exaggerated 1940s style, exchanging sinister meaningful looks and, in general, hamming it up.
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50This is an unabashedly pro-democracy message movie. Judged strictly as drama, it's pretty routine.
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Neither the investigation nor the suspense (hobbled by editorializing) have much impact; the movie, necessarily shot in Thailand, plays like secret-history tourism, complete with archival footage haunting the screen.
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A mostly pedestrian political thriller whose basis in true events adds little to the film's excitement or entertainment value.
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The dialogue is blandly speechified and the film’s pro-Taiwan agenda seems to have taken precedence over our enjoyment.
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20Only viewers wondering if James Van Der Beek has finally outgrown "Dawson's Creek" will be at all satisfied by this dreadful police procedural that contains good history lessons and bad TV-cop-show drama.