It’s unlikely any film this summer will dwarf Marvel’s X-Men: Days of Future Past’s dominance over the Chinese box office. But “Overheard 3”, Hong Kong’s latest crime-thriller part of a trilogy of unrelated plots, is a runner-up that might be worth a glance— maybe. Directed by Alan Mak and Felix Chong, “Overheard 3” explores the treacherous, sometimes violent, battles over Hong Kong’s real estate development market between helpless rural landowners and businessmen bullies while incorporating slick, futuristic surveillance gadgetry for stylistic flair. The film manages to remain watchable and entertaining despite running just over two hours, but it suffers from presenting the issue of land grabs and the plight of rural farmers with heavy-handed moral condescension.

“Overheard 3” characterizes the village farmers and their hero-protagonist-protector, Jau (Louis Koo), as too righteous, and the thuggish property developers as indiscriminately evil. The trouble is that everyone ends up feeling one-dimensional. Viewers will feel an unquestionable moral superiority toward the villains in the film. But as urbanites sitting in an air-conditioned, world class theater, we’re kind of benefactors of their efforts to expand the ever-creeping borders of China’s mega-metropolises, so it’s doesn’t really leave a great taste in your mouth afterwards.

A film isn’t required to include realistic characters purely for realism’s sake, but it’s definitely more interesting that way. What if the property developers had genuinely noble aspirations at stake or if the farmers realized some of the upsides of urbanization? It’d be a more complicated story with conflicting emotions, which creates a more compelling and interesting narrative with the added benefit of presenting the social situation with more honesty. Audiences wouldn’t feel like they’re being told what to think, instead we could perhaps consider the perverse incentives for greed generated by unfettered capitalism, which seems to be the real culprit here; not just bad people stealing land because they’re bad.

The film does manage to pull off some David Fincher-style finesse with the gratuitous number of dialogue-driven scenes. It’s still a bit lethargic though. Otherwise there’s a ludicrous amount of double crossing, backstabbing, and exploding automobiles to keep you engrossed. “Overheard 3” gets an A for effort.

Rating: 3/5