AllMovie

Another in the long line of Hong Kong films concerning mad bombers, this crime thriller was directed by Yeung Yat-tak. Christine Ng toplines as Anna Ngok, whose husband Tat-shing is murdered by a bomber who just might be her good friend and former lover Tommy Tang (Mark Cheng). Much of the film's story is told in flashback, chronicling Tommy's steady mental deterioration. He loved fireworks as a child, and this passion eventually grew into a fondness for bombs which resulted in the accidental death of his own mother. Tommy had come to Anna for comfort after that tragedy, and they became lovers, but when Tommy disappeared in Great Britain for a long time without answering Anna's letters, she took up with Tat-shing. Tommy returned from England and discovered Anna's new relationship, causing him to completely lose his mind. He took an apartment next to hers and began spying on her, doing everything in his power to end her marriage, finally killing Tat-shing with a letter-bomb. In the present, the increasingly desperate Tommy straps explosives to his chest and kidnaps Anna, forcing her to accompany him to the radio station which broadcasts his favorite call-in program so that the pair can die together on the air. Until its melodramatic finale, Bomb Lover is an effective and remarkably restrained thriller and features fine performances from Cheng as the mad Tommy and Bonnie Fu as his clueless girlfriend Ling, who abets his murderous behavior because she is so desperate for affection that she blindly lets herself be manipulated by the obsessed sociopath. Kent Cheng and Law Koon-lan co-star.