True Legend (**1/2)

This is one of those mythic Chinese films set in the past with warriors, martial arts, revenge and so forth. The director is Woo-ping Yuen, who directed Jackie Chan in Drunken Master. “Drunken” kung fu eventually finds its way into the story here too, and Yuen directs the action scenes well. There’s a lot of swordplay toward the beginning and more hand-to-hand combat, some fairly brutal, later on. There’s some of the gravity-defying Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon-style leaps, and the hero (Man Cheuk Chiu), Su, survives blows that would fell WWF wrestlers, but you expect that sort of stylized action in this kind of movie.

So that’s all pretty good. If you don’t mind the pedestrian dialogue and general hokiness of the whole thing, it should entertain. (The acting is a mixed bag, though Crouching Tiger’s Michelle Yeoh makes an appearance.) By way of example, in a very early scene we see Su embraced by his “blood brother,” who offers only gratitude as they part. Five years pass, and though nothing else happens in the meantime, we next see him trying to kill Su—to whom this comes as a complete surprise. (Su’s new archenemy stays in madman mode for the rest of the movie.) Superior movies of this type, especially those of Zhang Yimou (Hero, House of Flying Daggers), have almost an elegance to them, with stories that seem like fables. This seems more like a yarn. I will give it points for having a completely unexpected and different (though still corny) third act when it had seemed like the movie would end with Su’s inevitable revenge.

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viewed at Ritz 5 [Philadelphia Film Festival] and reviewed 10/19/10

The Karate Kid (***1/4)

I suppose the title will irritate some, given that Jackie Chan’s Mr. Han teaches the kid (Jaden Smith) kung fu, not karate. The kid’s mom (Taraji P. Henson) confuses the two, and even after watching this movie I’m not sure of the differences myself, but Chan is Chinese and the movie takes place in China, where kung fu is the reigning martial art. Even so, there’s an unmistakable fidelity to the 1984 film of which this is a remake.

Both characters feature handymen who employ repetitive tasks as ways to build strength and discipline. And both save the boy from a bully trained by a cruel master, only to train him for an inevitable showdown. In the 1984 version, Pat Morita’s Miyagi says: “Karate for defense only.” Han says that kung fu is for “making peace with your enemy.” As Han, Chan displays far less of the physicality than in his straight action (or action-comedy) roles, but is extremely likable. In the title role, Jaden Smith has very much the cocky-yet-charming persona of his dad, Will Smith. The only other prominent role, a quasi-love interest for the boy, is charmingly played by Chinese newcomer Wenwen Han.

There’s no getting around that the storyline is still completely formulaic, though that won’t bother the target audience. The message of nonviolence is nice, even if the kids will probably forget about it as the movie builds up to the inevitable revenge ass-kicking. But the novel element that most justifies the remake is the transplanted setting. While the Americans attend an English-language school, and most of the dialogue is in English, you can, more than in most Hollywood films set abroad, surmise that there are interesting places different from the United States, people who don’t speak English, and faraway places worth visiting. (The locations include both Beijing’s Forbidden City and the Great Wall.) Perhaps Chan’s participation—or the Chinese government’s—ensured that the Chinese come off as neither quaintly charming nor wisely exotic, excepting that Han seems to have magic healing powers.

Silly title or not, the new Kid’s all right.

(My rating is kind of from the point of view of a younger person, but the movie was still fairly enjoyable as an adult.)

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viewed at UA Riverview [PFS screening] and reviewed 6/2/2010

Kung Fu Panda (***1/4)

Yet another animated animal movie with a you-can-do-anything message, this is nonetheless fairly entertaining, with well-executed action sequences. The title character is infused with the persona—and, roughly, the physique—of the actor who voices him, Jack Black. A little bit paunchy, he mixes hapless bravado with a deeper insecurity. Being raised by a humble Chinese noodle maker who is also a bird, he fantasizes himself the venerated “dragon warrior” with enemies who “were no match for his bodacity.” But when an accident of fate—the juxtaposed emphasis on both fate and controlling one’s destiny makes no sense, but never mind—actually gives him his wish, he thinks there is a mistake. The aid of a reluctant kung fu master (Dustin Hoffman) and a multi-species posse called the Furious Five, perhaps in tribute to early rapper Grandmaster Flash, gives him the courage to face the excellently voiced villain, Ian McShane’s leopard.

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viewed 6/7/08 and 6/21/08 at Moorestown; reviewed 6/27/08

Speed Racer (**1/2)

In The Matrix, the Wachowski Brothers demonstrated their ability to create a stylish special-effects thriller built around a smart sci-fi premise. They redeemed themselves for its lackluster pair of sequels with V for Vendetta, another parable of totalitarianism for which they wrote the screenplay. And, in this, they shoehorn their obsession with opposing great power into an adaptation of a semi-forgotten 1970s cartoon that makes a pitch toward a family audience. That pitch will probably strike hardest at teenage boys. The younger ones may be put off by the fairly complicated plot and some of the darker textures, which somewhat harken back to the Japanese origins of the cartoon. This adaptation animates everything except the actors. Emile Hirsch (Into the Wild) stars as Speed.

For those who missed Speed, or were born too late, he’s, well, a racer. In childhood flashback scenes, we see that his obsession with driving began at an early age and runs in the family. (“Mom” and “Pop” are played by Susan Sarandon and John Goodman.) He has a childhood sweetheart called Trixie (Christina Ricci), drives a car called the Mach 5, and has a mysterious friend/rival called Racer X. But the movie’s main storyline concerns Speed’s opposition to a giant corporation that seeks to control the sport for financial reasons.

Of course, technology, not the story, is the draw here. On that score, it’s a mixed bag. The Tokyo-insired meglaopolis where villain, Royalton, runs his megacorporation is suitably futuristic, but the race course was unimpressive. It makes perfect sense that the movie has a product tie-in with Hot Wheels—the speedways where the racers do their thing looks like nothing so much as digitally manipulated film of a Hot Wheels set-up, complete with loop-the-loops. The scenes give you neither the feel of racing nor even the feel of watching a race. It’s more like watching a video game. Nothwithstanding all of the psychedelic graphics and swirling colors that illustrate the crashes, it’s all very…cartoonish.

It’s not only the look of the movie, but yes, that story that make the big-screen Speed seem like only a little more than what it is, a retread. For all I know the Wachowskis could have dusted off a few of those 1970s scripts. Mom, Pop, brother, Trixie, and even Chim Chim, the family chimp, seem like the cast of a forgotten old sitcom. The humor runs along the lines of Trixie saying “Was that a ninja?” and Pops replying “More like a non-ja!” Okay, it’s not all that corny. Most of it is perfectly serviceable, and the centerpiece of the movie, a dangerous cross-continental race in which Royalton drivers try to take Speed out, is exciting. Hardly anyone will call the movie slow. But in a couple of months, hardly anyone will be calling it anything at all.

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viewed 5/10/08 at Moorestown; reviewed 5/15–16/08

The Forbidden Kingdom (**3/4)

The big deal here is that martial arts stars Jackie Chan and Jet Li appear together for the first time. Chan has shifted between Chinese-language and American fare, but his best-known movies, like the Rush Hour series, emphasize comic elements as much as action. Li has also split his career between Chinese films, like the mythical Fearless and Hero, and mainstream Hollywood action films such as War and Cradle 2 the Grave, but isn’t at all known for comedy. So I was curious to what approach a movie with both would take, and the answer seems to be a little of everything.

Presumably helping to sell the movie to a younger audience is the presence of Michael Angarano as a kid who, in a remarkably cheesy opening segment, is magically transported from present-day Boston to long-ago China. I liked Angarano in Snow Angels, but here I kept thinking he was Shia LaBeouf. Maybe that was because his character was so petulant, though. At first he wanders around confused, with everybody speaking English. Encountering Chan’s character, he goes, “I can’t understand you,” like everyone’s being rude by not speaking modern American. But then Chan says, “That’s because you’re not listening,” and magically everyone now speaks English. And so the rude teen learns about the mythical Monkey King (Li) and his battle against an evil warlord, and becomes the student of the old master (Chan). There’s practically a Karate Kid homage, although luckily no one is forced to catch flies with chopsticks. The movie also vaguely recalls Chan’s old role as the drunken master; his character is supposed to be eternal, but only so long as he drinks.

Li has a double role as a fighting monk, and the fourth member of the anti-evil team is Sparrow, a revenge-seeking, lute-playing lass, because you always need an attractive girl. Oddly, although she has learned English like all of the other Chinese, she has sadly failed to learn first-person pronouns and so refers to herself as “she” or “her.” Li’s monk is philosophical in that he warns Sparrow about how her desire for vengeance can backfire, and that’s about as deep as the movie gets. She ignores the monk’s counsel, and when Chan mockingly calls him “master of sensitivity,” that’s almost as funny as it gets. The plot is a very simple good-versus-evil one. Chan does about three times as much kung fu as in his last three Hollywood films. Every significant character gets to fight, including an evil Jade Warrior who uses her long hair to lasso her opponents. The action scenes include realistic ones and also fantasies with flying effects. (Immortal characters know magic.) They’re fine, but none is as outstanding as the best ones in Fearless or Hero. But then, director Rob Minkoff’s best-known previous work was directing the Stuart Little movies and the Lion King. This makes sense, as the movie is simple enough to be enjoyed by children. (The violence is mostly mild, but there are bloodless stabbings.) The Forbidden Kingdom seems composed of parts of other movies and isn’t more than the sum of those parts, but is better than Chan’s lame Rush Hour 3 or Li’s turgid War, the stars’ most recent US releases.

IMDB link

viewed 4/20/08; reviewed 4/21/08

Mirageman (***)

A Chilean bodyguard whose sense of justice was honed when his parents were murdered turns himself into a self-styled savior. He’s got lots of fighting skills, but soon realizes he’s all too human. The story’s played for some gentle humor, but sincerity wins out in this original, reality-based spin on the superhero genre. The fight scenes aren’t extraordinary, but they’re as solid as star Marko Zaror’s lithe body. I don’t suppose this’ll get a non-DVD, non-film festival release in the US, but it has the elements to connect with both a mainstream and art-house audience.

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viewed 4/4/08; reviewed 4/4 and 4/6/08; screened at Philadelphia Film Festival

Rush Hour 3 (*1/2)

It’s been six years since Rush Hour 2, and six years since Chris Tucker made a movie. I swear I kind of liked the first two movies in this series, so either this one is a lot worse or it just took awhile for me to become completely annoyed by Tucker’s character, James Carter. We first reacquaint ourselves with Carter, now a traffic cop, as he’s being berated for falsely arresting some Iranian scientists and trying to pick up some “sushi-grade” women for himself and Hong Kong-born Inspector Lee (Jackie Chan). Presumably, Carter thinks Japanese and Chinese are the same thing. As for the Iranians, just because they’re scientists “doesn’t mean they won’t blow shit up.” Carter’s too busy to socialize, acting as the bodyguard of Ambassador Han, who’s making a big speech about the Chinese Triad gangsters at the World Criminal Court. Thus reacquainted with our heroes, we follow the Triads’ trail to…France.

The movie shows a side of Paris you can only see on a studio backlot, the halfway decent climax in what’s supposed to be the Eiffel Tower the only apparent justification. That and a silly bit in which the boys question/threaten a Chinese-looking thug with the help of a multilingual nun because he only speaks...French. This may be the comic highlight, notwithstanding the civil-liberties violations, so you can imagine the lowlights. Incidentally and idiotically, the thug’s the only character in the movie who doesn’t speak English. A couple of the French characters can barely speak French, it would seem, notably the variably accented cabbie sidekick Carter and Lee acquire, who later argues with his wife...in English. It’s an odd contrast to the multiple scenes in which Lee speaks Chinese to other Chinese characters. Language also figures in what’s supposed to be a showcase scene for Tucker. Wandering into a dressing-room full of showgirls, he tells them he’s the costume designer. Having clearly demonstrated that he doesn’t know French, he nonetheless speaks in a French accent so he can a) blend in and b) have an excuse to ask the women to strip. Seen in a random sitcom, this would have been corny already. What really made it cringe-worthy was that the apparently lobotomized dancers appear to believe him. Watching this in a fairly crowded theater, I listened for laughter and heard not a peep.

Admittedly, the same audience pretty much stayed intact to watch the predictable outtakes at the end, so what do I know? Whether you like the movie pretty much will depend if you think Tucker’s Carter babbling a 90-minute stream of bullshit is funny. Yes, the plot is perforated like Swiss-cheese, yes, Brent Ratner’s direction and Jeff Nathanson’s script are uninspired, and yes, martial-arts expert Chan has lost a step or two, but that I didn’t laugh at all is what made the movie a truly trying experience. The mismatched partners schtick has worn very thin, too. Rush Hour 3 counts on distant memories of past installments to establish what these guys are doing together. The action parts, fewer than before, are fair to middling, the best being the one in the Tower. Chan there displays some of the dexterity he did in movies he made as a younger man. Overall, though, I felt like I was watching three episodes of a sitcom that had long since “jumped the shark.”

IMDB link

reviewed 8/12/07

Jet Li’s Fearless (***3/4)

? In 1910, the best fighter in the Chinese province of Tianjin (Li) is matched against four international opponents in Shanghai. The story then flashes back to tell a fictionalized version of the life of Huo Yuan Jia, beginning with his childhood humiliation by a rival. Although there are many fight scenes, the story contains a strong dramatic component. Not what you’d expect from the guy (Ronny Yu) who directed Freddy vs. Jason and Bride of Chucky.

+  The many imaginative fight scenes, which incorporate the martial art called wushu, are far from the only reason to watch. Thematically, the Shanghai-shot movie is more about Yuan Jia’s struggle against his own arrogance than his quest to become the top fighter in his province. The violence is rarely lethal, and only then to make a point against brutality. (The fighters are shown signing a “death waiver” before each contest.) The story also takes in a little bit of Chinese history, as the period portrayed was one in which China was beginning to be threatened with cultural and military domination. Circling back to the opening scene, the conclusion is a moving surprise.

- This isn’t really a mark against the movie, but some people may prefer the fantasy action and mythical storyline of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Hero, or House of Flying Daggers. Both the fighting and the plot are basically realistic here.

= ***3/4 Sure to be one of the year’s top movies, this transcends the martial-arts genre.

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The Protector (**3/4)

? A pissed-off Thai guy (Tony Jaa) heads for Sydney to recover his stolen elephants and kick some Aussie butt.

+ The obviously incredibly skilled Jaa uses fists, feet and the occasional weapon to face off against an amazing array of opponents, including the seven-foot Nathan Jones, who appears concurrently in Jet Li’s Fearless. All of the very many apparent broken bones mustn’t be real, but it looks close enough. The stolen-elephant idea seems novel.

- There’s a back story mentioning some family lore and explaining how the elephants are supposed to provide power to the king and are supposed to be protected and all, but basically everything else is just an excuse for the numerous fight scenes. Jaa is great at fighting but not the most expressive actor. Half of the Aussies sound more like Americans. The villains are supposed to have half the Sydney police force in their pockets but can’t even find a gun to shoot the hero. The editing is clumsy. And so on.

= **3/4 Nothing to recommend except the fight scenes. But the fight scenes are very impressive.

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The Promise (**1/2)

Like Hero, or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, this fantasy martial arts movie tells of star-crossed lovers in semi-mythical past; the love story and the fight scenes are not as compelling, though.

The Promise is a fantasy action movie that attempts to appeal to the same audience as the Zhang Yimou movies Hero and House of Flying Daggers. It has the same basic elements-mythical storyline, a setting in the distant but unspecified past, gravity-defying scenes and swordplay, and the story of separated lovers at the center. The main characters are a slave who miraculously survives a massacre, the general he serves, and a beautiful woman who, in the film’s opening, makes a Faustian pact with a goddess. She will become wealthy, but all who love her will leave her. Hong King director Chen Kaige has made a number of successful imports, including  Farewell My Concubine (1993) and the similarly epic Emperor and the Assassin (1999), so it would seem that the movie might be as good as Zhang’s. There are certain excellent scenes, particularly the one in which the slave, pretending to be his master, dashingly saves the heroine while simultaneously making himself the enemy of the ruler. I also liked the massive battle scene in which the slave defies fate, even though the CGI effects are apparent. Aside from some of the effects, the movie’s gorgeous. But the martial arts battles were a disappointment. And most of all, the love story was not one for the ages. The formula for this type of movie is that the man is separated by fate from his true love. If done properly, we spend the movie in anticipation. But, perhaps because she is relatively passive, perhaps because her connection to her love is based upon one incident, I wasn’t anticipating so much as thinking, get on with it.

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posted 8/23/13