Saturday, April 26, 2008

The Forbidden Kingdom (2008)

Ugh. First, you can't make a Kung Fu movie for the youth without inevitable comparisons (I would think) to Karate Kid. And you cannot make a Kung Fu/Karate Kid movie with a doughy sloth-eyed prepubescent looking actor. The main-ish character is supposed to come of age and get all buff what with the kung fu and peace and whatnot and we see him with his shirt off and in a waterfall. Yick. My stomach turned. And he has a few chins. He's not really overweight but he is not fit. And I by no means believe that that child-man trained for months and months in ancient Chinese landscapes including a desert and a bamboo forest with any kung fu master much less two. Nor do I believe that the cute little Chinese girl who is also in their party falls for him. Nor do I believe that he became a competent fighter.

Second, do not have a character who always refers to herself in the third person. Just don't. It's annoying. It's cloying. It's useless. And if you absolutely must have her do this, don't have her use the first-person singular personal pronoun upon her death to proclaim her love for dough boy. Ich.

Third, don't break your own mythology. Just don't. You created it. Play by your own damn rules or don't bother creating them. You can't have a head immortal guy who comes back every 500 years to drink the immortality elixir so he can remain immortal and also have an immortal who doesn't need to drink the elixir every now and then. And you can't have them basically run out of elixir especially when the head immortal guy is due for his 500 year visit. You also can't have some immortal guys age and some not. That doesn't work. These are not difficult rules to maintain.

Fourth, get a better writer. "They say music is a bridge between heaven and earth" is not a good line. It's just not. Especially when delivered as if it's the most important information to be garnered from the movie. It's up there with "Finally I'll be able to stop living this double life."

Fifth, you have Jet Li and Jackie Chan. Make them fight each other more. Make them fight anything more. Stop showing us dough boy. He can't fight. Make the girl fight more. At least she has some grace.

Sixth, when the girl dies we need a better reason than she was pushed across the room. That doesn't exactly work when she's been fighting for the 10-15 minutes before she dies. And don't give her a pansy, revenge, my parents were killed by the bad-guy story. It's just stupid and demeaning.

Seventh, the bad guy in the contemporary world can't be more intriguing than the dough boy or the dough boy just looks doughier.

Don't bother with this one. Some of the fighting is cool but not enough to watch the whole movie. Look for clips on YouTube and mute any dialogue.

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