Movie review: The Forbidden Kingdom

A movie starring both Jackie Chan and Jet Li? You bet I'm there! The Forbidden Kingdom is the tale of a young man, Jason (played by Michael Angarano), who is a big fan of Kung Fu movies. He gets most of his authentic movies from an old Chinese man, who also have an old fighting staff in his back room, which turns out to be an important part of ancient Chinese history.

At some point, Jason find himself thrown back in ancient China, with the staff, where he will live a magical journey, filled with magic (of course!), mystery and of course, Kung Fu, which he will learn from two masters, who have very different lifestyles. He turns out to be part of a prophecy, as the one who must return the staff to his rightful owner.

The movie looks great, is well acted and has great fighting choreography. I really liked it. It is not in Chinese with sub-titles, but is filmed in English, for those who worry about such things. There are a few sub-titles here and there when some characters speaks in Chinese, but that's it. I don't know if it's in the work or even being considered, but I can see a sequel being made, although there's not really any absolute signs pointing to it. But the door is definitely open, shall we say.

Movie review: War

One movie I was looking forward to, since I first heard of it, is War, mainly because it stars Jet Li and Jason Statham. They are two of my favourite action stars, so just thinking about them fighting each other was pretty much all I needed to know that I would want to see the movie.

And it was quite an action ride! Good action, of course, including great fights and a car chase. The war in question is the one between the Chinese Mafia (Triads) and the Japanese Mafia (Yakuza), which Rogue (Jet Li) exploit to his own benefit. Jack Crawford (Jason Statham) is an FBI agent pursuing Rogue, who killed is partner. The later plot is not very original, but they managed to put a twist to it which makes it very interesting. The only thing I was not too crazy about is the end, which I can't discuss without spoiling it, so I won't say what bugs me...

A movie to be seen by action fans, particularly if you like the two main actors.