Xiong mao ji hua

Jackie Chan, an adorable panda, and the lovely Ce Shi are enough to keep me engaged, even if the kid-friendly slapstick martial arts film feels a bit worn out. Unfortunately, the panda was just a poorly animated CGI version! The villains were meant to be the real deal, but their acting was so subpar that viewers might have preferred the CGI instead!

The film seems a bit confused about its identity. For the first hour, Panda Plan is a fun action comedy focused mainly on stunts and jokes. Then, in the final act, it takes a serious turn when Su reveals she might have to leave her job caring for the pandas due to her parents' health issues. The film even attempts to tug at the heartstrings at the end when the motive behind the panda heist is unveiled.

Nonetheless, it was entertaining, as is typical with Jackie Chan films... so for the entertainer who continues to shine even in his 70s, I give it six stars!

International movie superstar Jackie Chan is all tired from filming his new movie and wants a worthy break. The non-filmy activities doesn't excite him much until he is convinced to adopt a baby panda at the Noah zoo. Unknown to him and others, the baby panda's kidnapping is planned and the deal is made with a group of mercenaries. When they make the move to kidnap the baby panda, Jackie Chan has to step up and do what he does best on screen to save the baby panda.

What the film gets somewhat right are the action sequences which are not entirely fun but atleast not outright bad. It's fun to see Jackie Chan doing those stuff for the millionth time and he stays committed. Setting aside the meta references, the film fails in it's attempt to strictly aim at the kids and the stale jokes don't appeal to anybody irrespective of the age. The supporting characters remain irrelevant and overact at cue which would have been okay for the 80s or 90s but not now. I am not being lenient is because after a long time I watched an English dubbed version and I was not happy with the dubbing at all. Having said that, I doubt I would have enjoyed this better in it's original language either.

More often than not,Jackie Chan movies are always entertaining as most of his films are made in a very light hearted fashion and Jackie always has a very sunny attitude alongwith him executing some excellent stunts. To a certain extent this was the same with this movie,although this Chinese film's quality was brought down tremendously by the extremely terrible acting by the junior cast who were extremely amateurish and childish in every way. The other huge minus point was the horribly horrible translation from Chinese to English resulting in a very cheesy output.

All in all it's worth watching just once,only because of Jackie Chan.

5/10.

Uniquely looking panda bear Hu Hu is born at Noah Zoo amusement park. An Arab prince is willing to pay any price for it. Soon, criminals are trying to kidnap Hu Hu for the bounty. Movie star Jackie Chan gets invited to adopt Hu Hu. He, his agent, and the zookeeper try to save the panda from the criminals.

This film has Jackie Chan going to an amusement park. I would hate going to this all-panda themed park. It looks modern and dead inside. Then there are the CGI animals. I'm not necessarily talking about Hu Hu. I understand the need for some CGI on that. It is all the other unnecessary fake-looking CGI animals in the background. Talk about dead inside. I do appreciate that Jackie tries to do some of his action stunts. He's an old man and shouldn't be expected to do that much. I did laugh once when the girl asks him those two questions. It's a funny safe meta joke. On the other hand, I do not like the ending where they try to salvage the villain. It completely destroys the stakes. All in all, this is pretty bad.

Watching Panda Plan was one of the most painfully cringe-inducing experiences I've had in a long time. Jackie Chan is a global icon, a legend who's given us decades of unforgettable action and charm. So how did we end up here? This film is a baffling mess that feels more like a propaganda puff piece than a movie.

The plot is nonexistent, the dialogue is insultingly bad, and Jackie-who we know can deliver so much more-looks like he's going through the motions with a forced smile. The whole thing reeks of pandering, with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Honestly, what does the CCP have on Jackie to make him embarrass himself like this?