Forbidden Warrior

Chinese film is currently going through a well-deserved revival, the cinematography, character creation and plot are for the most part excellent. Hollywood saw this and this has to be their take on the Chinese film phenomenon, and their way of cashing in. And what a joke it is. You can't just take Chinese-American actors, steal parts lock, stock and barrel from Tolkien's work and hope for the best. Does Hollywood think us idiots? Or consider the movie-going public morons? They must do if they think people are going to stomach this rubbish.

Hollywood HAS to stop leeching other nations creative and brilliant works and try and call it their own. I've only seen one decent example of this type of plagiarism and it's a video game of all things, Jade Empire by a Canadian company called Bioware, their work is meant to be a reflection of esteem onto the creators of genre, not a asset strip. If you want to see real personalities created, marvel at the scenery, gasp at the battles and generally bask into all things eastern give it a look.

I will not bore any readers with anything about the story of this film. Except that the story is more corny than ten tons of popcorn. Just do not waste your time watching this film. Everything about it is incredibly inept. The acting, the script, the costumes, the choreography, the CGI .... the list goes on and on. Films like Catwoman, Elektra and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen are all examples of bad films, however, they all look like masterpieces compared to this film. It has been claimed to be like Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter and that it is very good. You cannot get further from the truth. Why so many have given it 10 out of ten is beyond me. Please do not see this film or you'll regret it.

Anytime the urge rises to be entertained with an escapist film the top of the list becomes one of the Asian martial arts films, films of stunning beauty, breathtaking choreography, handsome actors, and enough legend to make the storyline fascinating, e.g. 'The House of Flying Daggers'. This pathetic film is packaged like those wonder movies and so deludes the public into thinking it is in an equal category. Not even close! A child is born to a couple informed that their progeny will be a male warrior who has the secrets to read the codebook that contains the key to the power of the universe. The pregnant mother is stabbed by the evil adversaries but the baby lives, 'disappointingly' a girl! The girl Seki is transported via a leaf boat to a blind wise magician who cares for her and teaches her Taiji and Kung Fu, raising her to return to the world and discover life along with her gifts. A family who wants to maintain dominion over China sends two sons (one evil and the other kind) to capture the girl and steal the code to the sacred book. The evil son is accompanied by warriors: the kind son is accompanied by Caucasian Marx brothers. The rest of the story is too simple-minded to discuss.

There are so many errors of judgment in the making of this film, not the least of which is a nebulous and silly script, that disrupt what might have been an honest attempt for Hollywood to make a martial arts film. But the acting is poor, combining Asian actors with non-Asian actors makes both look ridiculous, the special effects are clumsy, and the mood of ancient China is completely destroyed by the computer generated graphics superimposed on the real location of Griffith Park in Los Angeles! The three stooges added to the good warrior's team are so silly that they pass funny into absurd. There is no ending to the movie: instead it feels like the producers just ran out of money. A must miss.

Seeing all the negative reviews I just have to write one that contradicts this. People seem to go into this movie with expectations of another Crouched Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This it is not, having trained in 5 different martial arts I could appreciate the fights in this movie a lot more than those in CT,HD though as there are no ridiculous fights in tree tops or moves so fast that they are impossible to pull off...

I love the movie Kung Pow and although that was an intended totally ridiculous movie this one did have some references to it, but it also had a lot of references to Star Wars with the very Obi-Wan like Master, an evil empire chasing the princess and the orchestral score.

Most of the scenes were cut a little short and the actors may never get any Oscars but at least it never felt like the movie was dragging along (LOTR - are we there yet?) and it had adventure, treason, romance, a master and an apprentice, decent not over the top fights, some kind of land pirates, magic, an ancient riddle, and a Chosen One...

I watched the movie with my 16, 18 and 22 year old kids and none of us got bored, at times we good a good laugh with the references to other movies and we enjoyed it, only the lack of a decent ending was a let down but kept us wanting to see the sequel...

It's not a pretentious movie and if you can look at it that way it's really a good one!

I'm all for Asian Actors getting some featured roles in TV and movies, so this is no criticism of the actor's work.

I'm saying Hip Hop because of all the "sampling" that is going on in this movie...

The theme music is the same as the one from the original Six Million Dollar Man...

The guy that is with one of the brothers squats down and talks like that dude in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy...

The white blind master guy has crazy eyes like Master Po from Kung Fu...

Seki's father in the movie looks just like Sho Asahara from the Aum Shinri-kyo doomsday cult in Japan...

The tall dude is a rerun of Andre The Giant's character in "Princess Bride"...

Should I go on? I must say that Marie Matiko and Musetta Vander are very hot!!!

The lameness is not the fault of the acting or even on the concept, it's on who ever thought that people wouldn't remember all these "rip offs" of other people's original ideas...