12-03-2010, 12:56 PM
This is "Kung Fu, the Series" on steroids, and it's a bit disorienting. We've got this Chinaman who isn't Chinese because he's Ninja, which makes him Japanese, though he's played by a South Korean, who skedaddles it to the American West where he must contend with bad cowboys and bad ninjas in hot pursuit. See? Kung Fu the Series. Early on, there's a shot of Jang's back as he walks across an American desert, then the camera swings around and we see his face. And I'm thinking, Hey, wait a second. He's supposed to be Chinese, like David Carradine. But instead he looks like the guy sitting next to me. Very very disorienting.
The bad cowboys and bad ninjas are turbocharged to the max, and the climax is a bloodbath that intriguingly overlaps Jang's battles with both.
I likewise felt Jang was too stoic and so was Ti Lung as leader of the Ninjas (though he's Chinese). By contrast, Kate Bosworth splashed emotion all over the place like it was blood in a Ninja movie. At first I saw it as overacting (perhaps to compensate for Jang's stoicism), but she soon won me over as a real person. Far more real than the town this all took place in. Talk about a schizoid culture. I couldn't begin to fathom it. Yeah, yeah, I know. Comic book land. Cut it some slack.
Geoffrey Rush was channeling Paladin. Richard Boone, I'm telling ya. (Or is this before your time?) But as DM mentioned, they never sufficiently developed his character. They didn't follow through on other characters as well. The dwarf showed promise, but he needed to be sinful. I thought sinfulness was written into every dwarf's contract in Hollywood. Apparently not. Even super-baddy Danny Huston never clicked for me. Great villains should have charisma. They should be menacing in subtle, underhanded ways. He was just a bad-mood thug without any real skills, surviving by virtue of sucking the director's bullhorn.
The Ninjas were all identical and fully costumed in black, ever landing wushu-style, which gave some of the scenes a video arcade feel. I wish they'd been allowed to be individuals. Still, I agree with DM that there was a nice stylishness to the fight scenes.
I wasn't picking up any Baby Cart from Hell vibes, maybe because the baby wasn't allowed to participate in the mayhem. Well, that's not entirely true. I really liked the scene where Kate Bosworth was slaughtering Ninjas left and right while breastfeeding the baby.
All in all, worth seeing (if only for that scene alone).
A big thanks to DM for a pleasant night's entertainment.
The bad cowboys and bad ninjas are turbocharged to the max, and the climax is a bloodbath that intriguingly overlaps Jang's battles with both.
I likewise felt Jang was too stoic and so was Ti Lung as leader of the Ninjas (though he's Chinese). By contrast, Kate Bosworth splashed emotion all over the place like it was blood in a Ninja movie. At first I saw it as overacting (perhaps to compensate for Jang's stoicism), but she soon won me over as a real person. Far more real than the town this all took place in. Talk about a schizoid culture. I couldn't begin to fathom it. Yeah, yeah, I know. Comic book land. Cut it some slack.
Geoffrey Rush was channeling Paladin. Richard Boone, I'm telling ya. (Or is this before your time?) But as DM mentioned, they never sufficiently developed his character. They didn't follow through on other characters as well. The dwarf showed promise, but he needed to be sinful. I thought sinfulness was written into every dwarf's contract in Hollywood. Apparently not. Even super-baddy Danny Huston never clicked for me. Great villains should have charisma. They should be menacing in subtle, underhanded ways. He was just a bad-mood thug without any real skills, surviving by virtue of sucking the director's bullhorn.
The Ninjas were all identical and fully costumed in black, ever landing wushu-style, which gave some of the scenes a video arcade feel. I wish they'd been allowed to be individuals. Still, I agree with DM that there was a nice stylishness to the fight scenes.
I wasn't picking up any Baby Cart from Hell vibes, maybe because the baby wasn't allowed to participate in the mayhem. Well, that's not entirely true. I really liked the scene where Kate Bosworth was slaughtering Ninjas left and right while breastfeeding the baby.
All in all, worth seeing (if only for that scene alone).
A big thanks to DM for a pleasant night's entertainment.