I was actually really looking forward to this movie when the info about it came out last year I think it was.  But, in all honesty, it was disappointing.  Not straight up bad like the previous movie I reviewed, just not...that gripping. 

The plot is basically somewhere between Marvel comics and wuxia.  A superhero movie in the Qing Dynasty.  Now, reading that, you'd probably think this could be really awesome or really atrocious.  But sadly, it's neither.  It just...is.  Louis Koo and Sandra Ng are the titular superheros, and as the movie starts, you don't really know that, but gradually it becomes apparent that they've retired.  Eventually there's a flashback of what they did and how they met, then there's the part where they realize they're bored and want a child, but they can't because they're too boring.  So, naturally some drama ensues and eventually a martial arts tournament and a very ill-conceived baddie, and yeah, it's just not very interesting, ultimately.

It was occasionally funny at times, but not enough for me to want to see it again or even recommend it.  There was a lot that COULD have been done, but really, it was a wasted idea and a waste of the two stars' considerable comedic talent.  The other thing, is Louis Koo's way of speaking was EXTREMELY distracting.  I'm not sure what he was trying to do, if he was trying to mimic that one voice of Stephen Chow's where he sounds all tired and put-upon, I can't think of an example right now, but anyway, it was not working.  It was amusing at first, but then it just became really distracting, took me out of the movie.

It's funny, a similar silly movie, Future X-Cops, was actually a lot more enjoyable than this one.

Mood hungry Music 버즈 – Monologues Tags: comedies, louis koo, sandra ng, wuxia

This is a Beggar So tale. At least, that's what they tell me. Anyway. Vincent Zhao stars as Su, a awesome general who just wants to go be with his family and start a wushu school. So when he's offered a governorship, he hands it over to his adopted brother, played by Andy On. Then, as we get a little further in, it turns out that Andy On is still butthurt about Su's father killing HIS father for dabbling in a dangerous art called Five Venom Fists. So, when he comes back after some years, Su has married his adopted sister (Zhou Xun) and has a kid.

Well, Andy On does some evil things, and beats Su up and throws him in the river. His wife jumps in after. They're later rescued by Michelle Yeoh's doctor character and similar to the Stephen Chow story, Su just lays around and drinks, wallowing in his broken arm. But then, he gets motivated to save their son, and so as he's wandering around the mountain, he runs into the God of Wushu, played horrifyingly enough by Jay Chou. Let me just pause to say that Jay Chou should not be anywhere near any movie EVER. He's an awful actor and mumbles his lines like a drunk person or a retard.

But anyway. The plot proceeds in a logical direction, obviously Su learns kickass skills and uses them to beat on Andy On. And then there's a second part to the film that I don't really get. It was like a scene from Fearless and further, it seemed like it skipped forward a ton of years, Idek. However, I won't keep babbling on about that, because here is why you should watch this movie. THE FIGHTS. The fights were insanely awesome. Probably some of the best fights I've ever seen crammed into one 2 hour movie. Vincent Zhao is an irl martial artist and so is Andy On, so their final fight was epic. And the one with the wrestlers at the end was too.

And there you have it. Regardless of the odd plot stuff or Jay Chou's irritating presence, none of that can take away from how awesome all the fights were. And honestly, it was pretty close to 2 hours of fighting. There wasn't a ton of exposition or ~touching~ scenes. So if you like kung-foolishness as much as I do, you HAVE TO see this movie.

Mood blah Music Eat You Alive – Coke in a vein Tags: andy on, martial arts, wuxia

Only the second drama I've been bothered to write about, and that's because it's one of the few Stephen Chow starred in.  So, what we have here is a 30 episode TVB drama starring Sing Yeh, Ng Man Tat and Francis Ng.  It's a fairly typical wuxia thing in that it's ridiculously convoluted with the requisite amount of fake deaths, poisonings, love triangles and evil eunuchs/queers/women.  It also has probably the WORST sfx I've ever seen.  The good thing is though that they're so bad they're hilarious.

But onto the story....what I can remember of course.  No, it's too long, lemme sum up.  Stephen Chow is the son of the leader of Celestine School, but he hates martial arts, so he spends most of his time gambling and getting into mischief.  Unlike his brother (who isn't really his brother) who is a really great martial artist.  He also happens to be a huge douchebag.  The bad guy (at first) is Ng Man Tat's doppleganger, the seriously queer Koo Yim Yeung.  He's cultivated a female martial art and now has an insufferable urge to wear makeup and flip his hair.   Sometime before that he had a daughter, who starts out manly, but eventually falls for Chow's character.  Similar to the Royal Tramp story, Chow's guy bumbles his way through the movie, being tricksy and surrounding himself with powerful pals, before he finally stumbles upon the key to martial arts greatness.

As I said, convoluted.  And would be complete crap without Stephen Chow, who manages to make anything he's in above average.  Actually, in all seriousness, he was pretty hilarious and luckily in most of the scenes, so if you can make it past cheesy sfx and Francis Ng at his most smarmy, it's definitely worth having a look at Stephen Chow's early brilliance.

Mood sick Tags: dramas, stephen chow, wuxia

I did finally decide to watch this one all the way through. Mostly after reading how Stephen Chow managed to make "enemies" of Johnnie To and Danny Lee in the aftermath of this movie. The former vowed never to work with him again, and he has not, and the latter apparently wasn't pleased about the appropriation of his name for Chow's character, which culminated in the message on the wall "Lee Sau-Yin, I will kill your whole family."

This is the second and last movie Chow was in directed by Johnnie To, and like that first one (Justice My Foot), it's mildly entertaining, but decidedly unfunny. In it, Chow plays Dragon Fighter Lo-Han, a belligerent god that raises a bunch of havoc in heaven, only to get sent to Earth to redeem 3 unrepentant sinners; a begger, a whore and a killer. That is, they've been at their respective vices for 9 lives. If he can do that, his own transgressions will be forgiven and he'll be promoted. If not...well. Anyway, that's the gist of it. He has a magic fan and that's all the magic he can have. Oh, and he also has Tat following him around in retard-mode, not doing a whole lot.

Mostly Chow just spends his time making fun of people, kicking them in the face, and trying to keep the killer among the scoundrels from killing the other two. It gets a bit muddled towards the end, but like I said, it really wasn't all that funny. However, while in Mad Monk mode, Chow reminded me an awful lot of Jack Sparrow, and it makes me wonder if those people ever saw this movie. So, I suppose, in the end, I was only in it for his oddly attractive scruffyness and to add another tick to my list of Stephen Chow movies I've watched. So I figure maybe Chow did whatever he did to put Johnnie To off his breakfast to keep him from making more boring movies like this.

Mood cynical Tags: comedies, stephen chow, wuxia

A wuxia retelling of the classic tale, this one definitely has its detractors. In fact, I'm not sure I've read a good review of it yet. Though, I'm sure they're out there...somewhere. The story is pretty standard Romeo and Juliet. A girl and a guy fall for each other, but politics and family issues fatally get in the way. In fact, it goes right down to the part where the girl takes the fake death pill, but the only person who knows dies and so the guy has no idea and well, kills them both. That part is actually a revision to the original tale, as far as I can tell. So Jingle Ma essentially made it more like R&J that it really was.

Anyway, I'm going to do pros and cons on this one, because, as I said, the story is simple and it's really more up to your tastes if you like it or not.

Cons:

- Even though I have said that a girl posing as a guy in wuxia is as simple as a different hairstyle, Charlene Choi really didn't even do that. There was nothing that really suggested she was posing as a guy even. Especially since her teacher knows, you initially assume Wu Chun knows too.

- Wu Chun's acting was rather dubious. His range of emotions was simply not there. He was good at angry, but that was about it.

- It was a little hard to buy their falling in love. Too much like, oh bam, they're in love, that's how it is.

- Which leads to the pacing was bad up until the last part, and the costumes and staging were lackluster.

Pros:

- the fights were good. I was particularly impressed with Wu Chun

- Ah Sa is a funny gal, you can't help but like her infectious perkiness.

- when it came right down to it, they got the ending act right. I won't even lie, I had tears streaming down my face by the end. And ultimately that's why I would somewhat recommend it, just because it still ended up being a pretty affecting drama. But maybe less if you're a fan of the original tale, and more if you're a fan of R&J or Shakespeare in general. It had that vibe.

Mood bored Tags: charlene choi, romance, wu chun, wuxia

So, this is actually a set of movies, but they are definitely two parts to a whole and not just your regular sequels. The first one is called 'Pandora's Box' and it begins with a rundown of how the Monkey King was killed. Or disposed of. The next thing we know, we're in the middle of a desert with a bunch of robbers. The leader of these robbers is a scruffy unibrow'd caveman whom, with a bit of peering, is obviously Stephen Chow. Then, a couple of devil sisters show up and make themselves at home. One of them is Karen Mok, but I'm not really familiar with the other one. Thus the first half of the movie is mostly about Stephen Chow's character trying to one-up these gals and get them out. It's also side-splittingly hilarious.

Like most of Chow's best and funniest movies, it's all about big hilarious scenes. Everything else is just setup. Probably the absolute best comes near the very end where Chow has to go back in time to save his lover, but every time he does it, he ends up arriving just a millisecond too late and has to try again. Also great was the scene of him and Mok trying to have sexytimes in the desert complete with slow-motion clothes-ripping. But where it gets funny is when the clothes-ripping goes on for several seconds longer than it should. And then they finally give up since they can't get all the clothes they're wearing off.

The second movie, Cinderella, is more story-oriented as Chow is now the reincarnated Monkey King. He's still trying to find Karen Mok, but in the meantime Athena Chu falls for him. There's still plenty of hilarity, but the gags don't come as fast and furious as the first one, and it probably drags on twenty minutes too long.

Nevertheless, the two movies are funny together and they don't seem nearly as dated as their year suggests.

Mood bored Tags: comedies, karen mok, stephen chow, wuxia

I guess the standard plot vehicle of hilarious wuxia is the deposition of an Emperor. Previously Cat and Mouse and The Duel did the same thing. The main point is a love story of sorts, but it's told against the backdrop of a coup d'etat.

This one stars Louis Koo and Barbie Hsu and there plenty of glimpses of other funny people that usually show up in these kind of movies, which, btw, is directed by Wong Jing, purveyor of the ridiculous. Essentially Louis Koo plays Royal Dog, an absent minded professor who wears Aretha Franklin bow hats in the tub. He's in love with Barbie Hsu's character, but she doesn't think he really is, so she starts trying to test him. All it does is make him cry though, lol. At first he thinks she's fallen for a handsome guy (Brad Pitt in the subs), but the guy is actually a girl.

Meanwhile, one of the other royal guards has a thing for the princess. But the ridiculous emperor has a bunch of princes coming in from out of town to woo her. Naturally they're replaced by fake ones by the plotters. Which is basically the Empress's brother. Just like Cat and Mouse in fact, lol. However, during the IQ test part, Royal Dog somehow makes himself most wanted on the Princess's list.

That's about the gist of the plot, with a lot of ridiculousness thrown in. To say that's it's not funny is far from the truth, unless you lack a sense of humor entirely. Nevertheless, most of the hilarity is ridiculous and might be helped along if you've had a few drinks.

Mood creative Music Lady GaGa – Telephone (feat. Beyoncé) Tags: barbie hsu, comedies, louis koo, wuxia

So this was probably one of the more hilarious wuxia movies I've seen.  The problem is, vs say, The Duel, is that I don't think the hilarity here was intentional.  I could be wrong, lol, but on the other hand, I don't think you can make up this kind of comedy.  The movie stars Andy Lau, Anita Mui and Maggie Cheung.  Also a couple of other guys who play dueling brothers.

That is, fourteenth brother has stolen the throne of thirteenth brother, who is now on the run, with apparently faithful swordswoman, Maggie Cheung.  Along the way, he runs into Fei (Andy Lau), who is a simple fisherman, but with mad skills and an Orca pal.  No no, you read right, he has his own personal Free Willy.  They even do tricks.  I'm sorry, but it was pretty hilarious.  And speaking of hilarity, my personal favorite villain scene ever is when 14th is practicing his ~evil~ bow and arrow, and when a messenger shows up with bad news, he decapitates him with his bow, shoots the head before it hits the ground and it lands in a torch, then HE, who is still flying, punts it into his hillside or wtvr that is littered with arrows, and they all catch on fire to form the words "heaven and earth". 

Then later, Fei gets sent to find thirteenth brother's lady (Anita Mui), and naturally they are attacked and Fei and the lady go running off together.  Cue a fantastically funny fight in the Forest of Thorns, and then somehow she carries a wounded Fei for a very long way.  At first they don't really like each other, but naturally this changes.  Then it turns out that Maggie Cheung is actually working for the other guy, and after an attack on Fei's village, there's a final fight in which everyone tries super hard to kill 14th, but in the end it's Fei's Orca that saves the day.  Everyone else dies, and Fei, somehow once again, miraculously escapes death.

Yes, this movie was, in fact, ridiculous.  But really funny, if that's what you're looking for.

Mood amused Tags: andy lau, wuxia

Speaking of wacky wuxia...I had the dubious pleasure of watching The Duel last night. Another review billed it as at least 90 minutes of amusement, but it really wasn't. As much as I like Nick Cheung, his antics got old after about the first 30. Ekin Cheng was about as robotic as I've ever seen him, and that's saying something. Even Andy Lau had moments of overacting so ridiculous that I started laughing in spite of myself. Nevertheless though, he was still the most tolerable in a film full of things that set my teeth on edge.

The plot...oh there was a plot? Actually yes, sort of. It started out with a duel, thus the title. Or rather, a duel being set up. However, the rest of the movie was taken up by Nick Cheung's mugging and a side story of people being murdered by someone represented by a faceless clay doll. Everyone suspects Simon (Ekin Cheng), probably because he's so freaking without expression, he seems murderous. I don't think he really gave a crap though, his expression never changed. But at least, it would have made sense in terms of the faceless doll.

The other bit was the Princess (Wei Zhao) trying desperately to get into the pants of Cool (Andy Lau), who shows up a couple of times to display his awesome power, but otherwise mostly sulks in a cave. Then, it turns out he's been killing people this whole time so he can replace the Emperor (Patrick Tam). The duel was just a feint to distract everyone. But, naturally it takes place anyway, and Andy Lau, looking like Sephiroth, naturally loses cause he's the ~bad guy~.

Other than Andy Lau's awesome evil smirky sinisterness and consummate attractiveness, I was mostly only interested to discover that the Emperor was a younger Patrick Tam, after seeing him as the Duke in Spirit of the Sword. Heh, oh well.

Mood awake Music 白黒キネマ – 疾走 Tags: andy lau, ekin cheng, nick cheung, wuxia

IN the world of wuxia, all you have to do to pose as a man, if you're a woman, is wear a fake mustache. OH, and wear your hair and clothes differently. I don't understand why so many reviewers of these movies scoff at that. If you've seen more than one, it's simply accepted. In fact, there's a lot of things about wuxia that simply have to be accepted to be believed. I liken it to Western fantasy. You have to suspend your disbelief for a bit.



Anyway, this is a pretty lite story as wuxia stories go. There's Inspector Zhao (Andy Lau) and Judge Bao (Anthony Wong). They're hanging out...somewhere. Somewhere with no crime, so they're bored. So Zhao goes on vacation, wherein he meets Bai (Cecilia Cheung), who is a cheeky young man, only he's not a man at all, of course. Don't let that manly mustache fool you. Actually, after a couple of viewings, I started to see it as looking more and more like a mouse, lol. So, while Zhao is poking around in some other town, he happens upon a plot to assassinate Bao.

Before I go any further though, I should mention that the plot is really pretty thin. The movie is more about being a parody of sorts and how the mouse fell in love with the cat. Bai being the mouse and Zhao being the cat. I enjoyed the two leads' performances quite a lot. Andy Lau as a guy who was, well, kinda clueless, and some ancient version of stoned, or just not with it, but plenty dangerous. The only time he seems terribly concerned is at the start when he can't pull out his sword.

Cecilia Cheung actually made a pretty passable man, tbh. She had the swagger and the slightly raspy voice that could have conceivably been the property of a young man. And her chemistry with Andy Lau was great, in a goofy, comedic sort of way. Because Andy Lau's Zhao rather inadvertently got himself engaged to a considerably homelier woman in the form of Li Bingbing. See what I mean by clueless?



So as I said, very simple plot, entertaining, mildly amusing and all that. My favorite scene was probably the fight between Zhao and Bai, wherein Zhao deploys all the normal fighting methods, but somehow at the same time, manages to touch Bai in all the places that would reveal her sex, and nearly takes the chest of her robe off as well. Then later on, acts completely surprised that she's a woman, wondering why he couldn't tell in the restaurant (where the fight took place).

It's this sort of understated goofiness that makes Andy Lau's character so buy-able. Also, the Judge's philosophical, but mostly ridiculous, rants in the tub were quite funny too.


I'm still wondering where his hand was....


Inspector Zhao, at your service.




Tub talk is over!

Mood amused Music UVERworld – The Truth Tags: andy lau, cecilia cheung, li bingbing, wuxia