KCR: Fearless, starring Jet Li

The real Ho Yuan Jia
Image via WikipediaJet Li, with his thorough mastery of various Chinese Martial Arts disciplines, had taken on many of the iconic "folk hero" roles in the history of China. In this movie, he is portraying master Huo Yuanjia, a master about the turn of the century, when Western powers and Japan are trying to push the corrupt Chinese government into more concessions by awing them with other masters.

The premise: Huo YuanJia was the youngest son of a kungfu master. The young Huo had always been way too proud of his skills, instead of learning any restraint, which eventually lead to a series of personal tragedies. He tried to commit suicide, but he survived, and lived in the wilderness as penance for a long period before coming to his senses, and returning to the city, just in time to encounter the imperialists and others trying to denigrate China. Huo was able to rally supporters into forming a Wushu association. Then the imperialists challenged him to a match, against other masters... and they want to win at ANY cost...

The martial arts are excellent as always, and this movie is not shy about showing some blood when it calls for it. AND there's a plot instead of just slash and cut and punch. There's a theme behind it, about pride, about not backing down in face of challenge, and about the true winner of spirit if not in body... and about redemption.

Allegedly Jet Li's final martial arts film (except as fantasy characters), this is a masterpiece.

Rating: Watch it!

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• KCR: The One starring Jet Li (crankyreviews.blogspot.com)

KCR: The One starring Jet Li

Cover of The One (Special Edition)The One has a clever premise that is barely scifi, and relies on a clever premise: Jet Li vs. Jet Li. How do you set that up? Alternate universes, of course.

The setup: Gabe Yulaw was an MVA (multiverse agency) agent who once killed another version of himself in self-defense. He felt stronger. So he decided to go rogue... go through the various multiverses and kill all other versions of him. He had gotten much faster too, doing all the "Matrix" like moves. Two other MVA agents (Del Roy Lindo and Jason Statham) were dispatched to catch him, but ultimately it falls to the last remaining, "Gabe Law", who also had gotten stronger...

You sure don't watch this movie for the acting. If you understand any martial arts, you may actually notice that Jet Li used different versions of martial arts for the characters. But basically it's special effects all the way.

But then, you don't really watch Jet Li movie for the characters, do you?

Rating: Worth watching once, but not enough to own

 

KCR: Black Mask, starring Jet Li (movie)

Black Mask is a Hong Kong action movie starring Jet Li dated 1996. Production values are lousy by today's standards, and plot is cliche. However, you watch this movie to see Jet Li fight, and it's good stuff.

The setup: A group of supersoldiers, who had brain surgery to sever their pain center, can perform nearly super-human feats. However, they are about to be betrayed by their government, so one guy distract the guards and the rest of the unit slipped out. That one guy is "Michael" (or Tsui Chik, according to IMDB), who settled down in Hong Kong as a simple librarian, trying to leave his past behind. Unfortunately, his old unit, now a crime syndicate, to rival all crime syndicates, is coming to Hong Kong... And they start by slaughtering all crime bosses in spectacular fashion, then bomb the police, all in a plot to steal the Interpol database (all of it). The only one who can stop them is, of course, "Michael", who, in order to conceal his identity, wears a "black mask". Together with detective "Rock" of HKPD, they may yet stop the bad guys...

The sci-fi stuff is minimal, and there are a lot of bull**** elements. They even borrowed the "railgun" from Eraser, except they decided to use something as simple as an Aug Steyr. It's laughable to any one who knows that the after effects are just "drawn" in.

Still, the fighting stuff is pretty good.

If you are interested, there is actually a sequel (not with Jet Li) that's actually not that bad.

KCR: The Defender / Bodyguard from Beijing (movie, action)

Essentially Chinese copy of "The Bodyguard" (starring Kevin Costner and Whitney Houston), The Defender (also known as "Bodyguard from Beijing") stars Jet Li as a highly trained bodyguard for the Chinese government tasked to protect girlfriend of a businessman residing in Hong Kong. He has two Hong Kong police to help him to protect the girl from possible assassination because she witnessed a murder. He was forced to kill a whole boatload of assassins in a mall. One of those dead was godbrother to one of the best assassins. The assassin, ex-Chinese army special forces, vowed revenge, and there will be a big show down attack vs. defend, gun play and martial arts...

Set before Hong Kong was returned to Chinese control, there was a bit of rivalry between Chinese "cop" and the Hong Kong cops. This one, being somewhat G-rated, cuts down on the bad puns and R-rated jokes and double entenderes. However, the cops are basically treated as jokes, with one cop who can't even tell that his gun was swapped with a water pistol. Also, the various explosions are just spliced together... you don't actually see something blow up. Jet Li have played this completely straight, dialing down his charm to almost zero.

As standard action affair, this movie doesn't really have much to recommend it other than Jet Li's fighting and gunplay. The big fight with the bad guy is pretty good.

All in all, may be worth a rental.

Rating: rent it