Jay's Movie of the Week #20: Films of Fury

 Reviewed for DVDSnapshot, and recommended to everyone, this "Kung Fu Movie Movie" is the most fun Friday Night Flick I've seen in quite a while.

Official Synopsis:

Films of Fury tells the story of the Kung Fu sub-culture from its ancient Peking Opera origins to its superhero-powered future. From Enter the Dragon to Kung Fu Panda and everything in between, Films of Fury features the genre's greatest on-screen warriors, and reveals the legend, the lore, and the loony of the Kung Fu film genre like it has never been seen before.

Our Take:

Films of Fury has the subtitle "The Kung Fu Movie Movie," and that's just the sort of irreverent fun this documentary is going for. With plenty of film clips and animated segments tying it all together, this is a breezy but comprehensive look at the history of Chop-Socky flicks. Kung Fu on film is about the gracefully executed choreography as much as the whoopin'.

One A Week Reviews #31: Shinjuku Incident

 A very pleasant surprise of a crime thriller reviewed for dvdsnapshot.com - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

SHINJUKU INCIDENT

OFFICIAL SYNOPSIS
Action superstar Jackie Chan leads this tour de force as Nick Steelhead, a Chinese laborer who comes to Japan hoping for a better life. Unable to find honest work and bullied into the shadows with his fellow Chinese illegal immigrants, he soon finds himself ascending as the boss of a black market mob. After providing a deadly service to a powerful Yakuza crime boss, Steelhead's rise to mafia power spirals rapidly out of control as he's given reign over the dangerous and lucrative Shinjuku district. Get set to root for the underdog as Jackie Chan battles Asia's most ruthless underworld gangs in this action-packed crime drama.

OUR TAKE
I wonder what some of the more conservative American fans of Jackie Chan will think about this story of an illegal immigrant making "good" through a life of crime. Shinjuku Incident starts out like a docu-drama on the plight of the Chinese sneaking into Japan and making new lives for themselves outside of society. Humble immigrant Jackie Chan comes looking for the girl from back home and scrapes by in his new country through theft and scab labor, learning the tricks of living off the grid. From cleaning sewers and picking garbage to slowly creating his own gang of gypsy-like scammers, the story moves episodically as he succeeds beyond his wildest dreams. This is as much in the spirit of Charles Dickens and Horatio Alger as it is Scarface and The Public Enemy.

Gorgeous to look at, from an opening shipwreck (marred by obviously forced perspective in the CGI) through the gold-lit city streets of Tokyo, the cinematography matches the expansive sweep of the story. It's a full two hours that you feel without it ever dragging. There's an attempt at romantic subplot as Chan gets embroiled with the girl from back home and a hostess with a heart of gold. It's blandness offers a nice counterpoint to some jaw-dropping explosions of violence. Most of it happens in broad daylight with plenty of witnesses in seemingly instantaneous bursts. It's effective staging, giving realistic impact to each killing as the Japanese, Chinese, and Taiwanese gangs escalate their turf wars and racial tensions.

Chan, usually a warm presence, plays it serious and tends to come off as wan and exhausted. Whether fighting (though this film is light on the Martial Arts he's famous for), reminiscing about life back home, and even in a sex scene, his usual mischievous sparkle is set aside for this look at the downtrodden. The fact that he doesn't even smile until he embarks on bold, organized crime betrays this to be a crime thriller first and socially-conscious drama a distant second. That the film can be all that and convey the sense that the actions in the story affect the entire society at large better than almost any film I've seen is a testament to Shinjuku Incident being a fine surprise.

SPECIAL FEATURES
Shinjuku Incident is presented in Anamorphic Widescreen with both English and Chinese 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound. Subtitles are available in English, English SDH, English for Chinese Version and French. Special features include select scene commentary with Jackie Chan and Say Hello to the Bad Guy: Up Close With Jackie Chan, a ten minute making-of featurette. Additionally there are trailers for Unthinkable, Harry Brown, The Square, A Prophet (Un Propehte), The Karate Kid and Chloe.

CONCLUSION
The story of the rise of a Chinese Crime Lord from humble beginnings through the ranks of the Japanese Yakuza, Shinjuku Incident gives Jackie Chan a chance to stretch his acting muscles in a serious social drama punctuated with big blasts of explosive violence. It's an expansive, handsome crime picture that rewards the investment of time and not to be missed.

OVERALL PICTURE
MOVIE: A-
EXTRAS: B-

Jay's Review: Jackie Chan Presents: Wushu

Don't be fooled by the box, this is a "Coming of age" film fit for the family. Here's my review for dvdsnapshot.com!

WUSHU

OFFICIAL SYNOPSIS
Upon arrival at an elite martial arts conservatory, a group of young boys swear allegiance to each other and form a gang. A decade later at graduation, they unexpectedly cross paths with an evil martial arts master and foil his kidnapping plan. Now, they must put their combat skills to the test in order to defeat this enemy and save their brotherhood.

OUR TAKE
In the US, Jackie Chan has become synonymous with lighthearted martial arts films that exhibit a sense of humor coupled with dazzling action choreography. Chan executive produced the Sammo Hung starring, family-friendly Wushu and it has that same flavor. From the beginning the action sequences defer to gentle humor as Hung plays widowed father to two sons who join a trio of kids at a "martial arts conservatory."

The box cover copy is misleading to sell this like a crime thriller. If anyhting the crime subplot is almost extraneous. Instead of being about defeating "the brotherhood," Wushu is a "learning and growing through athletics" film. More Karate Kid than Karate Kid II. In fact, the first fifteen minutes play like a children's film until a creative sequence showing the children turning into their older counterparts by turning flips. Wushu may be "the ancient art of fighting," but they're more students of gymnastics. Even during their first combat exhibition you expect them to break out those long, twirling ribbons on sticks. A throwdown with the Bring It On girls feels almost in the offing.

(The "group of young boys" is also misleading as the team's fifth member is a girl who's just as agile in combat as the boys are.)

This "Scooby Gang" (The "Jing Wu Men," derived from Bruce Lee's film Fists of Fury) have cute teen romance and visits to amusement parks and movie sets while they foil a team of nefarious child kidnappers. Even Kung Fu Film legend Hung gets in on the action and proves one can still be incredibly nimble even with a great deal of middle-aged spread. He's still a pro, even if it's clear they're making some cheats to help him sell what used to look effortless. The rest of the cast are graceful athletes that prove that, even with a little wire-work cheating, there's a great deal of beauty and dance in martial arts.

The last third of the film gets a little darker as our leads go from exhibition fighting to real combat, making the end, where they wrap up their athletic competitions in a time-worn fashion. You know who'll triumph, but the ride's still enjoyable.

SPECIAL FEATURES
Wushu is presented in a widescreen format with audio 5.1 Dolby Digital in both English dub and the original Mandarin. English and Spanish subtitles are available. The DVD's special features include a nearly 18 minute behind-the-scenes featurette featuring lots of fight choreography, a featurette on the film's Cannes premier, and trailers for Jackie Chan Presents Wushu, The Spy Next Door, The Forbidden Kingdom, and Lionsgate's Blu-Ray line.

CONCLUSION
PG-13 for action-violence but tame, the family-friendly, coming-of-age-thru-athletics comedy Wushu reminds that you can enjoy the gymnastic beauty of martial arts without much in the way of real violence. The humor is never saccharine sweet and there's genuine thrills in the action sequences... though be sure to warn the kids not to leap in front of roller coasters or giant, rolling drums.

All in all, Wushu is a pleasure.

(...though I kept picturing Nadia Comaneci wiping the floor with these kids.)

OVERALL PICTURE
MOVIE: B-
EXTRAS: B