Cartoony Fun

Posted : 5 months, 3 weeks ago on 22 April 2008 08:15 (A review of Crazy Safari)

A mash-up of Mr. Vampire and The Gods must be crazy, starring Lam Ching Ying and N!xau. Lot's of misunderstandings, gags and cartoon villainy.

Lam Ching Ying and his employer are transporting an hopping corpse back to China when calamity strikes and the corpse is lost in south Africa where it is adopted by a tribe. Hilarity ensues.

Lam Ching Ying's Daoist priest is a bit more arrogant than normal, and a bit of a jerk, but with a good heart.

Of all the Mr Vampire sequels, this is one of the better, if sillier ones.


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Mythological Treasures

Posted : 5 months, 3 weeks ago on 20 April 2008 06:20 (A review of The Forbidden Kingdom)

I liked it. It really is a fan's movie. In the first five minutes you see pictures of Lau Kar Leung, Lo Lieh, Jimmy Wang Yu, Cheng Pei Pei (not sure if the poster was from COME DRINK WITH ME or GOLDEN SWALLOW), Gordon Liu and others flash past during the beginning credits. Movies mentioned (that I can remember), ENTER THE DRAGON, CROUCHING TIGER HIDDEN DRAGON, BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR (twice).

There's a training montage that I've heard people complain about,but please, how many Asian movies have I sat through with training sequences. Honestly, no new ground is broken here. If you're a martial arts fan you've seen it all before and probably better. I saw the fate of one of the characters from a mile away, having sat through sufficient Shaw flicks. If you've only seen CTHD or HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS, then it's a bigger treat. No one embarrasses themselves. I know it sounds kinda like I'm dissing it, but I'm not. It's a competent and comfortable (if you've watched a good chunk of HK martial arts movies) movie. It's certainly the best HK martial arts movie not made in HK and not directed by a Asian (BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA is more of a wu xia, I think) I've seen.

The look of the movie is fairly comtemporary, like CTHD, HFD, or FEARLESS except for a few scenes that could have come from the Shaw Bros sound stages or ZU (either one).

The Jackie/Jet fight was cool, though I have to echo the wish that they would have done it even 10 years ago.

Oh, and maybe it's a kid movie, but it's not a kiddie movie. I was happy seeing it a full price, so it's at least worth a matinee ticket. It's certainly the best Hollywood movie, Jackie or Jet have been in, in umpteen years.

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Fun, cartoony movie

Posted : 1 year, 5 months ago on 22 April 2007 03:52 (A review of Asterix and Obelix vs. Caesar)

Just got through watching ASTERIX AND OBELIX TAKE ON CAESAR (1999), with
Christian Clavier as Asterix and Gerard Depardieu as Obelix. It's a live action adaption of some the Asterix & Obelix comics by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. Yes, it's a comic book movie, just one that few of us have ever heard of.

Without being too spoilerish the plot revolves around the adventures of our two Gauls defending their village from the Romans. From what little of the albums I have read (a couple, years ago), the movie seems to capture their tone and heart quite well. There's violence, but it's all very cartoony and mostly good natured.

Clavier and Depardieu both nail their roles, though Depardieu's over-grown, superhuman, man-child shines brightest. All the comic's characters are given some screen time so you can point at the screen and go "hey, there's so & so"!

I don't know how many live action adaptions of euro-comics there have been (the only ones I can think of off the top of my are BARBARELLA and DANGER: DIABOLIK, both quite good). This has certainly got to be one of the better ones, too.



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Fluffy & gritty and fun

Posted : 1 year, 6 months ago on 14 April 2007 08:21 (A review of DOA: Dead or Alive)

Fan service out the wazoo. They threw out most of the games' plot(s) (such as it was). They did manage to get all the girl playing beach volleyball in bikinis. There's some beefcake in there too.

The fights are all well choreographed, but they went for a generic martial arts look & feel. Tina is the exception; a lot of her moves did seem to be wrestling based. She also had the best (most brutal) fight, with Zack.

As far as video game adaptions go this is one of the better ones. It's certainly one of the best of the fighting game adaptions (what, there's STREETFIGHTER (oog), MORTAL KOMBAT (good), MORTAL KOMBAT II (decent), THE AVENGING FIST (okay unofficial Tekken movie) and I can't think of any others).

Nobody embarrasses themselves. It's a good time. I wonder when they'll get around to making a Virtua Fighter movie?

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Fun film

Posted : 1 year, 6 months ago on 8 April 2007 01:31 (A review of Dr. Who and the Daleks)

Very much a childrens' movie. Thankfully, not particularly candy coated. There's a fair amount of action.

It's based, loosely, on the British television show that premiered in 1963 as a childrens' show. The only characters that come close to feeling like their tv counter-parts are the Daleks, though they weren't quite right either. Just not the same if they're not screaming 'EXTERMINATE!' every five seconds (when did they start screaming 'EXTERMINATE!')?

Still, movie adaptions of tv shows usually go their own way and it's not fair to be too critical; this and its sequel DALEK INVASION EARTH 2150 A.D. aren't considered canon and shouldn't be judged by that criteria.

It's a charming, modestly produced childrens' sci-fi film. Some of the sets are quite effective, it holds your interest throughout, Peter Cushing is a plus and the Daleks are nearly spot-on. Worth a whirl.


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Diminishing returns, but still likable

Posted : 1 year, 6 months ago on 6 April 2007 11:41 (A review of Taxi 2)

It definitely suffers from sequelitis. The action is more cartoony, the humor is a bit broader, everythings just more over the top. There's one segment in Paris where I thought I was watchiing the BLUES BROTHERS.

For all that it does deliver car action in spades. Emma Sjöberg and Marion Cotillard are easy on the eyes too, though Cotillard's role is way underwritten.

If you liked TAXI, you'll like the sequel TAXI 2. It's just unfortunate that they threw more up on the screen and still ended up with less movie than the first TAXI, but that's usually the way of sequels.

I guess it sounds like I'm coming down on it; it's definitely worth a watch if you get an opportunity. Maybe someday we'll see a R1 dvd release...

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