Know the rules of The Road

Warriors of Heaven and Earth is an unconventional action and buddy film. Filmed in the Gobi desert with a haunting OST and good performances, this film had almost everything needed to be epic. Almost.

Unlike many films with numerous plots and turns, Warriors of Heaven and Earth was more like the Silk Road going through the desert. A rough path with even rougher people traversing it, but fairly straightforward. The film starts with Lai Xi, a Japanese man, who came to China 15 years before to study war craft. All he wants to do now is go home and see his mother. The emperor, whom he is loyal to, has resisted letting him leave. The Tang emperor tasks him with eliminating fugitives in the Western region. Once he fulfills this task, he can finally return home to Japan. Lai's final obstacle is hunting down "Butcher" Li, a general charged with mutiny because he refused to slaughter captive women and children.

Lieutenant Li has been wandering the desert making a living when he is caught up in a sandstorm and nearly dies. He is rescued by the sole military survivor of a caravan carrying Buddhist texts and a precious artifact. One young monk protecting the artifact survived the storm as well. Li takes control of the caravan and promises to lead it to the capital. Along the way he ends up picking up a fighter who had seen too many winters, Old Diehard, and a young man who had seen too few, Salamander, as well as some of his old cohorts. Lai Xi also finds him and after a fight that ends in a draw agrees to allow Li to finish the caravan mission before killing him. For some reason, Lai is escorting the daughter of a killed general to the capital and she becomes part of the caravan as well.

No movie focusing on the Silk Road would be complete without gangs of bandits. This film focuses on Master An, the leader of a gang determined to steal the artifact. Another group, followers of a Khan, also want the artifact. They are relentless and seemingly willing to sacrifice anything to get their hands on the item in the monk's care.

Li and Lai have an almost comfortable relationship as two men who see each other as equals, and honorable, though they know at least one of them will not reach the capital. The small band of men, almost akin to The Seven Samurai, must use every bit of their wits and experience to fight through the bandits in inhospitable territory. Outnumbered and bearing the heavy burden of traveling with numerous camels and cargo, the fugitives are determined to carry out their mission. Once the artifact is revealed, the film ventures into Indiana Jones territory (think Buddhist Ark of the Covenant) which in one scene is intriguing and in another eye-rolling.

The fights and battles are all quite brutal and well choreographed. There is some wire-fu and CGI enhancement, but most of it is bone crunching and bloody hacking between seasoned soldiers and fighters.

What I enjoyed the most about the film was the beautiful desert scenery, shot with a loving eye. Desert towns looked authentic and the overhead geometric shots were fascinating. One scene where large jars of oil were used to create an impressive ringed fire at night was a great shot. The OST was unobtrusive and seductively wove the scenes and emotions together.

The cast was older than many recent movies which gave gravitas to the battle hardened men facing each other over swords or bonding together as brothers. Nikai Kiichi and Jiang Wen both played quiet heroes, yet still found ways to make their characters interesting beyond their ability to swing a sword. This is the first Chinese film I've seen where a Japanese character was shown as honorable and a skilled warrior, all in a positive light. Li and Lai made for a decent adversarial bromance. Vicki Zhao, was stuck in a token female role with little to do. Wang Xue Qi as the vile but intelligent Master An was acceptable as the bandit leader only going over the top on occasion.

What didn't work as well, was the very slow build-up to the story and the magical ending. I honestly was going to score this an 8 before the final scenes.

Warriors of Heaven and Earth was a surprisingly enjoyable film. Though a familiar sword fighting action narrative, it trod slightly different ground. It was strongest when focusing on the two men who each just wanted to be able to go home, thwarted by the emperor. When it veered from a more realistic survival epic into supernatural territory, it lost its way. I could still recommend this film with caveats. 7.75 for me.



9/13/22

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"I am part of that power which eternally wills evil and eternally works good." 'Faust'-Goethe

To watch Snow Girl and the Dark Crystal it would help to have a working knowledge of the Chinese legend of Zhong Kui. Which I didn't. And this movie tended to enter facts not in evidence which could make a confusing viewing for a novice. In the end it didn't matter too much because the storyline was thin. Very thin.

First off, I'll drop two things on the table about me and this movie. First, I am a Chen Kun fan and watched this mainly for him. Second, the CGI in this movie was terrible, slow, shoddy, cheap video game quality for the most part. And there was a lot of it, overwhelming any story the writers might have wanted to tell. As much as I love Chen Kun, even he couldn't save this movie from the weight of the CGI department.

Every thousand years demons can reincarnate into a human, god, or back to a demon depending on their moral checklist hidden within the Dark Crystal, which can also hold the 7 spirits of people. Chen as Zhong Kui steals the Dark Crystal for Zhang Daoxian (Winston Chao), a low level god tasked with keeping the realms from erupting into chaos. With his magic bat fan Zhong can turn into an enormous demon with the power to vanquish other demons. After the theft of the Dark Crystal, several female demons come calling to try and steal it back. Low and behold one of the them is Snow Girl (the gorgeous Li Bing Bing), Zhong's old lover. This causes a crisis for both of them which is further complicated when Zhong learns more of his origin story. Something I've learned from watching Cdramas, not all demons are bad and not everyone from the heavenly realm is good. The social hierarchy and ambitions therein exist in all the realms.

This could have been a beautiful, tragic love story. Unlike many Chinese movies, this one had the steamiest scenes I've seen, which could be attributed more to the chemistry between Chen and Li than any skinship. The filmmakers instead over-relied on flashbacks and their CGI creations to carry the movie which resulted in an emotionless, colorful mess. Chen, Li, and Chao did their best with the limitations constricting them. Most of the secondary characters were largely forgettable.

Even with the bad CGI, if the filmmakers had trusted their stars and developed their characters better this could have been a far more entertaining and moving film.



9/3/22

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Don't hasten your death!

The Great Buddha Arrival is an homage/reboot of the 1934 Edamasa Yoshiro film by the same name. Part mockumentary, part documentary, part Tokusatsu, and a whole lot of strange fantasy---The Great Buddha Arrival is hard to define.

In 1934 Edamasa Yoshiro created a film about the 18 meter/60 feet tall Shurakuen Buddha statue coming to life and walking to Tokyo. Destroyed during WWII, all that remains of the film are a few photos from a magazine. One of the first Tokusatsus and creative inspiration for those who would follow, fans and filmmakers decided to honor it by giving it a reboot. The movie is less than an hour long and largely crowd sourced. Blasts from the past showed up to be "interviewed" for the TV show being developed on the statue's past. Godzilla and Gamera stars of old made appearances and also Edamasa's grandson.

In the 2018 film the three photos are thought to be from a real event and a young writer is tasked with creating a tv show around them. Later he finds that they are from Edamasa's film but it was based on a real experience the director had with the walking statue. Very meta. It was thought the Buddha appeared because of the serial suicides of the 1930's, whether as a warning or a sign of hope was unknown. In a twist of fate, the statue comes to life life once again in the present and begins its walk to Tokyo. This time people aren't running and screaming and Tokyo Tower seems safe. The ghost of Edamasa appears to the writer as he follows the statue, "Don't hasten your death!" When a dead director and a walking 60 foot statue appear, I'd play heads up.

Recreated scenes imagined from the 1934 movie were done using the old school techniques from the 1930's showing the statue walking through town to match up with the photos. Some of the interviews for the tv show were fun for Kaiju geeks. The little boy from the original Gamera tells of how the walking Buddha saved him, repeating the scene from Gamera only without the giant tusked turtle, although a turtle is shown in his living room. 1954 Godzilla's Takarada Akira warns that science comes with both positive and negative consequences and the Kaiju movies of yore were cautionary tales. The one big oops was an "American" religious expert who mentioned other statues with supernatural events such as Mary Magdalene, I'm not Catholic, but I think she meant the Virgin Mary, Jesus' mother. Mary Magdalene's statues aren't usually as famous and FYI, she wasn't a prostitute. But she did bring up what would be important later in the movie-that not all statues were harbingers of doom, but could also be seen as messengers of hope.

The movie bounces back and forth with grainy black and white scenes from the 1934 film (ones recreated for this film), old (created) news reels, shots of people committing suicide in 1934, news stories that were not translated, and the current time with various people and "witnesses" being interviewed. News anchors and talking heads tried to understand what was causing the statue to walk, up to and including "dark energy" supplied by aliens. The acting throughout the scenes sufficed but not much more.

The cinematography wasn't very good and the lighting was downright bad in some scenes. The sets were about as rudimentary as you can get. Most of the money must have been saved up for the last quarter of the movie and the walking statue. I tried to cut this film some slack as it was an indie film and a fan service to honor Edamasa's lost influential work. It was very strange but also interesting.

The film's ending was stark yet offered a glimmer of hope. It took a long, pinball bouncing way to get there and I often didn't know what was real and what wasn't, but in it's own weird little way this bizarrely patched together movie had heart. The Great Buddha Arrival is probably only for hardcore Takusatsu/Kaiju fans as it does commemorate the origins of the film genre and has cameos by several actors from Tokusatsu films going back to Gojira's 1954 debut. The casual viewer will wonder why a turtle in a tank is featured during one interview, some of us will go, "that's the annoying kid from Gamera!" Never thought I'd be happy to see him again. The walking Buddha even healed those wounds.


9/1/22

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Yippee Ki Yay!

High Risk opens like Speed and transitions quickly to Die Hard with Jet Li playing it straight and Jacky Cheung playing it like a parody. Director Wong Jing and Jackie Chan had a falling out when making City Hunter and High Risk was Wong's payback, thinly veiling that Chan didn't do all his stunts and wasn't a great guy off screen through Cheung's character. Boy drama tops girl drama any day of the week!

Jet's character started out as a cop who was unable to save his wife and son from the evil Doctor. He left the force and became kung fu star Frankie Lone's bodyguard and stunt double. Before you can say Yippee Ki Yay---Jet, Frankie, Frankie's dad (Wu Ma!), an intrepid female reporter and a cop's sometime girlfriend became trapped inside the Granadur, make that Grandeur Hotel (spell check people!) with Hans Gruber, I mean The Doctor and a zillion minions who were there to steal a priceless Russian treasure.

There were plenty of explosions, fires, crashes, bloody deaths and snakes. Yes, snakes. What bad guy doesn't bring 100 snakes to a treasure heist, you know, just in case? Always better to be prepared, right?

This movie felt like a collision itself, with Jacky Cheung playing Frankie for laughs while Jet Li channeled his best John McClane completely all business. Real world kickboxing champion Billy Chow made for a properly menacing henchman. Kelvin Wong played The Doctor over the top and was more or less forgettable. Of the women Valerie Chow made an acceptable bad girl and Chingmy Yau did well as the reporter.

One of the problems, aside from the two movies in one, was that Jet Li's Lee Git was responsible for numerous civilian deaths through his use of a car and later helicopter that created grand damage in the building and on the ground. Cheung's mugging for the camera could also wear thin. Not really sure why Wong had Cheung channel his Bruce Lee imitation with the iconic yellow and black tracksuit and fight cries when it was Chan he was trying to skewer.

Corey Yuen's fight choreography was actually first rate when it came to hand to hand or lamp to sword combat. Li's fight with Ben Lam and Cheung's fight with Chow were both entertaining and creative. The gun fights were typical 90's fare where even when multiple bad guys were using automatic weapons they still couldn't hit the hero 15 feet away...numerous times..and even failed with a flame-thrower.

High Risk was ridiculous, especially when bodies that were obviously dummies were thrown off buildings or blown up, but Wong kept the pace and carnage coming fast and furious, thank goodness he hadn't seen that franchise at this time, and the movie did keep my attention even when it didn't seem to be making any sense. I would have preferred that they kept to one mood for the movie because I enjoyed Jet Li's scenes more than Cheung's. The best part about Cheung's scenes was that Wu Ma was often in them and I have a soft spot for the old kung fu movie veteran.

Wong Jing threw everything into a blender to see what would happen so if you are a Jet Li fan or want to see a movie poking fun at Jackie Chan or are curious what a comedic Hong Kong version of Die Hard would be, this might be one to try. If you are looking for a coherent plot and consistent quality acting, best to steer clear. This bonkers film is best viewed through a generous lens.




8/17/22

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Nameless daughter in lost and found!

Reclaim is an uneven but interesting story about a 60-year-old woman who has lived her life for others. When she finds herself between a rock and a hard place with her extended family, her reaction to their needs is to look for a larger home.

Ye Lan Xin's life has become one of many hats---mother, daughter, wife, friend, in-law, teacher, but none of them are truly her own. Her retired husband refuses to help around the house and uses her more like a servant. When she came home in the opening scene to find he had gone through her books telling her which ones to keep, he lost all sympathy with me. You don't mess with a person's books-that's sacred territory!

Her grown daughter soon moves back in after quitting her job and trying to start up her own company hoping for mommy's financial as well as emotional support. The daughter, too, doesn't see her mom as a person but more as an assistant and ATM. The grown son who had been educated on his parent's dime in the States, also expects her to do his bidding. When her mother who suffers from dementia once again wanders away from the nursing home, Lan Xin wants her to move into their apartment. Her husband's "antique" collection and teapot collection take up nearly a whole room but he refuses to part with anything. He even buys a champion pigeon and lets it roam freely through the house without cleaning up its mess.

Lan Xin decides to buy a larger house so everyone will have their own room. Out of all them, she has the least privacy, unable to even watch Richard Gere movies when she wants to.

Much of the movie involves Lan Xin walking up and downstairs, traveling in elevators and circling around reflecting the ups and downs in her life as she searches for an affordable home. There are a couple of fantasy scenes awkwardly imposed into the movie that don't really fit with the realistic mood and also make it difficult to know if some of the things that are shown really happened. Ultimately, what Lan Xin was looking for was herself and coming to terms with the young girl who wanted to go to Paris to study art and the older woman who had married instead and teaches art on the side. When someone asks her name she goes blank because it has been so long since anyone called her by it. The scenes of Lan Xin creating a dollhouse that resembles her home tells much of what she desires and also what she comes to learn. The movie is beautifully shot, particularly the trip she and her mother take to their home town. The music can be syrupy at times, but in this type of movie fit the mood well.

Nina Paw as Lan Xin gave a subtle performance yet quietly powerful as small clues showed through her almost imperceptible reactions. While his character could be grating with denigrating demands and opinions, Johnny Kou played the self-involved husband perfectly. The sets were all intricately designed, especially the main apartment, important since much of the action took place in the almost claustrophobic spaces as Lan Xin tried to carve out one tiny place for herself.

There are times when you will want to shake Lan Xin for letting herself be used by nearly everyone around her in her need for approval and other times you will want to cheer for her as she gains clarity. Far from a perfect movie, and too long for the subject matter Reclaim is still worth trying out to watch as one woman takes the slow journey to reclaiming her life.

"All of us are alone when we reach the end. There's nothing to be afraid of." -Lan Xin's mother



8/16/22

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Lisa is a sober look at how flawed humans behave in the wake of a devastating typhoon. Politics, military conflicts, and religion make allies and enemies as the people of a small farming community seek to survive when everything they have is wiped out by a cataclysmic landslide. Though the church is buried, their faith and their faith in each other is not.

The key character Ross, subtly played by Angeli Bayani, has been accused of embezzling school funds and if found guilty faces the death penalty. Her relationship with her husband has deteriorated and she is desperately seeking a new life for her and her son. The local communist rebels of which she is one is always at odds with the government's military. Despite being rebuffed by many of the villagers, she never gives up in her desire to help them. As alliances and adversaries are made, we learn more about Ross and the circumstances she has created for herself and the dangerous exit strategy she has devised.

The film follows Ross and Sister Jo as they try to bolster their people and come up with solutions to their dire situation. They are without food, shelter and medicine with no easy answers to be found. The dead need identifying and burying. Accustomed to hardships both man and nature made, the people of the village unite despite their differences to seek food and to rebuild their community. As the survivors attempts to receive aid are rebuffed by the local government because their political views are different, the residents take matters into their own hands with tragic consequences.

Filmed with mostly natural light and on a low budget, the scenes came across muted and realistic. The mountainous jungle scenery had a rough beauty of its own even with the village shattered and buried. The emotional score enhanced the scenes especially in the beginning when scarcely a word was said for the first 15 minutes.

Before watching this film, I read it is a film that has to be felt to appreciate it and I would agree with that sentiment. Lisa shows the aftermath of a natural disaster and the inadequate responses by the political and global structures in helping the people on the fringe of society. Political and military skirmishes left many trapped in the middle with few resources to find their way out. Lisa's message could be subtle and at other time's heavy handed, the pacing and narrative uneven in places but it never strayed from showing the hearts of the imperfect villagers and how they struggled together to survive and their dogged determination to rebuild.

8/6/22

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I'll have the house salad, hold the radish please

Monster Hunt was a messy quilt made of a variety of genres hurriedly sewn into one piece. Though childish in nature, it had enough disturbing scenes, one should think carefully before letting small children watch it.

The lack of clear and consistent narrative troubled me about the movie. A bad monster takes over the monster world and is hunting down the good monsters. When the pregnant ex-queen and her attendants escape, the hunt is on. Monsters are hunting monsters. Humans hunt monsters. It's rough being a squishy tentacled being in this movie.

Jing Bo Ran is Song Tian Yu, the de facto mayor of a backwater town, left in charge when his monster hunting father disappears. In a reversal of gender roles, Tian Yu is meek, a seamstress, and cook. His senile aggressive grandmother scarcely remembers who is and when she does is disappointed in what she sees. Along comes the pregnant hunted queen and her two attendants in human suits. Following them is Bai Bai He as Huo Xiao Lan, a low level monster hunter. When Tian Yu becomes pregnant, hilarity ensues. Eventually, the two humans are left with the baby monster king and have to decide what to do with the little bloodsucker all the while being chased by humans and monsters.

The movie is energetic, bordering on frenetic. Some of the martial arts fights, especially with CGI monsters are creative and captivating. Creatures break into song on occasion. A romance comes out of nowhere. Monsters eat humans and humans eat monsters, it's a dog eat dog world. There are bad monsters and bad humans. While I liked the moral complexity, too often it felt like someone throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks. The baby monster, which I did not find adorable, seemed to be used to try to manipulate the audience emotionally into caring about it and it's human caretakers. I don't mind cutesy cartoon characters, but this one bordered on nauseatingly saccharine. And aside from him being the true heir, we're never really told much about the baby king's importance or place in the world. Like Chekhov's gun on the mantle, a rusty sword foreshadows the limping, docile hero will overtake the heroic female warrior protecting him. I cannot overstate how tired I am of this trope.

I enjoyed parts of this movie. Jing Bo Ran and Bai Bai He were affable and had a nice chemistry together. They were believable when dealing with green screen images something not all actors can do. Jiang Wu as a conflicted bounty hunter was fun to watch as he battled monster and human alike. I was particularly happy seeing Elaine Jin/Kam, Sandra Ng, and Tang Wei make appearances. The theme of seeing creatures and humans for who they are and not what they look like always appeals to me even when I had to sort through a lot of other themes in the movie to latch onto this one.

A brain burrowing bug and open air exotic meat markets may not be for everyone. The movie doesn't shy away from death and oddity.

For those who like lots of random action and a plethora of strange creatures, this will be right up their alley. As much as I enjoy CGI children's movies, this one felt too much like a fever dream hopped up on sugar for me. I left it staggering from the sweetness and weirdness overload.




8/6/22

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Dreams are meant to be fulfilled!

Rebelling against loved ones and age itself, a group of 17 elderly motorcycle riders (average age 81) banded together to drive the 1178km / 732 miles around the outer edge of Taiwan in thirteen days. Short on sentiment but long on spirit, Go Grandriders was an engaging documentary of fulfilling one's dreams.

The Grandriders included retired military, civil servants, policemen, a pastor, and a housewife (who had to pass her driver's exam to join). They were all in average shape for octogenarians with a fair percentage suffering from hypertension, diabetes, or cancer. They all had their own reasons for taking the trek, most often boiling down to---if not now...when? Despite family members and loved ones trying to dissuade them, they stayed the course to show that just because they were old didn't mean they wanted a life without something to do and look forward to and those things were worth the risk.

The Hongdad Senior Citizens Welfare Foundation provided resources for the trip, including a bus for riders to rest on when they needed to, medical assistance and providing places to stay along the way. As the director said, in our 20's and 30's people are marrying and raising families. When people finally have time to do the things they want they are told not to leaving many elderly alone and lacking purpose. The documentary showed how people find that life isn't much fun being left alone without something to look forward to and this trip was the spark and rejuvenator some needed.

Taiwan's roads provided challenging situations with dangerous traffic, falling rocks and washed out roads from a previous typhoon. Police escorts joined them on various legs of the journey to give a measure of safety.

Grandriders didn't delve into sentimentality when allowing the men and woman of the trip to talk about their lives and reasons for undertaking the difficult journey. Men on different sides of different wars shared a moment of peace and unity as soldiers. A kamikaze trainer's tale of training young men to die was particularly moving as was a husband's story of taking his wife for "one more ride, honey" with her picture on his handlebars.

The shots of riders on harrowing roads could become monotonous, broken up by shots of sunsets on the water or mountains. Trips to nursing homes with the bikers sharing cheer with the residents or children on the sides of the road cheering them on were heartwarming.

Go Grandriders could have benefited from a more deft hand with the photography and traveling shots so that we could experience the ride along with them more. The heart of the of the story though came from the courageous and adventurous senior citizens reminding us that they were still capable and energetic and that one's dreams give us motivation and reason for living at any age.





8/4/22

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What price revenge?

Chen Kuan Tai directed and starred in The Iron Monkey, a dark and violent old school revenge flick. It's Monkey Fist against Eagle Claw, and the noble Shaolin vs the evil Qing.

Chen's rebel family was dragged away and executed by a notorious Qing general. Chen escaped capture because he was gambling and being threatened by bookie/debt collector Wu Ma. After the devastating loss of his family (good thing he didn't see what happened to his little brother in prison), he lives in the woods and scavenges food from a Shaolin temple. Chi Kuan Chun's Shaolin apprentice catches him and convinces the abbot to let Chen train there. Refusing to give them his real name, he simply goes by Iron Monkey, his nickname for the way he climbs walls and fights. The abbot hopes his training will help him release his need for revenge. Honey, if he did that we wouldn't have a movie.

Chen trains with Bitter Monk (Chen Mu Chuan), learning the most difficult style---The Monkey Fist. After a few years, the Qing come calling needing guards and fighters but are turned down by the monks. Chen goes to the Abbot and asks to be released. In a very un-Buddhist manner he's told to go quench his need for bloody revenge. Chen joins the Qings destroying other villages and rebel forces in order to move up the ranks and get close enough to the general so that he can take him out. When the Shaolin temple is threatened he has to move up his revenge rampage timeline.

The Iron Monkey is ethically challenging to watch. It is an unflinching revenge film where the hero crosses the line in order to avenge his family. It asks the question, "are evil deeds acceptable in order to eradicate a greater evil?" It's a 1970's kung fu film so no answers are given. Even more troubling to me were the real life fights between a monkey and an eagle at the beginning of the film and near the end. Though it might have been acceptable in that time and place, I still deducted points for the disturbing scenes.

Chen Mu Chuan who played the Bitter Monk was the fight choreographer. The fights and training scenes took up most of the film keeping him busy. The fights were well done and complex. The final fight scenes had brutal culminations. A few fights had acrobatics, but the wire-fu was kept to a minimum. There was no romance, no cringey comedy, this was old fashioned smash mouth kung fu fighting from beginning to end.

Good guy or bad guy, I enjoy watching Chen Kuan Tai fight and act. Wilson Tong played a treacherous baddie as well as Bryan Leung (Beardy!). As a director, Chen's pacing kept the story moving forward and flowing smoothly. The sets, costumes, and weapons were varied and their quality added depth to the performances.

Overall, I enjoyed this grim revenge film with the exception of the animal abuse scenes. I found it to be an above average 1977 kung fu film. If you are in the mood for an intense brawler, this is one to try.



7/26/22

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Not all progress is forward

Shot in black and white Kontora casts a surreal experience over the viewer as a father and daughter seek to heal in the midst of their grief and mend their broken relationship. They are aided by a mysterious mute wanderer who only walks backwards.

Sora discovers her recently deceased grandfather's war diary, a journal that details the vicious treatment of student scholars turned soldiers near the end of WWII. He had hidden his "metal arm" deep in the forest and Sora becomes obsessed with finding her grandfather's treasure. Ultimately, she is helped by the mute homeless man and her father.

All three main characters are lonely and lost. Sora seemingly has no friends and only had her grandfather to confide in. Her father has been adrift and bereft since the death of her mother. The vagabond meanders through town in threadbare clothes walking backwards with people staying out of his way. When her father accidentally hits him coming home from a party one night, Sora determines to care for him against her father's wishes.

Sora's cousin, who had failed to become a dancer and returned to town attempted to befriend Sora. Her father, the rich uncle, greedy for more, at first only wanted Sora's house to add to his collection, but after hearing about the "treasure" set his sights on it, further driving a wedge between family members. When the treasure was found the meaning behind Grandpa's words were obvious.

The mute man whether quiet sage or spirit in need of healing, in his own peculiar way helped pull daughter and father together on the quest for the missing treasure. A movie with a smooth glass surface became murkier and more turbulent as the characters dove deeper into their relationships and what they needed. It would take the miracle of working together to fight back to a bright surface.

An odd slice of life movie on coming of age, the power of family and desire for healing, Kontora perhaps ran too long. It could ramble slowly over the roads again and again of the small town and the hills and valleys surrounding Sora's home.

The performances were heartfelt and natural. Newcomer Mase Hidemasa gave an emotional performance as the mute without uttering a word. Marui Wan managed to convey the conflicting emotions of the insolent, independent teenager in search of meaning, relationship, and something beyond the borders of the nearly empty town. The performances were backed up by a forlorn musical score.

Despite a small budget and reportedly being filmed in 10 days, Kontora looked polished and felt meaningful even when it tried a little too hard to be mysterious.





7/25/22

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A man's temperament determines his fate

Saving General Yang is based on the famous story of General Yang Ye and his seven sons during the Song Dynasty. A better than average film that martial arts movie lovers should enjoy.

The Yang family's fate was thrown into turmoil when the youngest son killed a rival family's son in a tournament to win the princess' hand in marriage. As the Pan family was demanding justice the Khitan army attacked. Lord Pan was chosen as the supreme commander of the army who took the opportunity to betray General Yang and his men during a vicious battle. Yang was hit with a poison arrow as Pan's troops retreated leaving him and his men at the mercy of the cruel Khitan general Yelu Yuan. Yang and his men were allowed to live in an old ruins setting a trap for his sons. Out of love and loyalty his sons set out with a small band of men to rescue their father. A seer gave their mother a dire warning, "Seven sons will go out, six will come back". Interpreting soothsaying can be tricky.

The cast was huge and with the movie clocking in at a scant 100 minutes there wasn't much time for character development. Director Yu threw in a few flashbacks and enough comments to glean the bare basic characteristics of each brother. The brothers were led by the stalwart eldest, Ekin Cheng. Vic Chou played the supreme archer of the group and Wu Chun played the pivotal 6th brother. Adam Cheng did well as the stoic and loyal general resigned to his fate. Shao Bing gave enough menace to his vengeful general to make him a proper threat. And Bryan Leung ("Beardy!"), familiar to martial arts movie fans, rounded out the male cast as the treacherous Pan Ren Mei. Xu Fan as the General's wife and Ady An as Princess Chai Mei Rong were the small female presence in the movie.

This was not a personality and character driven movie, though stylish, it lacked in substance on occasion. This was bloody battle upon bloody battle as the brothers fought their way into enemy territory and then turned around to fight their way out. A devastating catapult/trebuchet assault and a thrilling archer battle in the tall grass were two of the creative highlights. Even with the modicum of character development I admit to getting choked up in a few scenes.

The costumes, sets, and CGI were all stellar. The battles contained the right amount of gravitas and high stakes. Stephen Tung Wai choreographed some amazing and cruel fight scenes. The brothers were outnumbered in every fight and the choreography showed the brutal reality of close quarters confrontations with sharp weapons complete with heroics and desperation. Wu could lay the family fidelity and heroism on a little thick at times, but given their dire situations and commitment to each other, I could overlook some heavy-handed moments. There were a couple of scenes that didn't work very well, but for the most part the movie flowed and usually at breakneck speed. The OST bordered on over-wrought but for me managed to err more on the side of rousing.

Saving General Yang would have benefited from greater character development, but as a perilous story of 7 brothers facing overwhelming odds to bring their father home, it mostly succeeded. Not everyone will like this movie, but I found it gripping and entertaining.

7/19/22

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Wong Fei Hung had to battle a local baddie, a romantic Russian, and dozens of lions all while trying to work out his relationship with 13th Aunt and thwart an assassin. All in a day's work for the martial arts folk hero. This outing for Jet Li's Wong Fei Hung tended to be busy, loud, and unfocused. There were moments of humor and romance, and a few good fights buried within the film.

The evil Empress Dowager wanted to impress the foreigners and encourage more martial arts by holding a lion dance competition. Instead of uniting the martial artists they ended up fighting each other in violent dance offs with lions. WFH tried to calm everyone down, but the local oil factory owner kept everyone stirred up. WFH also had to deal with a Russian who had eyes on 13th Aunt. Meanwhile, 13th Aunt worked at getting a marriage proposal out of WFH. She had a cute scene with WFH teaching him some important English words.

If you love violent lion dances, this is the movie for you. There are numerous lion dance fights throughout the movie. The problem with them, is that regardless of all the hidden swords, fire, arrows, and meteor balls, much of the action was hidden under the costumes and giant heads. They ended up in a tangle of costumes and erratic movements.

There were a couple of good fights. Most used quite a bit of wire-fu and advantageous camera angles. Jet Li was in his prime making all the extras distracting. The final lion dance fight was difficult to follow and the climax with the local baddie underwhelming.

Much like the lion dances, the story could be a confusing mess. Jet Li as WFH and Rosamund Kwan as 13th Aunt were fine in their roles. Much of the rest of the cast became lost in the noise.

If you are a fan of this series and Jet Li this is a perfectly watchable movie and much of it was entertaining, especially when Jet fought and we were able to see him fighting. He was quick and talented in his scenes, especially one on an oil slick floor. If you are a fan of vicious lion dances you are in for a real treat, if not, OUATIC 3 might be a letdown.

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You can avoid trouble, but you can't avoid fate

Another telling of a Monkey King tale, this time 500 years after the fall of the gods. Wu Kong has been reincarnated into a human form still carrying the revered Bodhi Buddha Relic he swallowed in his monkey incarnation. Be forewarned, Return of Wu Kong is a low budget, poorly told and poorly acted story.

Wu Kong, in the form of Shi Sheng, a wanderer who follows his overzealous demon hunting master has no idea of his former life. When the two run afoul of the god Du'er on their way to delivering the relic to the Great Leiyin Temple, Shi Sheng finds himself alone. Shi doesn't know what he is carrying but his diminutive master did. An old traveling companion, Sha Wujing comes to his aid aware he is Wu Kong. He picks up a female demon named Xiao He along the way. A blind Bodhi gives him half of the Monkey King's golden cudgel telling him he needs to find the other half for his memories to return.

Shi Sheng and Sha decide to help some villagers after the sand demons kidnapped a child for their even supper. That story gets set aside when they run into Pigsy, now called Zhu Wuchang. He runs the town where all the fallen gods live as well as the residence of the other half of the golden stick.

If the story to this point wasn't convoluted enough, the writer's said, "hold my beer". I won't spoil anything more, but the story was already messy and turned into a dumpster fire as it went along.

The lack of quality fight choreography showed. Most fight scenes were filmed close up, cut off, blurred and edited with a hacksaw. Or the fights were covered over completely by taking place behind curtains or other items or completely chopped off showing only the results.

This film was obviously low budget. The sets, costumes, and CGI were rudimentary at best. It was at its best when filmed out on the photogenic sand dunes.

Most of the actors were adequate. Louis Fan was the most accomplished actor out of the bunch. He Lan Dou, the actress playing Xiao He, mugged a lot for the camera and it didn't help that her character was written to be either cute or annoying. Most of the characters were vastly underwritten to the point of being akin to photos pinned to a bulletin board.

By the time the final showdown arrived to save the world, I was ready to be put out of my misery. The ending was just as underdeveloped, maybe more so, than the rest of the movie. If you are a Louis Fan fan or a Monkey King completionist, it is watchable-barely. If you've never watched any version of Journey Into the West or any Monkey King movies, this would not be a good one to start with as the makers assumed the viewers would be familiar with the story and glossed over important information. Thankfully, the movie is only 85 minutes long. As the blind sage said, you can avoid trouble but you can't avoid fate, however, you can avoid this movie.

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Life is a path of suffering that leads to death

The old phrase, “If it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all,” applied perfectly for poor abandoned and abused Sumiko. Sumiko was thrown from one bad situation to another and another throughout the length of the film.

Described as a masterpiece of the proletarian film genre, What Made Her Do It could be a difficult watch. The film was thought completely lost after WWII. A large segment of it was found in The Russian National Film Library during the 1990’s. The first section and last section are lost to the ages, replaced by descriptive title cards.

Young Sumiko was sent to her no good uncle when her father could not find employment and committed suicide unbeknownst to her. Her uncle stole her money and sold her to a circus. She made friends with Shintaro at the circus and they later escaped only to be separated. She ended up in a string of bad situations: a work house, evil employer, work house, evil employer, and ultimately a church home for wayward women which was as bad or worse than any prison.

Every single situation she ended up in was dreadful except for a brief happy one and even it ended in disaster. Exploited, starved, and upbraided, slowly she began to lose her ability to hold in her anger and resentment. When family, the government, and even religion failed her miserably she snapped and the answer came in a blaze of glory when the audience finds out what she did in What Made Her Do It.

What made her do it? The utter failing of society and its brutal treatment of people considered less than. Some may have blamed capitalist society or religion but more often than not, the dark side of human nature for any economic or social level during times of financial collapse or upheaval preys on those considered weaker. In this film, without family or friends, Sumiko had no safety net, no safe shelter from the storm, but she still had enough dignity and fire left to finally take a stand.

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From the moment the film opens with a black clad narrator in front of a curtain you know you are in for a different movie experience. The Ballad of Narayama is a colorful stylized kabuki inspired film that felt more like an elaborate stage play. New backgrounds dropped, scenes faded to black all on a meticulously created stage. A sing song narrator guided the audience through this strange land where the elderly were carried up to the mountaintop to die once they reached the age of 70.

The story focused on Orin, a kind, industrious grandmother who was about to turn 70. She set her affairs to order, including finding a wife for her widower son, Tatsuhei. He loved his mother and was in no hurry to carry her up the mountain. His son, Kesakichi, on the other hand, was a greedy, lazy and obviously shortsighted young man who wanted grandma gone. Orin knew that adding to the family meant more mouths to feed bolstering her resolve to do her duty.

The ungrateful grandson created a song about his grandmother and her 33 demon teeth which the villagers picked up on and sang throughout the film. Orin, embarrassed to meet the god on the mountain with a healthy mouth took matters into her own hands.

As gracefully as Orin was facing her end, Mata, an elderly neighbor steadfastly refused to take the journey up the mountain. His family kicked him out cutting him off from their food supply.

Eventually, the new year came. Orin and her son were given the traditional rules.
1) Don’t talk on Narayama
2) Let no one see you leave
3) Never look back once dropping off the family member

Tatsuhei broken-heartedly carried his mother on the arduous journey, spurred on by not only his sense of duty and tradition but also his mother’s resolute silent acceptance leaving him no room to back out of his deadly task.

On top of the mountain the film differentiated from assisted suicide and murder. Splitting hairs when leaving someone to die of starvation and exposure.

The story highlighted group needs and tradition over the individual’s. Tragedy collided with tradition and sorrow with ceremony. Ironically, Orin was the most productive and resourceful member of her family but at 70 she was expected to make the fatal trip.

Every scene in this film was lush and lovingly created. Lighting was used in a variety of manners to highlight the mood and conversations. There were a few close-up shots of the actors but mostly they were seen at a distance as if in a play. Both dialogue and silence were used to good effect. I can’t say I enjoyed the traditional music but it fit the film perfectly.

This film’s style will not be for everyone. It took some adjustment for me to be absorbed. The obvious stage nature worked to keep me at a distance. Yet, the story did resonate as human nature and survival was put on display. The role extreme poverty played in the development of traditions, treatment of the elderly and the nature of a mother’s sacrifice were touched on. The film was beautifully shot yet it felt like there should have been an opening to question whether traditions need to be blindly accepted or perhaps reevaluated at times. It was hard to be too judgmental of the impoverished village when modern societies are not much more merciful to their elderly.

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