Tai Chi Zero

2012 kung-fu movie

Rating: 11/20

Plot: Some guy with a horn travels to a town to learn some kung-fu. The master refuses to teach him. A pissed guy with a giant tank invades, and the guy with the horn and a woman have to help defend the city.

Though there's a lot of vibrancy and neat ideas, this movie is the type that is better to casually watch and appreciate aesthetically instead of think about and try to care about the characters at all. There's plenty of cutesiness with little pop-ups that tell about characters and the town. And the mash-up of steampunk imagery and weapons with the martial arts genre, the reason I decided to check this out in the first place, is kind of inspired. The giant tank thing, like a bulbous metallic turtle or some sea creature, moves quickly from being a novelty to something you just don't care about anymore. The special effects, those flashy sorts of effects that dominate a lot of modern kung-fu movies, cheapen the whole thing and make the fight scenes glossy and cartoonish instead of anything that has any real emotion. There's enough different about this to make it frustrating that it wasn't something better, and it's just fun enough in spots to make me interested in a sequel.

Stephen Fung directed this and played a character. Hark-on Fung is also in this. I just wanted to type that name.