Ip Man 2

2010 sequel

Rating: 13/20

Plot: Ip Man moves to Hong Kong after the events of the first movie. He sets up a kung-fu school and eventually draws in a few students, but he meets resistance from the other martial arts schools in town. Meanwhile, a British thuggish boxer smashes his way into Hong Kong, insults everybody, and

Well, it's not as good as Ip Man. The first half makes a good run at it, setting up an old-school kung-fu conflict with rival martial arts schools dissing each other. It's easy to love just how good the movie looks and Donnie Yen's smooth ferocity and ridiculous speed. And then look--it's the legendary fatso Sammo Hung. When the fight choreographers just allow these guys to kick and punch at each other, things are really really good. A scene where Ip Man meets some students from one of the rival schools in an attempt to fetch one of his students from their clutches contains a lot of thrills and excitement, and Yen uses props in a way that would make Jackie Chan proud. Then, during a scene where Ip Man battles a few kung-fu masters, including the aforementioned Hung, on a wobbling table, they suddenly decide to lean back on some special effects that make the fighters look a little cartoonish. Don't get me wrong. I was entertained by the whole thing, but it was a little goofy and killed the realistic feel that a biopic like this should have. After all that is almost settled, the movie shifts gears again and turns into Rocky IV. Or whatever Rocky movie has the big mean Russian guy in it. Then, you get a guy named Darren Shahlavi chawing down on the scenery as British boxing stud Twister. He's a weirdly arrogant villain, but the ensuing fights between him and the kung-fu guys never make any sense to me. Let's see--Twister's powerful but boxing-gloved punches vs. a guy who is using his bare hands and feet? I don't care how ripped the guy is, isn't who should win the fight kind of a no-brainer? Yeah, yeah. I get it. It's all sort of symbolic anyway. There wasn't really a moment during this movie where I didn't want to be watching it, but it's definitely kind of a let-down following the great first movie.

There's an appearance by a famous guy at the tail end of this movie. I wonder if he'll be a character in the third Ip Man movie.

Enter the Dragon

1973 kung-fu spy movie

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Bruce Lee's recruited to participate in a martial arts tournament on an island to check out what's really going on there with Han, an alleged criminal with an array of fake hands. He meets some new friends and kicks some ass.

Less a traditional chop-suey flick than a James Bond-esque excursion with Bruce's pectoral and abdomen muscles replacing 007's gimmicks. This movie actually doesn't need a plot; it's all about Bruce Lee's presence. Whenever Lee's on the screen in this, it's impossible to take your eyes off him. You don't even want to blink. He's just so quick and so powerful, and his every gesture is like a work of art. Lee's the focus of Enter the Dragon, and he fills the screen, always right in the center. And I'm not a homosexual or anything, but what a physical specimen this guy was. Enter the Dragon takes a while to build with all this plot stuff and character development getting in the way, but it's all undeniably cool. You get a cool cast with Chinese Hercules himself Bolo Yeung, a different kind of physical specimen but always fun to see; Robert Wall, one of the seventh funkiest white men to ever live; super-suave John Saxon; cooler-than-cool black samurai Jim Kelly; and the nearly-recognizable Kien Shih/Shih Kien with all those "hand" weapons including, I think, a rake attachment. How cool would a Han action figure be, by the way? One Han gripe: He swipes at Bruce Lee pretty well and scratches him up a bit, the only character in the movie to really do any damage to the hero. There's one scene where he sneaks up behind him and cat-scratches him. Why didn't he just stab him there? Once the action in this one gets going, it's a lot of fun watching Bruce Lee slink around, but the real excitement comes in the thrilling final twenty-five minutes, building to a Lady of Shanghai-like hall of mirrors sequence which would have caused me to cream my jeans if I hadn't just seen him doing his nunchaku thang a few minutes earlier and already shot my wad. And if I even owned a pair of jeans to cream. Some early philosophical mumbo-jumbo doesn't distract from the central message of Enter the Dragon: Bruce Lee is a total badass.

Bruce Lee Fights Back from the Grave

1976 Bruceploitation pic

Rating: 2/20

Plot: It's Bruce Lee fighting back from the grave. Duh! No, actually it's not Bruce Lee. It's some other guy who may be of the same nationality of the kung-fu superstar who finds out that his kung-fu master has been murdered and wants to find the people responsible--a cowboy, a guy with a cape, etc. Along the way, he gets himself a girlfriend.

I don't trust the people behind this movie. It's one thing to throw Bruce Lee's name in the title to put asses in the seats. But add to it the most bitchin' movie poster of all time that makes it seem like you're about to watch a movie about an immaculate dead guy (Bruce Lee doesn't decompose?) popping from 6 feet under to battle a beast with the head of rapper Slick Rick and the body of a bat while a scantily-clad woman looks on. Everything pre-credits, the part that does include stock footage of bad weather and a guy really emerging from a grave misled me into thinking I was about to watch the greatest movie of all time. But like the bitchin' poster and title, it's all just misleading. This is as offensive to the legacy of Bruce Lee as all those Dr. Seuss movies are to Theodor Geisel. They really over-do the Bruce Lee chirping noises, especially during the fight with the black guy who has a cape and an ax. They also pull a Dolemite and give you some slow-motion instant replays for a couple of the fake Bruce Lee's better moves. And he's got some good moves in his arsenal. He's not Bruce Lee though. You do get to see him fight a taxi at one point, so that's something. The action's overall pretty stale though, and this is one of those modern kung-fu movies where it takes place in an urban setting, and I just don't dig those as much. The best action scene, by the way, starts with the woman going to her car and a guy without a shirt hiding in the backseat. I think there's an urban legend about that actually. This guy made me think, at least momentarily, that the movie should have been called Chuck Norris's Chest Hair Fights Back from the Grave. Anyway, a chase ensues, and there's a sound effect that makes it sound like both of the characters are wearing high heels. The chase through an airport parking lot is just about endless. The worst things about this are some of the choppiest editing I've ever seen and the poorly-translated dubbed dialogue. Observe the following interrogation scene:

Po-po: You're going to get the chair.
Fake Bruce: What sort of chair is that?
Po-po: You what? What's with this guy? He wants his own special kind?
Other po-po: He wants his own maid. (I played this several times. I couldn't hear anything else.)
Po-po: The fool!
Other po-po: Are you putting us on? Give us some proof or you're gonna fry, boy.

And the voice work, as you'd expect, is not good. Especially the guy (I think?) who does the voice for a character named Welby. Oh, and you don't believe me about the bad dialogue? Check this one out:

Girl: What are you going to do tonight?
Fake Bruce: How am I suppose to know what I'm doing tonight?
Girl: Tell me.
FB: What do you mean?
Girl: I mean, where are you gonna go to?
FB: I got nowhere. I don't know a single soul in the city of L.A.
Girl: Where are you gonna go?
FB: Where my fancy takes me, I guess.
Girl: Really? Your fancy just go anywhere? (Rewound this one a few times, too.)
FB: I'll just wander (dramatic pause) around.
Girl: You poor boy. I've got a better idea. Why not just come home with me?
FB: Where to?
Girl: Come on!
FB: You don't have to, you know.
Girl: Come off it!

Do I sound bitter while writing about this bad movie? Maybe. But I feel like there were promises made and promises broken. I mean, a character with an ill-fitting cowboy hat is introduced, and I'm thinking, "Oh yeah! I can't wait to see this guy fight!" But then that fight [SPOILER ALERT] is just the fake Bruce Lee jumping 40 feet backward to avoid being shot by the cowboy. He doesn't kick or punch at all. Disappointing.

If I were you, I would not see this movie.

Game of Death

1978 kung-fu movie

Rating: 8/20

Plot: Billy Lo is an action movie hotshot. Some gangsters want him to join them to do some evil things, but he doesn't want any part in it. They try to kill him. He fakes his death in order to uncover their identities and take them out.

My advice: Rent this and skip the first hour and five minutes. Just put your finger on the fast forward button until you see Bruce Lee in the iconic yellow and black jumpsuit. Then, enjoy the rest of the film. The last thirty-five minutes range from tolerable (an ok kung-fu-on-motorcycles scene) to sublime (the footage Bruce Lee actually filmed for this). Once Bruce Lee gets to the restaurant/tower, there's some great stuff. He fights with the nunchucks and he beats up Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and he does it with that Bruce Lee personality/charisma that you don't see anywhere else. The first three-fourths of this movie is just crap though, and unfortunately, it's not nearly as entertaining crap as the exploitation sequel Game of Death II. There are some similarities though, at least more similarities than there are between the guy they have standing in for Bruce Lee and Bruce Lee himself. It's really a shame because Bruce Lee's vision for this movie seems really cool. Oh, this does have a good fight with Robert "Goofy white guy in the two Dragon movies" Wall. Watching him get beat up is always entertaining.

Shaolin Soccer

2001 kung-fu sports spectacular

Rating: 14/20 (Abbey: 20/20; Emma: 15/20; Dylan: 14/20)

Plot: A promising soccer superstar (Goldenleg) forced into early retirement and a kung-fu master who wants to bring kung-fu philosophies and discipline to the masses unite to form a soccer team. The latter gathers his brothers together and talks them into trying to reclaim their skills for use on the soccer field. They seem headed for a tournament victory. But, oh snap! Awaiting them in the finals of the soccer tournament is the fittingly-named Team Evil owned by none other than the man who ended Goldenleg's career. I think the owner's name is probably Mr. Evil, and his team will do anything to keep their record free of defeats. There's also a romantic subplot somewhere in this.

This is a lot of fun with tons of so-wrong-they're-nearly-right bonkers special effects and ridiculously silly plot developments. And we're once again reminded that things are cooler if fire is somehow involved. Watching the ragtag bunch of chubby or just plain dopey-looking kung-fu masters come to life and exhibit their skills is a treat despite the ultra-goofy goings-on. It's definitely original, especially if you overlook the mostly predictable plot line, and bonus points were given for the appearance of their semi-finals opponents (a bunch of women with handlebar mustaches) and the music number that was thrown in. As a full-blown spoof of American sports/action movies, this really would have smacked hard. Goofy fun.

Could this be the return of Kung-Furiday? One can only hope.

Persepolis

2007 animated memoir

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Free-thinking future prophet and kung-fu expert Marjane grows up in Iran during a revolution and a war. She watches family and friends suffer for beliefs, imprisoned and in some cases even killed. She's sent to Austria as a teenager, eventually transitioning from a detached outsider to a depressed homeless girl. Breasts arrive. She returns to her homeland and family but finds Iran has not become any easier, especially for a female, even though the war is over.

The first part of Persepolis manages to balance the innocence of childhood with the evils of the world in a way that nearly rivals Grave of the Fireflies. And like that movie, this one brought some tears. The story's at times a little loose and sketchy, but I guess that's how childhood memories work. Sketches of conversations, symbols and snippets. The heaviness of the narrative, both the personal and political, is made a little easier to swallow with some humorous moments. Even the stark black and white old school animation, mostly pretty bleak, has moments that'll bring smiles. And that animation is striking. I just love when an artist can take established forms and create something completely fresh and personal. A great creative use of the medium to paint some unforgettable imagery. Swallowing blacks, shifting shapes, violent tableaus. Graceful and moving. I did like that cute little Parisian mouse a lot, but it'd be hard for me to pick the best animated feature of 2007.

There's an animated mouse living in my hair:

Game of Death II

1981 kung-fu/Bruce Lee exploitation

Rating: 7/20

Plot: I wouldn't know where to begin. I believe revenge is involved. I know there's a monkey in there somewhere.

This is simultaneously one of the most ludicrous things I've ever seen and a film stringing together enough beautifully choreographed and athletic fight scenes to give me wood. Firstly, the ludicrous: Bruce Lee died after only filming 30 minutes of the original Game of Death, great action scenes (including a fight with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) taking place in a tower. After his death, the movie was made without him using stand-ins (including, I believe, Bruce Li who starred in numerous features of his own). That's borderline silly enough, but the makers of Game of Death II took it a step further--they made a sequel to the movie years after the star of the film had died. And he's still the star of the film! This is cut 'n' paste wackiness with stand-ins (I believe two of them), lots of dialogue filmed from behind "Bruce Lee," actors changing shape and clothes in the middle of conversations, walls in rooms changing color and decoration drastically, footage and deleted scenes from his other films, and even (I'm pretty sure) footage from Lee's actual funeral. I've read, although I didn't exactly spot it on my own, that there's even a scene where a cardboard Bruce Lee is used as a stand-in. The illogical plot reflects the plundered approach--it's senseless, spontaneous, and really really stupid. You're unaware who the real bad guys are in this one, probably because the filmmakers were also completely unaware who the real bad guys are. Most shocking of all is when Bruce Lee's character dies (as stupidly as Boba Fett in Return of the Jedi, I might add) in the middle of the movie and the brother, getting no screen time in the first half of the movie and being described as a porn-lovin' lazy slob of a disappointment, suddenly becomes the star of the movie. It was almost as if they had run out of footage of Bruce Lee (some, I swear, they had already used more than once anyway) and decided just to kill him off. In tribute, they show a montage of stills from Lee's career that is completely out of place since they are so obviously pictures of a celebrity and not the character in the movie. It's so bizarre and utterly unnerving.

Now the good: The bulk of the fight scenes in this were stunning and lots and lots of fun. Fast and furious, there's a good exhibition of mad kung-fu skills in this, from the master's easy fight with one of the challengers as he calmly drinks his tea to the brilliant and long climactic battle at the end. Along the way, you've got Bruce Lee's brother killing Gilbert Gottfried, a fight with about sixty silver-clad scientists (?), a ridiculous battle against a guy dressed as Tarzan, fisticuffs with what might have been a robot, and a kung-fu fight with a man in a lion suit who was probably supposed to be an actual lion. So many laughs and so many what-the-hell moments.