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The Forbidden Kingdom
Directed by : Rob Minkoff Starring: Michael Angarano, Jet Li, Jackie Chan, Colin Chou Synopsis: Jason, a kung-fu movie-obsessed teen discovers the magic staff that belonged to the Monkey King in Ancient China. After an incident involving some local thugs, Jason is magically transported through time so that he may deliver the staff to its rightful owner, who has been imprisoned in stone for 500 years by the Jade Warlord. Aiding him are Yu Lan (Chan), a drunken scholar, and The Silent Monk (Li), as well as the Golden Sparrow (Yifei Lu) who has her own score to settle with the Jade Warlord... Review: The initial excitement that came with the news that, finally, Jet Li and Jackie Chan were to star in the same movie, was almost immediately dampened by the fact that a) it was a Hollywood production, and b) it was a retread of the “Into The West” legend, which had already been done enough times (the tv series Monkey was a serialisation of this story). The first promos brought even worse news – neither Jet nor Jackie were the main character. That “honor” befell Angarano, who’d done a lot of tv work on 24 and Will and Grace. So, my enthusiasm for this movie was pretty much on a par with my enthusiasm for a Uwe Boll movie marathon.
The funny thing is though, my initial disappointment kind of waned as its taken so long for this movie to come to the UK. I was able to leave most of my baggage at the door and take the movie on its own terms. As such, I discovered a pretty decent kids movie. Although it has all the trappings of “Into the West” (Jason’s surname is Tripitaka, the name of the Buddhist monk in the tale), the movie has just as much in common with “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court”, and brings about the same kind of wonder. The
Forbidden Kingdom
draws on a whole number of ideas from various movies old and new, diluting the mix to make it palatable for a young audience who perhaps aren’t ready for the intricacies of Crouching Tigers, Flying Daggers or Golden Flowers. For those of us who have kids of our own, and want to broaden their horizons beyond transforming robots, this is a good place to start. I use the word diluted, rather than “dumbed down”, because this movie doesn’t disrespect its audience. One of the nice surprises was the fact that when Jason isn’t around, everyone speaks in Chinese rather than English.
Rob Minkoff may seem a strange choice for director, but he has made a couple of solid kids’ movies in the past (Stuart Little). He captures the action very well and keeps everything moving at a consistent pace. Jet Li and Jackie Chan both get to strut – just enough to make the whole endeavour worthwhile. They have a pretty decent fight scene where each is trying to keep hold of the Monkey King staff. Both get to play two different characters – Jet certainly shows a different side to his usual dour demeanour as The Monkey King – all playful and mischievous. He obviously had a lot of fun with the role, as did Jackie as the drunken Yu Lan, making fun of the gruelling training montages of his early movies. The best compliment I can give Michael Angarano is that he doesn’t make a fool of himself in such revered company, which would be pretty easy to do.
The legendary Yuen Woo Ping handles the action choreography, utilising mostly fantastical wire-fu for the whole of the movie. I’m not a fan of that style of choreography usually, but within the context of this movie, which is a fantasy afterall, the wire-fu kind of works and feels right. Verdict: For true martial arts fans this will be seen as a tragic missed opportunity. Taken on its own merits, however, this is a pretty good kids movie and a gateway for kids to appreciate more authentic martial arts movies in their future. 7 out of 10 (MikeOutWest)
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