The Backlog

The Jackie Chan vs Jet Li hype is overrated. While I have enjoyed Jackie Chan’s previous works such as Drunken Master, Police Story and Rob-B-Hood, I also admired Jet Li’s kung fu flicks such as Fearless and his series of Wong Fei Hong movies. However when the two were put together in the same movie, it seemed like the mountain was too small for two tigers.

The long-awaited fight scene between Jet Li and Jackie Chan was quite disappointing. It seemed like the movie was trying too hard to balance between the two, and as a result the fight ended in a truce. I expected one of them to beat the crap out of the other, then the loser would come back for another round to settle the score at 1 - 1.

Jet Li was quiet throughout the match, and then suddenly spurt out some English at the end of the fight. His Englund dawn powderful, man. Most of the time I can’t catch what the heck he was saying. Thank God for the subtitles.

Why oh why did the Jade Warlord and his cronies wear so much eyeshadow? Does it actually mean something or did they really put on the makeup to look more intimidating? It seems to me, that the Jade Warlord wore the most makeup.

The storyline seemed to focus on the American boy too much. Well, of course, since he is the lead character in the movie. I wasn’t used to watching a movie with Jackie Chan or Jet Li in it where they are not the lead characters themselves. Also, the way the characters appear and join the boy to face the Jade Warlord is a joke. That Sparrow girl just appeared out of nowhere and then cried father and mother, wanting to seek revenge on the Jade Warlord. The monk in white (Jet Li) also appeared out of nowhere moments before the fight against Jackie Chan. And Jackie… well… he was introduced as a roaming beggar who seemed to have passed by in coincidence.

Since Jet Li plays a monk, and also the Monkey King (Sun Wu Kong) Jackie Chan has to have two roles as well. I didn’t notice this until the very end of the movie. Jackie plays Lu Yan, the aforementioned beggar. He is also the old, old man in the present time who opens a pawnshop selling bootleg kungfu DVDs. I don’t know if the old man is a descendant of Lu Yan, as it wasn’t mentioned in the movie.

I can’t say I didn’t like the movie. The visual effects were awesome. Especially the part when the boy freed the Monkey King. I would rate this movie at 7.5/10. It can be an entertaining movie if you don’t look too much into the details.