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I WILL
not be surprised at all if many of those in theaters
viewing the film The Forbidden Kingdom consider
the act a pilgrimage. Already, there are critics—and
fans—who approach the film like a sacred treasure. No
question about that. Here is a film that has Jackie Chan
and Jet Li together, not only acting together but
fighting each other. The two actors are histories in
capsule for Chinese cinema and kung fu traditions.
Between the two of them are films that define action
films that redefined not only Asia in Hollywood but
inverted the flow of influence: Hollywood looking to
Asia rather than Asia looking to Hollywood.
Chan and
Li would go on also to making films outside Asia, which
would allow them to parlay their own skills into works
that were heady intros to the mystique of martial arts.
History, at least of martial arts and warfare, became
more real and sexier when people started seeing a man
doing actions without tricks. What caught on the fancy
of moviegoers then was that the fancy moves were so
elegantly done, they looked like tricks, but were not.
MASTERFUL TREAT.
Onscreen, the
scenes of Jackie Chan (right) and Jet Li (left) together
are a remarkable pas de deux of muscle, energy and
grace. Fans count the number of punches Chan gets from
Li and vice versa.
Chan was
introduced to us via his Drunken Master, an
unusual tale about a kung fu master whose fighting
stance was that of a thoroughly inebriated guy. Well, it
helped that in the film, Chan’s character was supposed
to be more than tipsy. Li would come to us through
stories about fighting monks. After this wushu champion,
Buddhism would never be the same again, or at least this
group belonging to the Shaolin Temple. China and its
fighting monks triggered an onslaught of films, copycats
if you wish, but Li’s three films about a monastery of
martial artists still stand out among any kung fu films.
Chan and
Li would both conquer
Hollywood.
Chan would find himself the comic performer. He would
star also with a black comedian, Chris Tucker, in the
blockbuster franchise called Rush Hour. Li would
take a generally serious path, although every now and
then, his being an Asian in a film surrounded by
Caucasians would push him to do tongue-in-cheek remarks
that turned out to be comic. The film Unleashed
comes to mind, where Li plays a man conditioned to fight
and kill.
Now,
here is this film that combines the two. This is a dream
tandem, to say the least. Media releases call the
pairing an epic feat. Two action stars known for their
iconographies are in one film. Fans, viewers and critics
whose memory of them cannot avoid cross-references to
pop history compose the audience.
The
Forbidden Kingdom
makes sure that we the audience are there in the
narrative. The film plays to our fantasy. An outsider—a
young American—is enamored of martial arts and
everything that has something to do with the traditions.
His room is wallpapered with icons and images of Chinese
kung fu films. Bruce Lee, his demigod, is right there on
the wall. He sleeps to the scenes of kung fu films and
wake up to the same scenes. Kung fu is not an obsession
for Jason but a religion.
The film
is a rite-of-passage film. But this is no typical
growing-up film, where the young man goes through your
usual day-to-day challenge. The pattern of
separation-initiation-return is a backbreaking series of
challenges. Jason is separated from his
New York
only to be initiated into a world where his reel heroes
come alive. His films and all his memories of kung fu
movies are there in the world where he finds himself
trying to return a staff.
Jason is
the Karate Kid, only that he has the whole magical
kingdom of kung fu masters and Shaolin arts of
self-defense to back him up. As with any hero tale, our
young hero finds companions on his way to the Five
Elements Mountain. In that mountain is the Monkey King
trapped in a statue by the evil Jade Warlord.
To set
free the Monkey King, who was deceived by the bad
warlord, Jason must give back to him the staff. This
will not be easy because everyone there in the Five
Element Mountain knows his kung fu. Jason our hero has
zero kung fu.
Jason,
however, has two masters available to teach him. This is
the fun part of the narrative. The Drunken Master Lu Yan
and the Silent Monk, two figures who are only alive in
his obsessed-for videos, are actually with him. A
prospective lover, Sparrow, is also there to show our
hero his limitations, and inspire him in the process.
Two tigers in the forest/jungle are indeed too much for
our kung fu student, but study he does. Unwritten also
is the condition that even if the two masters are there
to help him, the legend is explicit, or at least Jason’s
Chinaman was clear with the instruction: that Jason
returns the staff to the owner.
The film
is fantastic but it never allows us our mind to wander
from the endearing, old tale of the person with the pure
of heart able to vanquish any evil. It does help a lot
that in the retelling of this old tale we have two
actors returning to their roots. And what a return!
The
action scenes demand that we rethink our standards of
what makes action scenes work. Like the dance numbers of
Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly that we enjoy, because we
only see the end-results and not the effort, the fight
scenes in Forbidden Kingdom are seamless, searing
choreography not seen for a long time since Woo-ping
Yuen directed Chan in the first of Drunken Master
films. Which should not be a puzzle because the action
choreographer for the Forbidden Kingdom is again
Woo-ping Yuen.
If there
is a complaint I hear from audiences, it is because
enthusiasts can never get enough of the kung fu duel
between Chan and Li. Onscreen, their scenes together are
a remarkable pas de deux of muscle, energy and grace.
Fans count the number of punches Chan gets from Li and
vice versa. Everyone is concerned about the length of
exposure for each actor. Fan or no fan, it is not easy
judging who is the better action star: Jackie Chan,
marvelous and unique as he reconstitutes his Drunken
Master; or Jet Li as the monk with very few lines
bringing us back to the Shaolin Temple once more. I
myself think their fight scenes, which are marvelous for
their precision and rhythm from any angle, could have
been made longer. Never mind the dialogues, never mind
the logic, never mind the ending.
As our
kung fu kid, Michael Angarano as Jason packs a wallop of
charm and good nature that when he starts to fight and
shows his own skills, there is no other way for us but
to cheer him. The viewers go ahead also imagining Jason
back in his neighborhood for some “kicking-ass” actions.
But that’s getting ahead of the story.
The
film, as expected, is really about two great kung fu
stars who do not need any good story but just a space to
create their own martial-arts theater. The great thing
about
Forbidden Kingdom
is that it attempts to reconstruct for us the magnetism
of Chinese/Hong Kong filmmaking, the site of legend and
technology and fight philosophy, and enlists the
services of two great storytellers who enjoy telling the
story using unending variations and styles. They seem to
enjoy each other’s company, too.
Rob
Minkoff (Stuart Little, The
Haunted
Mansion) directed this film from the screenplay of John Fusco,
who has also taken on a daunting task: write a remake of
Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai. In the meantime, we
praise the director and scriptwriter for giving us back
Jackie Chan and Jet Li not through a remake but through
a reimagination. |
