The Forbidden Kingdom Review

Quite a few posts back, I said that I'm going to watch the movie even if I have to go all alone. And I did.

Watching a movie all by your lonesome is no fun, but that depends on you being used to being lonely. And I am pretty much very used to doing things alone. But really, I had things to do that day and wasn't expecting to be done with it so quickly.

Ok, I was totally ignoring the main character, which I supposed was the white guy, whom I've never even seen before. He was nerdy-looking in my opinion, or maybe he could've looked better in other movies or shows, I just didn't care about him. I went to watch the movie because I wanted to see Jet Li and Jackie Chan.

Anyway, so what do I think about it? Well, it wasn't the kind of movie that would compete with stunts from the Spiderman and Mission Impossible movies. Those stunts are very thought of and they used weapons. In The Forbidden Kingdom, all the action was pure martial arts, in short, you don't fake any of it. Sure, you can assist the effects and make them look like you were flying, but the martial arts is still feasible. And in martial arts, execute them properly and fast enough, you can actually be flying for a couple meters.

I'm so stuck at the fight scene that Jet Li and Jackie Chan had. The Praying Mantis was shown with such grace by Jet Li, and Jackie Chan did the Tiger. Errr, you gotta watch it to appreciate it. The scenery was really nice, bamboos in China, the stream, the pink cotton bushes... They looked like cherry blossom trees, but they were too small and looked like bushes. The movie was full enough of beautiful scenes for you to appreciate it.

The special effects with the chi generating Jade warlord was excellent actually, you can't even tell if it wasn't real. That was how well-blended the technology was with the movie. I'm pretty sure I've seen the girl on their team before, she had a show here in the Philippines during prime time, and well I didn't realize how skinny and tall she was until the movie. She usually wore a kimono in her TV show. :)

Jackie Chan was a drunk in the movie and I just couldn't help but think about how long he has been in the movies that he was constantly referred to as an old man in the movie. I never thought he would actually grow as old as he is now.

It was weird on my part to see Jet Li act as The Monkey King. The Monkey King was an enchanting character, with his mischievousness and naughty demeanor. But then again, Jet Li played a serious monk as well. And I was very surprised to see him laughing at the main character when he first met the main character. Who would think that Jet Li can laugh out loud?

Anyway, so there you go. I enjoyed the movie and I went all alone. So if you're gonna go with somebody, you're gonna enjoy it even better.