Tai Chi Zero

[Egg Born Son]

Anyone seen this? It's billed as a martial arts / steampunk crossover and seems to be well received by reviewers. Choreography by Sammo Hung so you know the fights will be good. Was going to see Looper today but the screening times don't fit with my schedule so it's a toss up between this or The Watch for some brain at the door fun (trailer looks hilarious - which typically means it isn't...).

 

[Egg Born Son]

Ended up seeing Tai Chi Zero. I'm still processing what I saw. It was a hell of a rush, I can be sure of that much. Very stylised (I think in a good way), kind of a mashup between Once Upon a Time in China/Iron Monkey era kung fu movies, Wild Wild West (but not as ****), a dash of Tank Girl (comic style) and some anime and computer game conventions and other references to modern asian youth culture. A fair bit borrowed from Westen cinema too but not necessarily to appeal to the Western audience as much as acknowledgement of its influence. I got a sense of the old guard passing the banner while watching this. A metamorphosis for the new generation and taking on a wider range of influences, much as their gen-y audience in particular has.

By the end of the prologue you know you're in for something different, it may fill you with both excitement and dread about what you are about to subject yourself to. A lot of genre in-jokes, many flagged for a presumed younger audience who might miss them. A good dose of humour and fantastic fight choreography behind some interestingly different methods of presentation. As always the female lead is not only stunningly beautiful but also kicks some serious a$$ and in that particular chinese way the bad guys have depth, driven to their deeds by tragedy inflicted by the good guys.

Unfortunately I had to watch it in 3D but it didn't suffer too much for it. The filmmakers certainly had a far better understanding of the format than the pioneers of the modern format, Cameron et al as well as many more contemporary western 3D films. I have seen only a few 3D films which used it well, John Carter was better for it and Sherlock Holmes (Downey Jr) used it well. Hugo seems to but I missed it in the cinema. The animated title sequence of Tai Chi Zero looked fantastic in 3D. The stylistic choices of the film also played out well in it although I'm tempted to go and see it in 2D now. The superimposed text and graphics throughout the film looked great in 3D and were placed creatively into the action.

As always in kung fu movie the white 'actors' were awful but I suspect that was a deliberate nod. Their acting in chinese was not as bad but the chinese actors even acted the english parts better than them! Again I suspect this was a nod, as much of the film was. It references everything. Using superimposed text so much it even had a subtle BAM and POW reference to the batman tv series at one point. Industry veterans were introduced as such within the movie! It really was a rulebook out the window kind of movie, whether you like the mashup or not you can't deny the execution. Style and panache. There is a lot in here for the well educated b-movie buff/filmmaker to spot.

It is hard to describe the movie without making it sound terrible but it isn't. It has it's own heart, you have to meet it on it's own terms. It's subtitled but the reason kung fu films always worked well even for those who don't like subtitles is that the action stops when they speak so you don't miss anything for reading. Apparently this is a trilogy, the second one is already made and comes out as soon as this theatrical run ends. The third to land in 2013.

I would recommend this but be prepared to see something different. It pushes gen-x expectations and conventions through the potato masher of gen-y. I would compare it to Pulp Fiction (but at a million miles an hour) in that it is very referential and stands on the shoulders of giants yet brings its own cohesive style to it. If you want something predictable and familiar go with The Watch. It might not be the greatest movie ever made but it's certainly doing some things differently and I'm interested enough to want to see the sequel. I wouldn't necessarily want this to be the future of cinema but it certainly makes for an interesting branch.

 

[jghenderson]

I'll see if it for the sole reason that Sammo did the fights. He's the greatest fight choreographer in the world.

 

[Egg Born Son]

The fight choreography is great. There are many cameos from the people behind the people who are famous, choreographers and stunt coordinators and even directors.

While they dabble in the over the top kick-a-guy-across-a-room stuff, they mostly focus on showing the flow of energy back and forth in the close stuff. In some parts of the fights they actually draw the mechanical "physics" of the moves over the action. You will either love or hate this but it is playing to the steampunk element of the film. Much of the film has plans and blueprints superimposed over it. There is a touch of the way Guy Ritchie did Sherlock Holmes with planning and execution of the plans somewhat intermingled in some scenes but with an anime/arcade influences as well. It's really hard to paint a picture but I think there's a lot of value in this, especially for the openminded filmmaker, even if you don't like it.

I'm still deciding whether it is a classic of the future or just an oddity that grabbed my attention. But I still think it's worth seeing because it's certainly fresh and certainly exhilarating (if you let it be). It has enough slow parts and emotional parts to let us older folk catch our breath from it's gen-y fractured attention span pace. It's been in my mind all day today. Not too many films do that anymore.

Also be warned that it is a trilogy, like the second matrix movie there is no act III. After the boss fight you learn that it was a minor boss, that the big boss is coming and then it ends. Just as you get really annoyed they give you a bit more and then a preview embedded in the credits. But it is still disappointing (if you were enjoying it). Fortunately the next film will be out in a matter of weeks. I think it's 3 weeks away at my local but I haven't confirmed yet.

 

[Egg Born Son]

Just read that it might have been revised into a sequel rather than a trilogy but even the reviewer can't be 100% sure. The synopsis on the board at the cinema said the third one was due in 2013 but doesn't mean it's true in this cut-and-paste world.