By Ryan Parsons | Image property of Lionsgate, AICN
The Forbidden Kingdom
With The Forbidden Kingdom due out this weekend, some of the first reviews have begun to surface online. Judging solely on the trailers, I think this film looks like a lot of fun. Sure, there are some silly aspects here and there, but we're willing to let them go for the sake of seeing Jet Li and Jackie Chan fighting together on the bigscreen.
Screening Report: The Forbidden Kingdom
The good people at AICN have received what looks to be the first screening report for The Forbidden Kingdom. As we had hoped, the film comes off as a very fun martial arts adventure.
The martial arts sequences are breathtaking. Once again, fight choreographer, Yuen-Wo Ping (The Matrix trilogy), never ceases to wow the audience. Action movies can tend to drag at times between the action scenes, but "The Forbidden Kingdom" jumps right in, and just when the story's momentum starts to slow down, you're treated to another thrilling, fast-paced fight scene. What amazed me the most was the variety in styles that Chan and Li both utilized throughout the film - drunken boxing, praying mantis, tiger claw, staff fighting, to name a few. Truly an original work of art.
If I had to assign a rating to the dialogue, I would have to give it 3 1/2 stars out of 5 - which is not great, but not bad at all. There are a few minor moments where some of the characters' lines seem forced and undeveloped. For example, there's a moment when Jason (Michael Angarano) and Golden Sparrow (Yifei Liu) are pointing out cloud formations and he finds one that looks like "The Green Monster" from Fenway Park. Sparrow obviously has no clue what he's talking about, so he attempts to compare it to a green dragon. Perhaps John Fusco (writer) was just slothful the night he wrote that page, but he sure makes up for it with some hilarious one-liners.
Like what you hear? Then check out the entire screening report for The Forbidden Kingdomhere.
The Forbidden Kingdom opens to theatres on April 18th.
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