The Forbidden Kingdom is like fan-fiction written by a newbie Wuxia film-junkie who just read Neil Gaiman's Stardust. While I found the epic pairing of less popular masters Donnie Yen and Sammo Hung (in SPL) to be more intense, Jackie Chan and Jet Li were so monumental together that they actually deserve their own trilogy. It's really a shame that Li wasn't more strict and stoic to contrast Chan's inebriated whimsy.
Directed by Rob Minkoff (Disney's The Haunted Mansion) and written by John Fusco (Hidalgo), there doesn't seem like much was going for the movie, as a transition between Chinese and American cinema. The initial storyline is played like Dragon Wars, wherein a white boy (Michael Angarano) must realize his connection to Asian mythology. The premise beyond Angarano's introduction is much more adequate. An alleged drunken-scholar (Chan) and a Silent Monk (Li) help the accidental time-traveler return a sacred staff to the petrified Monkey King (also played by Li), while a puzzling rebel (Liu Yi Fei) assists them in order to assassinate the tyrannical Jade Warlord (Collin Chou), who has hired a white-haired bounty hunter (Li Bingbing) to stop them.
Martial arts choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping and cinematographer Peter Pau, who last collaborated on Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, provided the necessary amount of skill to redeem the problematic premise. Yuen has worked extensively with both Chan and Li, making their first encounter of the film the most memorable scene in the movie. Thankfully, neither of them is untouchable, giving and receiving a fair amount of damage for at least seven minutes. A few of Yuen's trademarks appear, such as the two masters arguing over superior animal-styles ("Praying Mantis, very good ... for catching bugs") as well as the mixture of wired and grounded fighting. The movie lacks a little beyond this, particularly to focus on the entry of vacantly written villains and Angarano's transformation into some sort of Kung Fu Cinderella. Of course, without that, there'd be no story for the movie (which I'd still pay to see).
Chan and Li make an excellent odd-couple for Wuxia, able to banter well with words and fists. The only thing sad about this pairing is that it feels too much like an overly expensive "test" movie, experimenting with the chemistry between these two legends for future endeavors. Thankfully, they're impressive together, but the movie would collapse miserably without them.
Poster image from www.imdb.com
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