SPL 2: A Time For Consequences (杀破狼II)

For F*** Magazine

SPL 2: A TIME FOR CONSEQUENCES (杀破狼II)

Director : Soi Cheang

Cast : Tony Jaa, Louis Koo, Wu Jing, Simon Yam, Zhang Jin, Philip Keung, Ken Lo

Genre : Action/Thriller

Run Time : 120 mins

Opens : 2 July 2015

Rating : NC-16 (Violence and Drug Use)

Tony Jaa has no more time for elephants, only a time for consequences in this Hong Kong-Thai action thriller. Jaa plays Chai, a prison guard whose young daughter Sa is battling leukaemia. An unlikely new prisoner lands in the jail where Chai works: Hong Kong undercover cop Kit (Wu), who has had his cover blown while on the trail of organ trafficking ring kingpin Mr. Hung (Koo). Mr. Hung, himself terminally ill, is in Thailand for a heart transplant to save his life, forcing his younger brother (Jun Kung) to be the donor. Kit’s supervisor and uncle Wah (Yam) tracks his nephew down and travels to Thailand to retrieve him. It turns out that Kit is the only bone marrow match for Sa, so Kit and Chai must become unlikely partners to save their own lives and the life of little Sa as fists and bullets fly.

            SPL 2 is rather confusingly named – it is almost completely unrelated to the 2005 film SPL, starring Donnie Yen and Sammo Hung, even though both Simon Yam and Wu Jing were in the earlier movie too. This is a “spiritual sequel”, i.e. some other script with the “SPL” name slapped onto it. The film’s grammatically-impaired English tagline is “Real action. Real fight.” There are fights aplenty and action director Li Chung Chi choreographs some intense battles, including a shootout at a ferry terminal and a stylish climactic showdown in a pristine high-end medical facility. It is also a boon that Tony Jaa, Wu Jing and Zhang Jin are all highly skilled martial artists in their own right and are able to perform their own fights. Those looking purely for “real fight”, however, will probably come away slightly disappointed at the usage of stylised wirework for several of the sequences.

            While it contains enough fisticuffs to satiate action junkies, SPL 2 is burdened with an unexpectedly convoluted, labyrinth story. A key plot device is that of a terminally ill little girl and the search for a bone marrow donor – this seems more at home in a soap opera than in a martial arts flick. The plot has to straddle both Hong Kong and Thailand and this is often done quite clumsily. It seems as if screenwriter Jill Leung Lai-yin was tasked with finding a way to work Jaa into the story and ended up spinning a far knottier yarn that was needed. This is a film in which the two protagonists do not speak the same language, and have to communicate via smart phone translator app. If that doesn’t drive a wedge in the buddy chemistry, we have no idea what will.

            Tony Jaa is very likeable as an action hero and is experiencing something of a career resurgence after completing his stint as a Buddhist monk, making inroads into Hollywood with Fast and Furious 7 and the Dolph Lundgren-starrer Skin Trade. He has the earnestness and intensity down pat but of course, it’s his impressive Muay Thai-trained athleticism that makes more of an impact than anything else. Wu Jing comes from a different martial arts training background and they do complement each other, even though their partnership never feels complete because of the invisible cultural/language barrier that’s always there. Rocking a waistcoat, Zhang Jin is slick and dangerous as the prison warden and main henchman to Mr. Hung. Louis Koo puts aside his usual handsome, healthy appearance as the sickly master criminal; his portrayal sinister but never wholly threatening.

            Instead of having a little fun and being truly inventive with the action sequences, SPL 2 takes itself far too seriously – the faux-portentous subtitle “A Time for Consequences” should have been indication enough. Instead of being gritty and hard-hitting, the film is often frustratingly maudlin, melodramatic and hard to follow. The cliché use of very recognisable pieces of classical music in an attempt to elicit pathos, including Mozart’s Requiem and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (Summer), further mires the film in unintentional hilarity. The filmmakers clearly had access to the resources and talent to make a truly entertaining, breath-taking martial arts extravaganza, but have instead tangled themselves up in too much plot.

Summary: Even though it contains a fair amount of neatly-choreographed action, SPL 2 is slow, difficult to follow and fails to deliver a cohesive team-up between Thai action star Tony Jaa and Hong Kong action star Wu Jing.

RATING: 2 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong 

Fast & Furious 7

For F*** Magazine

FAST & FURIOUS 7

Director : James Wan
Cast : Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Elsa Pataky, Lucas Black, Jason Statham, Djimon Hounsou, Tony Jaa, Ronda Rousey, Kurt Russell
Genre : Action/Thriller
Run Time : 137 mins
Opens : 2 April 2015

Big wheels keep on turning, the rubber keeps on burning and Dominic Toretto (Diesel) and his crew are rolling, rolling, rolling down the road in the seventh instalment of the Fast and Furious franchise. Dom and his “family”, comprising Brian (Walker), Letty (Rodriguez), Tej (Ludacris) and Roman (Gibson) have been pardoned for their crimes in the previous films. Now, they’re sent hurtling back into their dangerous, high-speed existence when the lethal Deckard Shaw (Statham), looking to make the crew pay for almost killing his brother Owen, comes calling. With the assistance of spymaster “Mr. Nobody” (Russell) and Special Agent Hobbs (Johnson) of the Diplomatic Security Service, Dom and co. ride for their lives, this adventure taking them from L.A. to Azerbaijan to Abu Dhabi and back.

            We’ll get straight to the point – the untimely passing of star Paul Walker has cast a dark pall over a franchise built on pure escapism. What should have been yet another fist-pumping, all-out action spectacular is now a bittersweet affair. Director James Wan, taking the baton from Justin Lin, has managed to create a flick where the audience is reassured up front that it’s okay to have fun, it’s okay to just go along for the ride - and yet Brian O’Conner’s exit from the series is handled with as much grace and sincerity as the series can muster. The film displays a level of self-awareness – early on, Brian tells his young son Jack that “cars don’t fly”. Later in the film, they absolutely do fly. Screenwriter Chris Morgan supplies dialogue that is as overripe and clichéd as ever and yet, there is an undeniable charm to it all. Surprisingly, the 137 minute run time passes at a decent clip.

            There’s something that makes this franchise very different from the Transformers movies, even though they are aimed at exactly the same demographic and contain cool automobiles, explosions and leery shots of scantily-clad women. There’s an earnestness here as opposed to the cynicism that pervades the Transformers films. This is movie #7 and yet there’s the sense that all involved are still invested and are determined not to phone it in, embracing the over-the-top stunts with all they’ve got.

Wan must’ve broken out in hives trying to devise vehicular set-pieces that would top those of Fast & Furious 6, which involved a tank and a massive cargo plane. Here, we have cars inserted into a treacherous mountain pass via air drop, a Lykan Hypersport sailing out a skyscraper window and crashing into the adjacent building, and a finale in which our heroes are pursued by a stealth attack helicopter and a souped-up Predator drone. Props go to second unit director and stunt coordinator Jack Gill for putting it all together – those cars were dropped out of a plane for real. Unfortunately, as adrenaline-pumping as these signature sequences still are, there is a conspicuous increase in the reliance on computer-generated imagery, especially for the Etihad Towers jump and the helicopter attack. The scenes in which Paul Walker is digitally doubled also stick out. It’s not enough to pull one out of it completely, but it does lack polish.

For all of screenwriter Morgan’s unsubtlety, he’s done a fine job of distributing the spotlight among the ensemble cast. The moments of pathos are cheesy – Michelle Rodriguez’s Letty is still coping with her amnesia – but all parties involved know that’s not why the audience is present. Even then, the loss experienced by the crew following the deaths of Gisele and Han in #6 is palpable and does lend the proceedings an emotional backbone, however slight. The film serves a great swansong for Walker; he gets to go mano a mano with Tony Jaa in two blistering martial arts showdowns. Ludacris and Tyrese Gibson continue to have amiable chemistry as the constantly bickering Tej and Roman, but Tyrese’s comic asides border on the excessive here.  

Jason Statham is a fittingly intimidating villain, essentially Frank Martin from the Transporter series if he had no moral compunction whatsoever. There’s a nice appearance by Djimon Hounsou as a secondary baddie even though the character doesn’t do much. Dwayne Johnson revels in the exaggerated action hero persona the material presents him with, trucking out one-liners like “you’ve earned yourself a dance with the devil, boy” and “I’m gonna put a hurt on him so hard, he’ll wish his mother kept her legs closed.” Ronda Rousey shows up as a bodyguard to furnish the requisite catfight with Michelle Rodriguez, a role fulfilled by fellow MMA fighter Gina Carano in the previous film. The show is well and truly stolen by Kurt Russell. The 80s action icon has still got it and looks like he’s having a ball. When he slips on the night-vision shades and draws twin pistols to get in on the fun himself, prepare to cheer.

As film critics, we hear the “it’s not meant to be Oscar-worthy high art” defence a whole lot. Well, for the Fast and Furious films, especially #5 onwards, it applies. We’re not about to give the cheesy dialogue and sometimes-intrusive visual effects work a free pass, but Wan makes sure it all comes together nicely and delivers what was promised – a really good time for action junkies. In addition, the director shoulders the responsibility of fashioning this loud, brash extravaganza into an emotional send-off for its recently-deceased star. Vin Diesel has been open about how truly distraught Walker’s death left him and we do see some of that laid bare on the screen. We’re not ashamed to say we were left misty-eyed and in that respect, Wan has succeeded. There are no stinger scenes during or after the end credits and while this does seem like a great place to call it a day, Universal is intent on doing at least three more. Better to ride off into the sunset while you’re ahead, but that’s not how studios work, we suppose.

Summary: The spectacle is as bombastic as ever and the laws of physics are as irrelevant as ever; the series continuing to entertain. Fast & Furious 7 also manages to provide some genuine heart amidst all that cheese, bidding a fond farewell to Paul Walker.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong 

We are fast. We are furious. We are Groot.

Tom Yum Goong 2

For F*** Magazine

TOM YUM GOONG 2

Director: Prachya Pinkaew
Cast:  Tony Jaa, RZA, Petchtai Wongkamlao a.k.a. Mum Jokmok, Marrese Crump, Jija Yanin Wismitanan, Ratha Pho-ngam, Kazu Patric Tang, Kalp Hongratanaporn, David Ismalone
Genre: Action, Thriller
Run Time: 104 mins
Opens: 7 November 2013
Rating: NC16 (Violence and Some Coarse Language)

         Any action star worth his salt has a trademark: Van Damme does the splits, Schwarzenegger cracks corny one-liners, Jackie Chan integrates prop comedy into his fighting and Tony Jaa has his elephants. If he asks “where are my elephants?!” it is far wiser to point in the direction of the nearest pachyderm and scram than to laugh in his face. This, his first film since becoming a Buddhist monk for a period, is a sequel to 2005’s Tom-Yum-Goong and a second serving of the spicy stuff that’s definitely an acquired taste.

            Kham (Jaa) is wrongly accused of killing a powerful tycoon and elephant camp proprietor; the man’s nieces (Yanin Vismitananda and Teerada Kittisiriprasert) in hot pursuit and out for revenge. Kham is able to convince his friend Sergeant Mark (Petchtai Wongkamlao) of his innocence, and Mark informs him this may be connected to an impending terrorist attack. The target is a peace treaty signing between the rulers of East and West Katana. Crime lord and arms dealer Mr. L.C. (RZA) isn’t too keen on the prospect of the end of the civil war. He also runs a fight club in which the world’s most skilled martial artists are pitted against each other for his own entertainment, his henchman No. 2 (Marrese Crump) and femme fatale Twenty (Phongam) among them. He has his sights set on adding Kham to his “collection” – oh, and he’s captured Kham’s beloved elephant Khon as well. Bad move, Mr. L.C.

            Fans of the films of old-school martial arts icons like Sonny Chiba and Cynthia Rothrock would probably go in for Tom Yum Goong 2. The film does have more than its share of extremely silly moments and a sprinkling of “so bad it’s good” charm that does seem very typical of the genre but that moviegoers will not find in Hollywood action flicks these days. The film does inspire thoughts to the effect of “were they aware this is silly? Was this intentional? It’s gotta be, right?” and maybe that’s your thing.

            It goes without saying that in a film like this, it’s action first, plot (and logic of any kind) second. The flow of the story is completely interrupted by some lengthy action beats that don’t seem to have very much bearing on said story at all. An early sequence involves Kham getting surrounded by “moto-punks” on a rooftop (how the motorcycles got on the roof is the least of our concerns, really). Such bits have an over-choreographed “stunt show” feel to them and you could be forgiven for wondering “wait, so what does this have to do with the narrative again?” and similar thoughts will continue to creep in as the movie progresses.

            Lest we start sounding like killjoys, it is worth noting that the fights and stunts are very impressive. Audiences generally get a kick out of seeing displays of superlative physical prowess on screen, and Jaa delivers that in spades. Earlier in his career, he made a name for himself as a martial artist/actor who did not rely on wire work and computer-generated assistance. Well, there is a very noticeable use of sub-par CGI in places, mostly to emphasize the “stuff flying out of the screen” gags (the film was shot in 3D; we saw the 2D version). At no point does it look like Jaa is “cheating” though, and it pretty clearly is him doing those badass Muay Thai moves, whether it’s when he’s using flaming shoes as weapons or swinging from a bridge by a rope around his ankle.

            The film’s supporting cast includes a number of very formidable combatants whom we certainly can believe can hold their own against Jaa, including “lightning bruiser” Marrese Crump. On the not so punchy-kicky front, Petchtai Wongkamlao returns as Sergeant Mark and plays the role straighter than in the first film which definitely helps. Yanin "Jeeja" Vismitananda, star of Chocolate and Raging Phoenix, is effectively intense as one half of a tag team, though the role of “fan service provider” falls to the sexy Yayaying Rhatha Phongam, last seen opposite Ryan Gosling in Only God Forgives.

            Of course, you need a big bad villain in your over-the-top martial arts picture and that role is filled here by RZA (born Robert Fitzgerald Diggs) of the Wu-Tang Clan. The hip hop artist has attempted to break into acting with The Man with the Iron Fists and a small role in GI Joe: Retaliation. He is not a great actor, but we cannot fault the guy’s passion and enthusiasm for the martial arts movie genre. He must have leapt at the chance to play the bad guy to Tony Jaa and while this is the umpteenth “underground martial arts tournament organiser” villain we’ve seen, the guy does have a good time with it.

            Tony Jaa is now charging into Hollywood with a role in the upcoming Fast and Furious 7. We have to wonder how he’ll work the elephants into that one. Tom Yum Goong 2 is something of an improvement over its predecessor (it doesn’t have scenes like Sergeant Mark’s superfluous tour of Chinatown) but if you’re looking for a realistic, gritty fight movie, turn away now. The clashes in this flick are as inventive and entertaining as they are pretty ridiculous, and it is in fact because they are cheesy in that exaggerated 80s kung fu flick tradition that the movie is ultimately enjoyable. Stick around during the end credits to watch a mix of behind-the-scenes footage and outtakes.

SUMMARY: Liam Neeson memorably barked “take the f**king elephant!” in Darkman. Our advice – don’t take Tony Jaa’s elephant. TYG2 is gratuitously silly but is undeniably entertaining at the same time.

RATING: 3 out 5 Stars

Jedd Jong