The Forbidden Kingdom - Mike Gregory
I love this movie. Maybe
I’m just a sucker for this kind of movie, with the little guy standing up for himself, but I love this
movie.
The Forbidden Kingdom is part Karate Kid, part Neverending
Story. Jason Tripitikas, a play on the
name Tripitaka from Journey to the west is a bullied, pushed around nobody
kid. He frequents the local pawn
shop / movie store where he devours any and all old school Kung Fu movies (or
Gong Fu as the movie uses) He dreams of
being a bad ass, “Learn Kung Fu, kick ass, get the girl” as Hop the pawn shop
owner puts it. Jason is forced to help
rob the place by the local bully, things go bad from there and Jason tries to
run away, falls from the roof and wakes up in magical “forbidden” kingdom. Now in this fantasy world, Jason
has to return the Staff, free the Monkey King, and defeat the evil jade warlord
to save the kingdom.
The Story is nothing fantastically new, the Journey to the west story has been used in several movies and games over there years, and I have to admit the first time I watched this movie, I was
a bit let down. I was expecting more
action between Jet Li and Jackie Chan.
That was one of the big selling points of the movie. For the first time ever, the two the most
popular Kung Fu actors teaming up for an epic fantasy film. Fight choreography
was also done by Woo-Ping Yuen, another legend in the business. I was expecting more action between the two stars,
but there sadly was only 1 fight. The
first time I watched the movie, I think I was just waiting for the fights, so
hyped to see how it would go down between the two stars and just considering everything else filler. The 2nd time I watched it, I fell
in love with the movie.