WARRIORS OF VIRTUE
Now, I’ll admit, in a lot of ways the actual physical production is quite impressive -- the sets, photography, and stuntwork are all well-done, and the kangaroo costumes are about as believable a bunch of fightin’ kangaroos as you’re likely to see, assuming you can get past ludicrousness of the idea in the first place (why kangaroos? because turtles were already taken?). Expatriate Hong Kong director Ronny Yu is a first class stylist, as he proved in the classic THE BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR, a much more satisfactory blend of fantasy and martial arts than this, which in the end gets far too bogged down in special effects. It says something about the film’s stylistic overkill that its most effective and exciting scenes is the one of chef Dun at work – juggling pans and ingredients with gleeful abandon, it made me wish they’d made the film about him and ditched the kid straight off.
Kangaroos, maybe.
Directed by Ronny Yu, screenplay by Angus Macfadyen, Mario Yedidia, Marley Shelton, Chao-li Chi, Michael John Anderson, Tom Towles, Lee Arenberg, Dennis Dun, Jack Tate, Doug Jones, Don W. Lewis, J. Todd Adams, Adrienne Corcoran.
Trap:
My mother once told me "if you can’t say anything nice about someone, don’t say anything," which, when you think about it, is pretty lousy advice to give someone who grows up to be a movie critic. However, since Mother’s Day IS coming up, in her honor I’d just like to go on record as saying this is by far the best talking kangaroo flick I’ve seen since TANK GIRL.
Bluesy:
Since I never saw TANK GIRL, I’ll have to take your word on that one, Trap. Actually, WARRIORS OF VIRTUE really seemed to me to be a combo deal… take the cute, short non-descript fuzzy creatures of a George Lucas film, mix it with some star, ninja fighting animals (Kangaroo’s as you mentioned) via TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, add a dose of Villain via a really bad Alan Rickman impression, toss in some KARATE KID wisdom from a fast moving stir fry chef and wrap it all with the word "Tao" and poof… you’ve got, a very loud, annoying movie. It seems to me like the Law brothers, actually four surgeons from Hong Kong living in Colorado, would’ve made a far more interesting film about why these guys ever decided to make a movie in the first place than churn out this Valuepack extravaganza.
Trap:
Yeah, the mix of American kidpic cliches and Ancient Chinese Folk Wisdom doesn’t sit very well, does it? Kinda like an order of Peking Duck with a side of fries. The film starts out in territory that’s already too familiar. Ryan (Yedidia) is a well-meaning handicapped kid who dreams of being the high-school quarterback and hanging with the popular crowd from his school, despite the advice of a friendly neighborhood Chinese chef (Dun) who tells him he just ought to "be himself." When he falls down a rabbit hole (well, a storm drain, actually, but you get the idea) on an initiation dare, he finds himself in the magical land of Tao, which is inhabited by cheesily-garbed humans and anthropomorphic animals, chief among the latter being the five kangaroo warriors mentioned above, who are Tao’s last line of defense against Komodo (Macfadyen), a sort of cross between Liberace and Ming the Merciless, who is threatening to throw Tao into eternal darkness by choking off the "wellsprings" of its energy.
Or something.
Trap:
Ah, Bridget Lin . . . . Oh, sorry, I must have drifted off for a bit there. Anyway, I don’t know whether what you described would necessarily have been a better movie, but at least it would have been somewhat more original than this one. To be honest, I have no idea who this movie is for – it’s too violent and confusing for small children, and too juvenile and condescending for adults. I’m not sure who that leaves for a potential audience.
