For the past several decades, whenever someone wanted to find the cream of the martial arts film crop, they (rightly) turned to China and Hong Kong. Shaw Brothers, Golden Harvest, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Chang Cheh, Gordon Liu, Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao—the list goes on and on, stretching back to form an unparalleled cinematic legacy.

However, within recent years, martial arts cinema has spread throughout the globe. Inspired by the aforementioned names, and the many films tied to them, other countries have begun their own vibrant, ass-kicking cinemas which blend together the influence of Hong Kong and China with each country’s own unique martial arts offerings.

Thailand immediately comes to mind, thanks to films such as Ong-Bak and Tom Yum Goong and people like Tony Jaa, Prachya Pinkaew, and Panna Rittikrai, which showed Muay Thai kickboxing in all of this bone-breaking glory. France burst on the scene thanks to Banlieue 13, Cyril Raffaelli, and the rise of parkour. Chile has contributed Kiltro and MirageMan. And now, with The Rebel, Vietnam is stepping up to the plate, and showing off some pretty impressive moves.

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In 2003, a little unknown film from Thailand called Ong-Bak rocketed up the charts of action and martial arts film fanatics the world over, and for good reason.  Unlike so many action movies these days, which make use of copious amounts of CGI, wire effects, stunt doubles, Ong-Bak was, for all intents and purposes, the real deal—no special effects, no wires, just lots and lots of jawdropping stuntwork and cringe-inducing martial arts choreography. 

Not surprisingly, the film’s star—Tony Jaa—was soon being proclaimed as the successor to the throne of both Jackie Chan and Jet Li, due to his incredible abilities and seemingly suicidal risk-taking.  All eyes were on Jaa’s next film, Tom Yum Goong (aka The Protector here in the States), and the clips that began popping up on the Web were certainly encouraging.  Tom Yum Goong promised to be Ong-Bak turned up to eleven.  Which, considering that Ong-Bak itself had turned the action movie thrills up to eleven, was something indeed.

But the fact is that Tom Yum Goong is a decidedly inferior film, and proof that Jaa isn’t quite up to Chan and Li’s levels as a martial arts star.  He’s got the bone-breaking chops to be sure, but he’s missing the necessary charisma—and it doesn’t help when he’s backed by a storyline as weak and nonsensical as Tom Yum Goong‘s.

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I never thought I’d say this, not in a million years, but here it is: with Curse Of The Golden Flower, Zhang Yimou has become the George Lucas of “wuxia” cinema, and I mean that in both the good and bad ways.

But mostly the bad ways.

There’s no question that, by year’s end, Curse… will have been the most opulent, visually astonishing film to grace movie theatres in 2007.  Compared to the elaborate set designs and costumes that fill every single scene here, Zhang’s previous period pieces—2002’s Hero and 2004’s House Of Flying Daggers—look like shabby high school productions.  Thanks to the incredibly elaborate costumes and stunning sets, each frame of Curse… is awash with every color of the rainbow, so vibrant that it’s almost blinding.

Unfortunately, like those Star Wars prequels, visual splendor is about all that Curse… has going for it.  And even the visuals ultimately fail to satisfy thanks to the shallow characters, threadbare-yet-still ponderous plot, and lumbering execution—qualities that I never thought I’d use to describe a Zhang Yimou film.

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One of the downfalls of having so much information concerning upcoming movie releases, especially foreign movie releases, at your fingertips (due to the likes of YouTube) is that it’s entirely possible to see all of the good parts of a movie before you even pop the DVD in your player.  That’s how I felt at first with District B-13 (aka Banlieue 13).  However, to its credit, the movie actually turns out to be a little more than I thought it might be.

Don’t get me wrong—District B-13 is still, first and foremost, a high-octane action movie.  The setting is Paris in the year 2010.  Crime has become so rampant that the government has resorted to walling off entire sections of the city.  The worst of these is B13, which is ruled by a ruthless gangster who has somehow come into posession of a nuclear warhead that he intends to use against the rest of the city.

Enter the two buddies: one is a by-the-books police officer with one helluva roundhouse kick; the other is a former citizen of B13 who has been selected to lead the other through B13 to defuse the bomb.  As you might suspect, the two hit it off right from the start.  Or maybe not.  While the cliches are pretty obvious, as are the movie references—Escape From New York, Lethal Weapon—the movie’s action sequences inject a whole new sort of thrill into the proceedings.

Of course, it helps when one of your leads is a bonafide martial arts expert who has squared off against the likes of Jet Li and the other is one of the inventors of “parkour”, a sort of martial arts/acrobatic regimen for urban environments.

Using very little CGI or wirework, the stunts and fights scenes have an edge and brutality that you just don’t see everyday, and the men scale buildings and fly across rooftops in a manner that makes Superman look clumsy by comparison.

There are a few unbelievable plot and character twists, but for the most part, the film keeps things lean and mean, becoming much greater than the sum of its parts.  And all of the business about ghettos and government indifference feels strikingly relevant given all of the urban unrest that France has experienced in recent years, which adds an interesting layer of subtext to the film.

It’s safe to say that, in the annals of martial arts cinema, Geochilmaru will never go down as a classic of the genre.  However, in this day and age where even the smallest display of martial arts on the silver screen quickly becomes a CGI and wire-assisted spectacle, there’s something quite refreshing, and even affecting, about the lo-fi approach that Geochilmaru takes.

The basic premise is as old as the genre: a group of eight martial arts devotees have been invited to sqaure off against eachother in a tournament, with the winner taking on a legendary master known only as “Geochilmaru”.  But the film finds some clever ways to update the tried and true plot.  For starters, this is no period piece.  Rather, it’s set in modern day Korea, where cellphones and Internet access abound.  And in this internet-savvy setting, it only makes sense that all of the combants know eachother, and “Geochilmaru”, via Internet discussion forum.

As the eight men and women travel to the duel’s remote locale (in a battered RV, no less), we get small bits of backstory (though character development is certainly not this film’s strong suit).  Though teachers, accountants, bouncers, and hip-hop dancers in “real” life, they’ve all spent their lives practicing judo, kickboxing, kung fu, hapkido, and boxing.  And as they travel to meet Geochilmaru, we get several displays of martial arts prowess, as the characters decide to work out on-line discussions about the efficacy of various martial arts forms, stances, and ideologies face to face.

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When Jet Li announced that Fearless was going to be his final martial arts film, folks and fanboys were understandably concerned.  After all, this is Jet Li we’re talking about, arguably one of the finest onscreen martial artists of all time, a man for whom there really is no replacement.

However, Li certainly has his reasons.  In various interviews and statements, Li, who has been making martial arts movies since the age of 16, has confessed that he feels he has done as much as he can with martial arts, and wishes to branch out into other genres.  Furthermore, he’s become increasingly tired with the way martial arts are often portrayed onscreen, with all of the focus placed on the violence and mayhem, rather than the arts’ philosophical and spiritual aspects.  And then there’s the simple fact that, at the age of 43, Li is getting to the point where age is a concern, even for a gold medalist and world champion.

And so Fearless is his last pure martial arts movie, his final statement on the topic.  And if you wanted to make a final statement on martial arts, there would be poorer choices than a film (loosely) based on the life of Huo Yuanjia, a martial artist who rose to prominence defending China’s honor in the early 20th century.

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Yes, yes, yes… a lot of people have been talking about the decline of Hong Kong cinema over the years, and certainly, when compared to the glory days in the late 80s/early 90s, the country certainly has fallen.  I’m sure than when people see that what was once one of the greatest filmmaking countries in the world is releasing movies such as Where Is Mama’s Boy? (featuring American Idol favorite William Hung), they’re tempted to throw up their hands, stop importing HK DVDs, and maybe even pray that the Apocalypse comes even faster.

But there are still bright spots, movies that take what have always been HK cinema’s great strengths (memorable performances, emotion-filled drama, not-cheesy sentimentality, and kick-ass action scenes) and repackage them for the 21st century.  Films such as Just One Look (which might be one of the best teen romance/cinematic nostalgia movies I’ve seen since Cinema Paradiso), One Nite In Mongkok, Lost In Time, and of course, Infernal Affairs.  And I think it’s safe to say that one can add Sha Po Lang to that list.

Unrepentantly dark, bleak, and wrought with the sort of manly existential melodrama that made us fall in love with John Woo back in the day, Sha Po Lang is also incredibly glossy, stylish, and prone to sometimes get bogged down by its own excess.  Oh yeah, and it also features several action scenes that are just stunning for their sheer knock down, drag out intensity and brutality - just the way we like it.

The film’s title refers to three stars in the Chinese astrology, stars that have the power to destroy or create a beautiful life for someone.  It also refers to the names of the film’s three main characters, Chan (Simon Yam), Po (Sammo Hung), and Ma (Donnie Yen), three men who seem absolutely determined to destroy eachothers’ lives, as well as their own, by their violence, corruption, and vengeance.

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If you’ve seen The Twilight Samurai, there’s a very good chance that watching The Hidden Blade will give you a major feeling of deja vu.  The two films are so similar—in tone, pacing, storyline, and characters—that I don’t think it’s entirely unjustified to call The Hidden Blade a retread.  A skillfully done, artfully made, beautifully rendered retread, but a retread nonetheless.

Katagiri (Masatoshi Nagase) is a low-ranking samurai with seemingly no prospects: he’s stationed in a backwater part of the country; his father had been forced to commit hara-kiri, thus casting a shadow over the entire family; and worst of all, he’s unmarried, an unthinkable position for a man his age.  However, Katagiri and his family make do, managing to eke out a happy existence. 

Much of this is due to Kie (Takako Matsu), a young servant girl who has been living with them for several years, learning the domestic skills needed to be a good wife.  Unfortunately, Kie’s time of service is up, and she’s married off to a merchant family.  Katagiri’s sister, Shino, is also married off to one of Katagiri’s best friends, leaving him all alone after their mother’s death. 

After three lonely years, Katagiri bumps into Kie while running errands, only she’s no longer the bright, cheerful girl she knew.  A hard marriage and a hard life have reduced her to a sickly state.  Incensed, Katagiri takes her from her husband’s family and begins nursing her back to health, which inevitably starts some scandalous rumors.

However, the clan has far more pressing matters at hand than one samurai’s supposed indisrections.  The film is set at the end of the Edo period in Japanese history, the time when modern warfare—in the form of cannons and firearms—came to Japan, thus signalling the end of the samurai.  As with The Twilight Samurai, this casts a elegiac, nostalgic atmosphere over the entire movie, and director Yoji Yamada captures it just as beautifully and longingly here as he did with his previous film.

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