Genre: Action/Fantasy
Released: 2008

When I first saw the trailers for this film, it wasn't advertised that strongly that Jackie Chan and Jet Li were finally appearing in a movie together. Then I watched the trailer and it looked like a freaking fantasy film and I am asking myself, like I think everyone else was, why are they wasting these 2 martial arts stars in this PG-13 fantasy flick. These two guys should be appearing in a hard R-rated action film where they just have to kill each other. The movie should just be ONE BIG ASS 1 and a half hour fight scene to the death. I guess we just have to take what they will give us. I am sure that people will still flock to see this film to see if you do indeed get a fight scene between the two stars. Well, let me be the first to tell you that you do get a fighting scene between them and it was pretty bad-ass. YOU ONLY GET ONE THOUGH! They needed to have a little more than one to keep this movie above a 2.5 BDK rating. The Forbidden Kingdom stars Jet Li (Black Mask, Lethal Weapon 4), Jackie Chan (Rumble in the Bronx, Supercop), Michael Angarano (Snow Angels, Sky High), Yifei Liu and Collin Chou (plays the Jade Warlord).

Right when the film started, my buddy looked over to me and said that he hoped this would not be another Last Action Hero. Now, if you grew up in my generation, you hold Last Action Hero close to your heart. Yes, it was a crappy movie, but it was every kids dream for something like that to happen. If you haven't seen the film, a kid who is obsessed with action movies and Arnold Schwarzenegger, goes to a theatre one night and is handed a magic ticket, which somehow transfers him into the movie and he gets to live his fantasy. The Forbidden Kingdom does follow a very similar plot line, just without a movie ticket. This time you have a magic bow staff. In the beginning, we meet Jason (Angarano), a young high school student waking up in his bed, while kung fu movies are playing on his TV. We notice that his entire wall is covered in kung fu posters. He is obviously obsessed. He takes his daily trip to the local pawn shop owned by a guy named Hop (Chan) where he buys his kung fu flicks. While there though, he noticed that Hop has a bow staff that he has seen in his dreams. One night, he is bullied by some kids at school to bring them there to rob Hop, who is blind. Things go badly and Hop is shot. Hop tells Jason to return the staff to its rightful owner. One thing leads to another and Jason ends up falling off a roof and ending up in this "OTHER WORLD." It is obviously old times with armies of people wearing metal suits, forbidden kingdoms, etc. Jason quickly learns a back story about the staff and that it belonged to the monkey king (Li), who was turned to stone by the Jade Warlord (Chou) 500 years earlier. He needs to get the staff back to the king to bring him back to life and for Jason to return back home. He is joined by Lou (Chan), who claims to be an immortal master, a monk (Jet Li) and a woman fighter named Sparrow (Liu) on his journey to return the bow staff.

Overall, the movie is completely cheesy and over the top, but there are some pretty bad-ass fight scenes and some pretty decent humor. The fight scene that occurs between Jet Li and Jackie Chan was pretty damn bad ass. It was just the aura of having them on screen together and fighting. The fighting you are seeing is very much in the same style of something like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero.

I was talking to my buddy about Jet Li and Chan on the way to the film. I have always enjoyed their older films. Jet Li was so amazing in Black Mask and I was always a fan of Jackie Chan in Operation Condor. But my ultimate Asian action star has always been Chow Yun Fat. If you haven't seen John Woo's Hard Boiled or The Killer, you need to get off your butt and go rent those right now. Ok, I just went off on a little tangent. Please forgive me for that.

When I say the movie is cheesy, I am talking provolone, American cheese, Swiss cheese; cheesy. Now I know that was the whole fantasy aspect, but it became ridiculously stupid at times. Like, this kid never knew anything about actual kung fu fighting and then after a perfectly spaced 2 minute montage, he is now a kung fu master. Also, I didn't really understand why Sparrow's character was always referring to herself in 3rd person. It really confused the plot line for me and made absolutely no sense. She would say something along the lines of "She will get her revenge." I honestly thought she was talking about someone else, but she was referring to herself. It was very odd. See, her parents were killed by the Jade Warlord when she was a little baby, so she wants revenge on him.

I give the film 2.5 BDKs because besides the fight scene between Chan and Li, you have seen this film a million times. Kid gets picked on. Kid meets action hero. Kid becomes master fighter. Kid beats everyone's ass. You really do not need to see it in theatres. Just rent the flick or watch it on cable and fast forward to the Jet Li and Jackie Chan fight scene and you'll be good to go.