Although this movie got a poor rating in our local newspaper movie review, I feel it’s far superior to anything else Jet Li has done so far in the West. There is no comparison between K.O.D. and Romeo Must Die.
In our local newspaper, when the film critic reviews films starring Asians, he has a habit of making comparisons between Asian actors, as if an Asian man can’t stand alone on his own individual merits. This time he did the obligatory comparisons to Jackie Chan and also to the movie Crouching Tiger. He claims Jet Li is robotic and too brutal…he cites a scene where Li uses a hot iron on a thug, and says that Jackie CHan would have just sprayed the thug with steam and made it funny. Well, Jet Li isn’t Jackie Chan and isn’t trying to be.
He also b!tches about Jet’s plodding his way through the English language, even when talking to other Chinese in the film. It’s a film made for Westerners mostly, and besides, all the French speak English to each other as well…!
The fight scenes, IMO, are the best so far in an American/European-made film. The film also inspires an emotional response to the evil being perpetrated and you really want to see the villains pay.
My one knock on Jet is his characters’ continued way of acting “virginal” and naive about so many things, although he is an always expert fighting/killing machine. I would like to see him be allowed (or allow himself) to portray a more romantic side so as not to appear one-dimensional to Western audiences.
If K.O.D. is any indication of Jet Li’s career in the West, I forsee lots of great stuff in his future. So long as he keeps the H.K. choreographers he’s always worked with, and has more say in his films like in this one.
Jim
There were some solid fighting scenes in there, although a couple were a little too edited with quick cuts making it hard to follow the fighters.
The last scene is well done with Jet Li against the 2 French guys.
Knowing others is wisdom, Knowing the self is enlightenment- Lao Tzu
I disagree with you guys. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a Jet Li fan too but I think Romeo must die was more entertaining. Don’t think just fight action, look at the movie as a whole. Romeo must die was a little more lighter, like when he was playing football. Kiss of the dragon was too serious thru out the whole movie.
I didn’t care for either RMD or KOD. It’s the cinematography of the choreography. No one knows how to shoot Jet - he’s too fast. There were some great fight scenes, but your couldn’t see them very well and there were too many cuts. Give me full bodies and long sequences like the old school Shaw bros, or even Fist of Legend. Jet can handle it - it’s really a waste of material the way the scenes are shot.
Neither RMD or KOD had great plots, which I can accept from a kungfu flick, but if they’re going to make a movie that way, at least give us the spectacular kungfu.
