The Storm Warriors

Storm Warriors

I give the film: 2.5/5

What you see is what you get?

Partly. When audiences were treated earlier to the great trailer of Storm Warriors, it just whetted our appetite for more. In any case, fans of this classic comic book adaptation have been waiting more than a decade for producers to create this sequel, and inevitably, expectations are high.

What you get in the movie is - thankfully - groundbreaking effects that the trailer promised, but out of all the swirling fire and sword fights, the plot and characterizations fall flat to the ground.

SYNOPSIS

The story tells of an evil lord with superior power who plans to take over China together with his son (a rather extra Nicholas Tse). It is now up to Cloud (a very charismatic Aaron Kwok) and Wind (an effective Ekin Cheng) to battle against the tyrants, since their master has suffered tremendous injury in his battle against the evil lord. Wind has taken up the potentially-dangerous responsibility of learning the art of the dark side, as that would be the only chance to counter the strength of the evil lord. But soon enough, Wind is overwhelmed by the 'evil forces' in him, and Cloud has to make the hard decision whether to destroy Wind to prevent him from wreaking further havoc.

PLUS POINTS

Filmed stylistically, props must be given to the Pang Brothers (the duo who brought us the chiller, The Eye) for translating the comic book's vivid colours and action so beautifully onto screen. Several fight sequences feature eye-popping effects that keep the audience at the edge of the seat; but sadly, relying solely on graphics and dramatic close-ups do not make a good movie.

FLAWS

Featuring two of the most useless female characters we've seen in a long time (one of them being Charlene Choi), the storyline does not bother about characterizations, so much so that when characters die-off, the audience do not get engaged. And a blatant attempt at a love story only results in more rolling of the eyes. Plus, there probably wouldn't be a more unsatisfying ending you'll watch at the movies this year.

FINAL SAY:
Watch it only for the decidedly interesting effects, and the cool performance by Aaron Kwok (albeit a one-dimensional one). If not, save your money for Avatar.

Wilson Ng - http://wilsoniscurious.blogspot.com/

Last updated: 2010-03-14 05:00:47 by wilsoniscurious

The Storm Warriors (Hong Kong) (Preview)

Now that Andrew Lau is officially too busy for The Storm Riders sequel, we have The Pang brothers to make it. Man, I just saw the Bangkok Dangerous remake starring Nicolas Cage and it was awesome. Nevermind The Messengers, The Pang Brothers are going to make it big internationally!

Anyway, back to SRII. According to monkeypeaches.com, this sequel is currently being shot entirely indoors with blue screens as the background, at location in Bangkok (again?). This sounds like it's gonna be another Sky Captain & The World Of Tomorrow/Sin City/300 type of film. So far we have seen great CGI in most of the Pang brothers' films. I have good faith in this breakthrough ambition of theirs.

All of the characters from part one will be returning except Sonny Chiba's Lord Conquer. Then we won't be getting Shu Qi back, I think, as she is too busy getting into films to win awards. Ekin Cheng and Aaron Kwok will be in the same film again for the third time, the second time being Kwok's award winning Divergence. The Pang brothers had used both of these main actors in The Detective, Forest of Death and Leave Me Alone, which also has Charlene Choi. Wowwee, talk about familiar faces.

Can't wait to see the movie, really. I betcha it's gonna have some horror feel to it. Word says that this will be out at the end of 2008.

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Last updated: 2009-08-18 22:09:29 by joekhor