646f9e108c Two friends, ex Shaolin monks, part waysthey brush with the ongoing rebellion against the government. The ambitious one rises up to be a powerful military commander, while his betrayed friend resorts to learn the calm ways of Tai Chi. Jet Li plays Junbao, a child that grows upa monk in a Shaolin temple along with his friend Tianbao. During a friendly competition, they are both expelled during a vicious fight when another competitor cheated by using a weapon. They wander China and during a performance, Junbao and Tianbao go their separate ways, Tianbao joining the military, and Junbao joining the rebels opposing the government. Tianbao, hungry for power and wealth, sets-up and betrays his lifelong friend, Junbao, in an ambush to attain the rank of general. Junbao, stricken with grief and disbelief, turns to Tai Chi to help. The climactic finale pits Tianbao against Junbao in a martial arts battle that rages throughout a military encampment while an army of thousands look on. This is one of the top 10 worst movies I&#39;ve seen and probably in top 5 when it comes to fighting movies. The plot is really unoriginal and boring, most characters are pretty linear and dull. The fighting is so- so, very cheesy and you can see a lot of wires around. The movie starts somewhat nice, but it gets worse and worse. It&#39;s not worth more than 6/10, but I give it less in order to balance things since it was rated pretty high by a lot of people that clearly haven&#39;t seen too many good movies, especially from this category *sigh* Yes, Jet Li does play in this movie, but that doesn&#39;t mean it&#39;s a great one. I had plenty more fun watching Lone Wolf staring Chuck Norris to be honest :) This movie is a disappointment to the genre and it makes the Shaolin monks look pretty bad overall. As children, Junbao and Chin Bo were put together in the monastery to help each other learn. Over they years they became great friends and great fighters to the point where Chin Bo is entered into an internal tournament to see who from all the students will progress. During the fight Chin Bo&#39;s opponent cheats, enraging Bo and causing him to beat his opponent with a savagery that is unbefitting a monk. Kicking out for this, Chin Bo and Junbao find themselves out on the street to fend for themselves. They meet a young woman, Siu Lin, and start to help her out but, after thinking about the future, the two friends go their separate ways with Chin Bo becoming a soldier and Junbao falling in with Siu Lin and a group of rebels.<br/><br/>With Hero currently being touted all over the placethe greatest thing ever, I thought I&#39;d just avoid the multiplex hype and view some older Jet Li films, one of which was Twin Warriors,it is known in the UK. The film starts with an OK plot but then it starts to fall down a bitthe story widens to include entire armies and so on. The reason it faltersit goes is due to the lack of character in the script; the film is about the lead two but, other than both can fight, one is nice, the other a bit rough, we are not given much to get into and I never really was drawn into the passion, the loss and the conflict in their relationship. The film uses some of the humour that made Fong Sai-Yuk (The Legend) so very enjoyable, but it uses it sparingly at the start and then not at all later on. As a story it is neitherinvolving norfunnyit could have been and needed to be to work better for me.<br/><br/>Of course this is a problem that can be understood when you consider that the director is better known for his fight choreography than anything else. As such he does well to produce some exciting fights that demonstrate how good wire work can be only once or twice does he hit a bad note (Junbao&#39;s bouncing head butt was more silly than exciting). None of the fights really stand outbeing one of the greats, they are often too contrived and and are (surprisingly) rather flatly filmed at times; but they are still enjoyable and are certainly a lot more fun than the stuff that Jet Li has been reduced to in his American films in the past few years. Li shows again here why he became a global star he makes the wirework look natural and he has great charisma combined with a winning smile and the ability to convey more complex emotions. Yeoh was a big draw for me but I didn&#39;t feel she was used very well; action-wise she did well but she didn&#39;t have a great character and gradually slips into the shadows when the film comes back to focus on the battle between Li and Shi-hou. Shi-hou is OK but he is so simple an angry man at heart; this could have been a complex character but Shi-lou makes him too easy to dislike and there is no requirement for us to think about him or feel anything at all. Support is good with the most memorable stuff coming from the rebel comic relief but the dubbing leaves a little to be desired. I&#39;m not a snob I don&#39;t need to see the film in the original language but often it helps with the performances. Sometimes dubbing is OK with this but here I didn&#39;t think some of it was very good and they messed with the characters by the manner of their delivery the Emperor was the worst, he was done by some guy giving a very bad Peter Lorre impression.<br/><br/>Overall this is an enjoyable film from a martial arts point of view but it really isn&#39;t that great. The fights are mostly well done without any of them really being amazing but the story and characters are all done far too simply to really engage and excite. The story had potential to be emotional and driving but without the characters it didn&#39;t work so well if it had I would have been more involved making the action scenes a lot more exciting and dramatic.
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