Dragon Blade

DRAGON BLADE isn't a great film at all, but given that the previous Jackie Chan film I watched was Chinese ZODIAC, it seems somewhat acceptable by comparison. Certainly it's a messy movie, which is typical of Jackie's more recent efforts, but it has some good stuff included alongside all of the tat. The story is supposedly based on historical fact and involves some Roman soldiers who traverse the Silk Road and find themselves in China. They're split into two factions, the small number of good guys and the overwhelming bad, and the good guys end up joining forces with Jackie and his men to fight the enemy. What DRAGON BLADE boils down to is a heady mix of laughable sentiment, Chinese comedy, war and battle sequences, and some very bad acting.

Jackie himself doesn't really seem to do much that's new in this film. The director throws in a few of his old-fashioned fight scenes to recall his glory days, and while the action is acceptable, it's never memorable. It's the western actors who do surprisingly well: Adrien Brody as the quietly menacing villain, and John Cusack as the likable ally. Some of the set-piece sequences are well-handled, like the building of the defences, and the large-scale action at the climax is quite a lot of fun. I was glad to see that director Daniel Lee has calmed down since the days of DRAGON SQUAD and can now direct reasonable fare like this and THREE KINGDOMS: RESURRECTION OF THE DRAGON. DRAGON BLADE isn't perfect by any means, but there's a good film hiding underneath the mish-mash of styles and ideas.

Epic historical war movies are easily marketable, they have a certain hook to captivate audience, especially when big budget and A-list actors are involved. Dragon Blade couples together many aspects from similar movies. With its grand production some of these work fairly well. However, it tries too hard to please viewers with inept script and poor direction that the movie becomes unoriginal, even to the point of cringe-worthy.

Huo An (Jackie Chan) is an officer of Silk Road tasked to maintain peace in a land divided by many countries. Soon, he's drawn by the turmoil and political struggle as conspiracy of Roman Empire knocks on his door step. The story admittedly has merits, there are a few subplots that are decent enough, although the pacing drags on way too much on unity issue. The main message that it wants to push is how many tribes or Silk Road can exist, this could be a great if the movie doesn't consistently shove it in the most heavy-handed way.

Jackie Chan is a star in his own right. He's not that well versed in acting, but audience would know what to expect at this point. John Cusack holds his own, but frankly he's not very interesting. The choice for child actor isn't that great either, this is an obvious bait to draw audience sympathy. Still, some of the Chinese actors are pretty good as they look more natural. Props to Adrien Brody, he alone raises the acting level. A beastly antagonist, he delivers a menacing on-screen persona.

For setting and costumes, the movie puts a lot of effort. Design is flamboyant, it almost looks like a high profile video game set. Each character has their distinct look which is quite appealing to showcase diversity. Choreography is fine as well, this is a strong point of Chinese movie. The fights are engaging with many details in movement, meticulous array of gimmick and different fighting style. At least it got the warfare department covered.

Cinematography, on the other hand, is bad till the point of cringe-worthy. The scenes are badly paced and often recycled, some scenes are even needlessly repeated several times. There's no logic on flashback of events that just occurred, it doesn't add to emotional value, instead it makes the movie that much boring. It also spams slow motion in insufferable rate, not to mention with overly aggressive soundtracks that attempt to sell the scenes with cheesy tone. It's as if the movie is constantly yelling, "Intense! Emotion! Sadness!"

Dragon Blade is an odd endeavor in epic historical film, it copies too many aspects of already known formula in hope that the success can be transmitted here. It has choppy direction and all sorts of issues, but the movie sometimes brings some good elements, which might just be enough for light entertainment.

Let me set one thing straight before I begin this review, I am not here to defend this movie's honour, indeed I can see that it does have a great many flaws. However it is absolutely undeserving of many of the criticisms put forth in other reviews and I feel that someone has to put the record straight, and call out a worrying trend.

This movie was not perfect, it was mechanically sound, the acting while nowhere near award winning, was human enough I could enjoy it, and the choreography and special effects though they rarely came into play were even enjoyable. All this could be fairly pointed out to add to a product that is sub par, and yet what are almost all the most vehement protractors of this film gnashing their teeth about? The realism! Yes in a fantasy martial arts movie people are concerned with the plot, with geography, with trifling details.

Now look, I understand people having personal preferences for more grounded realistic movies. I also understand how some people cannot suspend their disbelief over such a mighty chasm, but to call this movie terrible, garbage, or any other pejorative for that is simply wrong. It is wrong, because it misses what this movie, and movies like it are supposed to be. Like many older films out of china, what this movie is striving to be is a throwback to idealized legends. To stories who's actors are idealistic people, who embody ideals and provide a moral message. This kind of storytelling is present in nearly all culture's legends and tales. This is what I like to term as a whimsical film. Now I admit it is not a shining example for all to follow, but it needs to be judged by other standards. Just as a romcom needs to be judged by different standards than that of true cinematic brilliance. A movie like this doesn't have to be realistic, it shouldn't be. Furthermore to see so many people demanding realism, expecting everything must play out like a well thought out novel frankly saddens me. It saddens me because I fear that this prevalent attitude is why we get so few movies these days that are willing to be silly, to be unrealistic, to give us idealistic and hopelessly unworkable moral lessons.

Maybe you disagree, maybe you think I'm a blithering idiot so full of sh*t it's pouring out my mouth. That's okay too, but please, next time you see a fantasy movie like this, please try to enjoy the flow and the essence of the movie, before resorting to cold literary analysis of it.

Anyways to wrap up this rant disguised as a review, my personal thoughts on the movie were that it was enjoyable, though I'd hesitate to recommend it to anyone but people who share my love of fantastic and improbable meetings of ancient cultures for a fantasy romp. 6/10 it's okay.

While the main message of the movie was about multi-cultural peace (probably what the world needs now), choreography was good (nothing less than expected from a J.C. movie), side jokes to make you giggle from this otherwise boring plot, nothing else about the movie was able to redeem it from it's cliché story progression and bad script.

1) The message about multicultural peace was smacked right in audience faces left, right, up, down from the beginning of the show. To make things worst, coupled with cheesy lines, it made a profound and wise motif seem plain cheesy, overly-simplified and lacked the depth it should have had.

2) Despite the strong development of major characters, minor/side characters were not grounded enough. Fickle change in beliefs by side characters (people of the Wild Geese Gate), once again, made the story look superficial and badly developed.

Unfortunately, great choreography, scene shots and strong casts could not save it from its draggy, underdeveloped plot and horrible script.

Read a review claiming Dragon Blade achieved "so bad it's good" status. Wow, did it ever! Imagine if Sharknado (the dethroned champion of "so bad it's good) had a $65 million budget.

This movie had a lot of good going for it. Jackie Chan is an amazing action star, made famous by his "stunt fighting" which he excels at in this movie. The production value was really top notch - sets, costumes, cinematography, special effects, all of it was quite impressive.

Where this movie fails on every level is the writing and the acting. I could go into great detail but I think the best comparison is the cheesy, campy entertainment that is the SyFy original movie.

Adrien Brody and John Cusack must have signed onto this movie like all the A-list celebrities back in the 80s making Japanese commercials for a quick buck, certain that no one in America would ever see them.