Martial Arts of Shaolin
02/07/2001
Review
Format: Non subbed VCD
Stars: Jet Li, Yu Hai, others

I have no idea what the story is here except the Manchu (or Qing, dunno what it was) main officer takes some girl who is a friend of Jet Li, and Jet goes after him and his army.

This is the third in the Shaolin Temple series, and though I haven't seen the second one yet (Kids from Shaolin), I can see that the series greatly improved from the first to this one. MAoS is EXCELLENT, one of the few Shaolin movies I can sit through in one go. The camera is excellent (a MAJOR overhaul since the first), and it moves along with the action flawlessly, and VERY quickly. Everybody is extremely fast, probably faster than in the first. And the fights are very fast. Totally amazing. Jet Li and his 2 friends, as well as the incredible Yu Hai, totally blow up the screen and show that they are really one-man armies. And the music is really good too, totally catchy.

The film starts off not with a bunch of monks training madly, but instead with Jet Li punching some piled paper tacked onto tree, and another guy training with a staff. Jet breaks through the paper and begins nailing the tree, and the way it breaks apart just looks too real, and I wonder if he really beat the hell out of the trunk. He goes over to Yu Hai, who is training some students, and Jet and his friend jump in, and he sees a catepillar in Yu Hai's shoulder and runs at him and they have a small and very fast exchange with poles, which is an intro to the speed at which everything moves in this film. As I said, the camera flawlessly follows every strike. Great stuff.



Jet and his friend see Yu Hai practicing the mantis style outside and they go and spy on him and try to learn everything. Yu Hai is amazingly quick and shows some good mantis here, never stopping or anything.



Then there's a competition to write out some calligraphy between two teams of 4, and everyone gets in on the fight to get ahold of the paint brush. Jet and someone else struggle with it while fending off opponents, and it's really great with all the acrobatics and everything, plus group choreography. A fairly long scene too, with lots of good Jet action, his talent portrayed properly as it always should have been. And everyone else is fast and flexible, and whenever there's any fighting, it's so fast, faster than most modern MA action.



Then there's a very long traditional lion dance with some other stuff, actually I was watching this movie late at night so it was really weird because there are long cuts with a lady moving really slowly with the sun behind her, so it was pretty surreal. But still it's interesting. Some acrobatics here and there. But things quickly move into a fight between some imposters posing as officers and the woman leading them has a small fight with the main general, which is fast and good and is a closeup so they look big, and then Jet has a small one, and they then escape into the marketplace. Here there's a BIG group fight with Jet, some other guy, and a woman taking on about a hundred officers, and between fighting the masses with poles and spears, they take on more powerful ones individually. The fight itself is over 6 minutes long, and the scene before that is about 4. Great stuff.



Immediately following, Jet fights with the other guy in the previous fight which is a bit slower but has some good choreography and great acrobatics. The other guy is very talented, and I dunno what style he was using (he had long hair so I don't think it was the Shaolin style), and Jet's kicking is excellent. Jet, once, was an amazing on screen martial artist, but now is mainly a toy for directors. Sad, because stuff like this probably won't come back any time soon, if ever.



Jet and his 2 friends end up going to the great wall and fighting there, which again is impressive. His friends stay below and fight there where they do mostly hand to hand stuff and end up at some farm, while Jet does some weapon work on the wall itself which is great in itself. The male friend of his fights off some spear wielders and obtains a metal 3 section which he uses quite effectively, while the female friend has a sword and fights with that. All of the action is filmed in a fast style, but it keeps the camera steady wherever the action takes place so you not only get a sense of speed, but a sense of mastery as well, unlike those movies that insist that the camera move EVERYWHERE like in Hot War and Fist Power. And the editing is great too. Anyways, great stuff.



About 30 minutes later, we come to the finale. Jet and his male friend are waiting on a bamboo type of ship block in the river and board the ship where the general is. Lots of fighting, almost non stop. Jet boards first and has lots of soldiers come at him and he goes hand to hand. The other guy stays outside for a while and fights on the ship block. Jet, meanwhile, takes on more powerful men inside who are equally fast (amazing speed, this is rarely seen). The general throws the man outside into the boat and he starts fighting Jet, while the other guy takes on the others by hand. Then he helps Jet, and they fight against the guy using Chinese swords I believe. The thing about this weapon fight that I enjoy is that they look like they're actually trying to stab eachother with those swords, they don't just aim for the other guy's sword. So everything is real and fast, which makes it good. The woman goes outside (she was tied up and was untied) and has her own scene as well and fights like she's from Beijing Wu Shu. The three of them end up together, outnumbered, and Yu Hai and the Shaolin monks as well as the other guy's friends come to the rescue. Then things start getting pretty wild. Everyone fights everyone, and the general abandons ship, while some guys with rope darts take on the three heroes for a moment.



Off the boat, Yu Hai fights the general on some farming area. Yu Hai is great with a staff, and the general is impressive with his sword, again using it properly. Yu Hai loses his staff and gets into the mantis stance (he tends to do this in other movies). He moves very fast, and Jet jumps in to help out. More mantis from him, and some more from Yu Hai, and then the other guy comes in, brings the entire structure down (some bamboo support) and then the general is decapitated by the woman. This whole ending scene (including the boat) is probably over 10 minutes in length.



I think that Martial Arts of Shaolin is a Shaolin temple movie done properly. I've seen a few, and I didn't like many of them. This is exciting, fast, modern, but still classical in many senses. The camerawork is amazing, and everyone is so fast. After watching Zen Master 6 (which I'll review some day), I never wanted to watch another Shaolin Temple movie again, but this proved me wrong. Here's what a Shaolin Temple movie needs:

1. Great scenery, which this one has a LOT of. From a big mountain in the background to a ship on a river, this one is wonderful. Plus, it should all be during the day too, Shaolin at night never works it seems.
2. FAST FAST FAST. The players CANNOT move slowly, that's not Shaolin.
3. Good camerawork. If the camera stands there not doing anything, really it isn't much of a mood setter. It should move around at least a little.
4. No BS. Here, we have lots of fighting, all of it REAL, no wires or any crap like that. You don't learn to fly in the Shaolin Temple.
5. Characters. No Shaolin Temple movie can work without some characters you can care about.

So, this easily fits the 5 criteria, and I was surprised at how good this was. Maybe, just MAYBE I can find another one like it, hopefully Kids from Shaolin will be as good. But for now, if you want a Shaolin Temple movie, get this one.

5/5

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