Forbidden Kingdom

I watched Forbidden Kingdom the other night. I can just imagine how this was pitched.

Dude1: "Hey, we should totally make a Kung Fu movie."

Dude2: "That would be totally awesome. I love those movies."

Dude1: "Yea, we could basically redo bits and pieces of all the best Kung Fu movies. And we'll call it an homage."

Dude2: "Sounds good. Who should we get to be in it?"

Dude1: "What about Jet Li. That guy is so cool."

Dude2: "Didn't he say he was going to quit doing Kung Fu movies?"

Dude1: "Don't be such a downer, besides, he said that back in 2005, he probably needs the money by now."

Dude2: "Oh! We should get Jackie Chan too. He's still popular, right?"

Dude1: "Yea, definitely get him."

Dude2: "What about a plot?"

Dude1: "What about it?"

Dude2: "Well, we need one don't we?"

Dude1: "I guess. Let me think... Ok, I got it. Picture this. They fight."

Dude2: "Dude, you rock!"

Dude1: "And we have to have them flying around and stuff when they fight. People love that."

Dude2: "Excellent. But we need to make it appealing to an American audience. How do we do that?"

Dude1: "We'll just have the main character be a modern day American."

Dude2: "Does he need to know Kung Fu?"

Dude1: "Nah."

Dude2: "How does he meet up with Jet Li and Jackie Chan?"

Dude1: "Hmmmm... How about we not explain how or why, but say he is the chosen one that has to fulfill a prophecy and to do that he has to journey to the Orient where he meets up with Jackie Chan and Jet Li."

Dude2: "That could work, but that's really complicated. Can't we just have him time travel back to the Orient with no explanation?"

Dude1: "Whoa, that's perfect."

Now despite all that, I actually liked the film just for the fight scenes. They're all choreographed, but I still like watching those types of movies. Just don't go in expecting anything deep and you should be fine. Heck, don't even go in expecting something shallow. Just watch for the fight scenes because honestly if you start trying to make sense of the story you'll hate the movie. Watch it for what it is, a chance to see a couple of really good martial artists going at it.