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Cast: Jackie Chan, Aarif Lee, Lay Zhang, Sonu Sood, Mu Qimiya, Circe Shang, Disha Patani
Review: Kickboxer: Vengeance By- Stephen Folklore
Jack (Jackie Chan), a world-renowned archaeology professor, and his team are on a grand quest to locate a lost ancient Indian treasure when they are ambushed by a team of mercenaries and left for dead. Using his vast knowledge of history and kung fu, Jack leads his team on a race around the world to beat the mercenaries to the treasure and save an ancient culture in this breakneck action-comedy that reunites Chan with acclaimed director Stanley Tong (Rumble in the Bronx, Supercop).
'Kung Fu Yoga' is about an archaeologist who teams up with a Treasure Hunter and an Indian Princess as they race against the clock to find a long lost Indian treasure. But there is also someone that wants the treasure as well and is willing to kill for it.
At the start we are presented with an animated sequence that shows us how the treasure came about and what happened to it many years ago. The film then switches to modern day where we are introduced quickly to the characters. This was the first problem I had with the film. The back story was given too fast to digest it enough before the modern day story began. This certainly hurt the flow of the film and it can easily confuse some viewers.
'Kung Fu Yoga' teams Jackie Chan with Director, Stanley Tong once again so my expectations were higher than usual. Sadly what I watched was a bit of a mess. For starters the story just isn't very good which is the biggest hurdle it has to over-come and just can't. Secondly while a lot of the film looked good, I thought a lot of the CGI work was rather poor considering the film had a large budget as far as Asian Cinema goes. The film is meant to be a light-hearted comedy/adventure. A "Indiana Jones" type film but it just doesn't work for the most part.
Not all is bad though, Chan is his charming self and the fight scenes all well done too. The car chase scene isn't half bad either and there are some funny moments in the film as well. I caught myself laughing out loud a few times but in the end it just wasn't enough to save the film for me.
Acting is another problem here, while the veteran actors in the film did a good job there was some acting that was below average as well. I am a big Jackie Chan fan so I was I was really looking forward to checking his new film out but I ended up disappointed in the end.
The film's poorly constructed story, below average effects and sub-par acting were too much for Jackie to overcome. My rating is based solely on Chan's performance which is the only reason to see the film. The Bluray and DVD both come with Special Features that include:
Best Of Both Worlds
The Dynamic Duo
The Making Of
Jackie Chan Featurette
Bloopers
Bollywood Dance Featurette
Released by Well Go USA
** Out Of *****