Customer Reviews

Forbidden Warrior

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

This looked like a good idea at the time when I rented it. The story looked good replete with Asian actors and not animation. The proof of the pudding lies in the eating however, and in this case gave me some indigestion.

Clearly of asian origin this is low budget hollywood at it's worst. Trying to mimic Martian Arts movies on the cheap is not the best idea anybody ever had and coming up with a lame storyline does not help either. The characters are mere cardboard replicas of their former selves and I found it infuriating that the wise sorcerer kept refering to the grown woman as my child.

I found the movie to be over the top moralising painting dilemmas with spray paint rather than calligraphy brushes. While the output of Hong Kong can beat the world in silliness and stunts they do have the edge on the delicate treatment of their myths. This ham fisted treatment shot in the Hollywood foothills as as much finesse as a Terminator movie. It is too long, boring and predictable with such a lame ending, not to mention the silly boat which looks so fake.

It was worth a try but I think the producers should have quit whilst they were still behind.

Anytime the urge rises to be entertained with an escapist film the top of the list becomes one of the Asian martial arts films, films of stunning beauty, breathtaking choreography, handsome actors, and enough legend to make the storyline fascinating, e.g. 'The House of Flying Daggers'. This pathetic film is packaged like those wonder movies and so deludes the public into thinking it is in an equal category. Not even close!

A child is born to a couple informed that their progeny will be a male warrior who has the secrets to read the codebook that contains the key to the power of the universe. The pregnant mother is stabbed by the evil adversaries but the baby lives, 'disappointingly' a girl! The girl Seki is transported via a leaf boat to a blind wise magician who cares for her and teaches her Taiji and Kung Fu, raising her to return to the world and discover life along with her gifts. A family who wants to maintain dominion over China sends two sons (one evil and the other kind) to capture the girl and steal the code to the sacred book. The evil son is accompanied by warriors: the kind son is accompanied by Caucasian Marx brothers. The rest of the story is too simple-minded to discuss.

There are so many errors of judgment in the making of this film, not the least of which is a nebulous and silly script, that disrupt what might have been an honest attempt for Hollywood to make a martial arts film. But the acting is poor, combining Asian actors with non-Asian actors makes both look ridiculous, the special effects are clumsy, and the mood of ancient China is completely destroyed by the computer generated graphics superimposed on the real location of Griffith Park in Los Angeles! The three stooges added to the good warrior's team are so silly that they pass funny into absurd. There is no ending to the movie: instead it feels like the producers just ran out of money. A must miss. Grady Harp, August 06

i rented this movie with the expectation of a great asian film: well-choreographed martial arts, beautifully shot scenes, and a good storyline
boy, was i ever disappointed, maybe i was expecting too much, considering its a low budget independent film but nothing about the movie was good except for the summary in the back of dvd case!
the acting was terrible! not one of the actors could act, which made the whole film laughable and the martial arts was slow, with a few (let me stress *few*) added wire scenes obviously trying to copy from other great asian films to try to make it look authentic
halfway through the movie (after much discussion between my boyfriend and i to try to return the movie to the rental place but deciding it was too late), i put on the director's commentary, just to see why the directors actually thought their movie was even worth making; i was amazed to hear them actually saying good things about the movie!
i watched a little bit of the "making of" in curiousity; when i got to the part of the main character, seiki, saying how she loved her character b/c it provided range for her acting, i finally turned off the movie in amusement, amazement, and yes, even pity, that she would even think that

Forbidden Warrior sounds interesting at first. Hot chick? Check! Mystical powers? Check! Martial arts? Check! It has all the right ingredients to be awesome ...

But it is so the opposite of awesome. It is, in fact, the anti-awesome.

The plot, what little there is, involves two brothers and a pirate on a quest to find Seki (Marie Matiko), the magical girl who can read the magical book that will unlock the Secrets of the Land. She is raised by a blind flying Anglo hippie who speaks in SLOW. PLODDING. SENTENCES, and spends much of her time in the wilderness, picking flowers and eating berries.

Into this idyllic lifestyle wanders an Asian pirate and his hot white chick companion (Musetta Vander, who seems to have no purpose other than to glare at people). The pirate instantly falls in love with Seki. What this plot has to do with anything, I have no idea.

The real story is about the two brothers, raised to be ruthless by their overbearing father. They're seen as kids fighting against each other, and then again decades later, only nobody has aged one bit except the two boys. Ah, movie magic!

Each brother has his own henchmen. The Good Brother has a group of misfit white guys: a fat guy who speaks gibberish named Jibberish, a Jerry Lewis imitation named Mouse, and a big guy named Tall Tall. Did I mention Tall Tall interprets everything Jibberish says? Are you laughing yet?

Fortunately the Bad Brother has some cooler bad guys, including Yang Sze (played by Al Leong, who has been in every American film featuring martial arts as every moustached Asian bad guy). Lots of time is spent establishing how bad the Bad Brother is and how Good the Good Brother is. SPOILER ALERT: These two are going to fight over the girl!

And then she will use the magic the flying white hippie taught her!

And there will be a big sword fight!

And then there will be very little actual martial arts!

And now that I think about it, there wasn't all that much magic either ...

In short, Forbidden Warrior lowers the bar for chop-sockey flicks down to its toenails, then trips over it. On the upside, it will make a hilarious drinking game.

1. Bad acting
2. Thin Plot
3. Poor Scripts

and the list goes on. Buy or rent it at your own peril.

I stumbled across this film by accident a couple of years ago. I would this is not the best, for an action film. However, for those who think that this is supposed to be a martial arts; think again. It's a low budget B movie. Take it for what it is. The acting isn't the best, but that's to be expected. I still have this one in my collection. If you like the odd ball, rare comedies (there were only a few) from Troma, you might like this film. That said, it's not for everyone. I certainly liked it, though.

Part Bible, part Golden Child, part Big Trouble in Little China, part SyFy channel FX, part tale of Oedipus. There is simply far too much going on, with far too many other possible comparisons.

Somewhere in there is a story of a Khan ruler who sends henchmen to kill his nemesis and family. The result is a guy who can turn invisible helping to keep the newborn baby alive, and the khan's two sons (one evil, one benevolent) on a search for someone who can read a magical book (read: it's the girl). Throw in a few poorly rendered scenes from a Street Fighter video game, some kind of Chinese version of Rip Van Winkle, a tidal wave of bad acting, and possibly the worst script in cinema history. Script diarrhea.

Avoid this unless you like sedative-free colonoscopies.

Jason Elin

Ohmigawd it's awful. So awful it's NOT funny. Every cliche, every lame plot twist, every limp character you can imagine, all stuffed into a thin "plot" and some damn rotten acting. It's like someone pulled all the bottom-rung characters from a lot of the really bad "martial arts" movies, and stuffed them all in here. There were non-asians as the oriental wizards, buffoons, idiots and oversized dumb hunks as the sidekicks, a blind magician, super-nasties on the side of evil, and even a female non-asian pirate. Pirates. In Cathay. Which apparently was some tiny mountain valley, where the pirate was really a good guy. So he died. And warring brothers. Let's not forget them. One good, one evil. And the good one loved the heroine. So he died. Coulda saved a lot of time by taking out all the hokey stuff, but then, there'd be only about fifteen minutes left. Woulda been an improvement. Watch it if you want- be prepared to laugh (or groan). You've been warned.

This movie could have been done much better, but I found it enjoyable and entertaining for the most part. I was very disappointed in the ending, apparently we are to create our own ending, or there is a tv series to complete it.

It does contain a few old style Chinese martial arts effects. The comedy was sometime endering and sometimes something only a child would enjoy.

If not for the violence this would be better suited for a childs story.

I recently watched this movie and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. I typically do not watch this genre of films, but my husband talked me into it. It was really great! The movie revolves around a strong female lead during her childhood and up through young adulthood. She is faced with many struggles and challenges along the way and overcomes them with strength and intelligence. Forbidden Warrior would be a great movie for young women to see, as well as the whole family.