I'm not sure whether this scenario counts as exploitation of the vulnerable, but see what you think... Zin is the lover of Yakuza boss Masashi. She works for her ex, a Thai gangster called No.8. Zin and No. 8 have a minor fall out, with No. 8 shooting his own toe (?) then at a later date chopping off Zin's toe. Anyway, Zin has a daughter to Masashi but No. 8 forbids Zin from seeing Masashi again (it's all a bit complicated). The daughter, called Zen (Yanin Vismitananda), turns out to be autistic and a dab hand at catching objects that are thrown at her face. Zin and Moom, a young boy she's taken in, decide to make some cash by using Zen as a street performer. Everyone gathers in a ring round her and chucks stuff at her, which she catches. Then they cough up some dough. Hooray. After watching some martial arts films, like the director's own Ong-bak, Zen develops the ability to kick people around a fair bit. So Moom and Zen embark on a quest, collecting debts owed to Zin to pay for her cancer drugs.
So yep, it is exploitation but at least it's for a good reason. Although the inclusion later on of another adult with a learning disability who fights on the side of the gangsters left an unpleasant taste in the mouth and felt decidedly unnecessary.
Despite this Chocolate is actually a pretty good scrapping film. It doesn't go down the Ong-bak route of not using wires for the lead actor but they seem to have used wires more for safety than for performing supernatural leaps like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Given that they were used there are still a surprising amount of injuries shown in the credits sequence. It's actually really funny. Not the fact that people got hurt making the film, but more the way it's edited. Someone gets kicked in the face. An ice-pack is applied. Someone gets punched in the face. Ice-pack. Someone gets slapped in the chicken nuggets. Cue ice-pack. (Maybe the slapped nuggets doesn't actually occur but you get the idea.) A neck brace appears at one point, which possibly isn't that funny.
The stunt where this happens is in the final fight scene set on the side of a building and it's impressive stuff. Zen regularly boots hoodlums off the narrow ledges and they fall to ground level, hitting other ledges as they plummet. Admittedly they were slowed slightly by wires but the falls still look brutal. Let's face facts, that's why we love Jackie Chan films and stuff like this: there's virtually no health and safety. The actors certainly suffer for their art which makes it far easier to appreciate them.
Probably the stand out stunt is when Zen runs towards a low glass table and slides under it. At the exact same moment a crime boss type throws a wooden pallet just over the top of the table at her. This could have gone really badly wrong if the timing had been even marginally out. The ice-packs would definitely have been needed. (Along with a surgeon who specialises in skull breakages and facial reconstructions. Or possibly an undertaker.)
Good fight films have scraps that are all different in some way. Chocolate manages this task perfectly well. One fight involves Zen doing a quality Bruce Lee impersonation, another has her using two big sticks to batter criminals and yet another has her fighting in an abattoir with all of the lovely weapons that location suggests. All in all the variety keeps things interesting right up to the end.
As for Yanin Vismitananda, well she's one to watch. I've already got another couple of her films on my radar: Raging Pheonix and This Girl is Bad-ass!! (That's if some kind person gets around to releasing the latter in the UK.) She seems to have a natural flair for comedy and I must say that I like a few laughs with my bone-crunching, plum-squashing action.
This lacks the really brutal edge of Ong-bak (no elbows plummeting vertically down on heads here) but it makes up for it with engaging lead characters. The story is non-descript but I don't watch these films for their stories. Enjoyable stuff. 7/10 evlkeith If you like this you could also try: Ong-bak, Police Story.
Tired of seeing preposterous fight sequences where performers leap through the air and boot people from fifty feet away, all due to wire-work or CGI? Ong-bak could be just the thing you need to buck you up. Admittedly there is a small amount of CGI, but it's used more for a flame effect in our hero's eyes and a flipped coin spinning slowly close to the screen. Plus there's also a little wire-work. But it's only used on the stunt performers because they couldn't match the athleticism of Tony Jaa.
Ah, Tony Jaa. Is he going to be the next in line in fighting superstars, following on from Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li and Mark Dacascos? (Okay, maybe the last one's a stretch but I think he's great.) Tony Jaa comes across as a more brutal version of Jackie Chan with a penchant for jumping really high in the air and then coming down elbow first on the top of some poor unfortunate's head. Supposedly, Ong-bak is a bit violent for Jackie and a bad example for children. I don't know about children, but I performed this move on the postie today when he didn't bring my Hepburns CDs. Luckily, he saw the funny side of his fractured skull. Literally.
Let's face facts, it's all about the fights and stunts. Are they any good? The short answer: yes. The longer answer: it's pretty amazing the feats that Tony Jaa can perform. Whether it's leaping from tree branch to tree branch, diving through a hoop of barbed wire with his hands touching his feet or kicking the turds out of someone whilst his legs are on fire, he constantly amazed me. Something that The Raid missed badly was variation in the fights. Ong-bak doesn't suffer from this problem. Even fight includes a different element so boredom is never an issue. The final scene tops everything that came before which could have been a potential problem.
There are some supporting characters who add some humour to the proceedings. There's George (AKA Humlae and Dirty Balls) who is a bit of a dodgy swindling character always trying to make money out of Ting's (Tony Jaa) fighting skills. His partner in crime is Muay Lek who is okay for the most part, until she starts crying and wailing. She was still at school when she filmed this and had no prior experience. I suppose I might grudgingly let her off.
Every hero needs a worthy villain to overcome. Bad guy duties fall to a David Lynch-esque character who has a wheelchair and talks with a microphone held to his neck. He is fairly harsh and certainly knows how to deal with a martial arts expert. There didn't seem to be any real threat to Ting for a long time, he sees off anyone he comes into contact with, so it was very welcome when a drug-fuelled nutter who can't feel any pain enters the fray. You finally feel that Ting is in danger.
Do you really need to know the plot? Okay. The head of a sacred statue gets thieved from Ting's village. He has to get it back. Job done.
After seeing this I'm looking forward to the two sequels. I love Jackie Chan older films and this is similar, but is different enough to feel fresh and worthy of your time. 8/10 evlkeith
If you like this you could also try: Police Story, Armour of God, Drive, Crying Freeman.
I can remember seeing this a long time ago when I was a tiny little evlkeith, more of a moderately-spitefulkeith at that point - I was still in evil training. It was a cut version that I had to rent from Creepy's Seedy Video Emporium but even so, it was bound to be at the very limit of acceptable gore standards. As I watched, I couldn't help but dream about what the uncut version was like - a veritable smorgasbord of lopped heads and dribbling entrails. Beauty.
It was with some trepidation that I sat down to watch an uncut version only recently. I removed my rose-tinted glasses, (I am often confused with Elton John. No, sorry. That's a lie. That would be horrendous) and prepared myself.
Let's face facts: I was always going to be disappointed. It all seems very tame now, especially compared to the excesses of Machine Girl and Helldriver. There are some quite stylish gore scenes with split heads and blood fountains, although I think I was expecting a lot more decapitations and limb choppings.
It is quite funny in parts, especially the panto acting of the shogun. The camera zooms in on his face at regular intervals and he performs comedy evil grimaces with his symmetrial eyebrow/moustache combo (two lines of symmetry - nice).
The story concerns a samurai and his son, travelling around with a baby cart (a babby cart - Yorkshire translation) trying to evade the Shogun's sneaky ninjas. The film was cut together from two original Japanese films: Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance and Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx. I can't help thinking that I would rather watch the originals instead. Why did the films need to be dubbed and simplified into one truncated package? I would have thought that even Japanese language unedited versions of the original films would have become successful at the time. Just for the blood alone. It would only take one film like this to be a mega-hit and it would open up a world of cinema for viewers, rather than having to sit through pale-imitation remakes. Or badly dubbed versions of Studio Gibli classics. Rant over.
Easily the best characters in the film are the Masters of Death each with their own signature weapon. Luckily we get to see them in action, slicing, bludgeoning and hacking their way through numerous sword-fodder, before they finally meet our heroes. This builds their part up nicely and provides worthy foes. Our Mars Bar magnet hero still has a good go at them. What amazes me is how a chubby little fellow like this can be such a top samurai. I think I need to eat more Ginsters. Maybe that will hone my skills.
This is a film that I file under 'influential but not that great now'. I want to like it more than I do - and I did enjoy it to a certain degree - but It just doesn't get me that excited now. Some people love it though, so give it a try. If you fancy. 5/10 evlkeith
If you like this you could also try: Saviour of the Soul, Sword of the Stranger, Machine Girl, Zatoichi, Lady Snowblood.
