These two were not too happy about Jackie Chan's latest.. WHO AM I, and it seems more public opinion is stacking up against the film, but they do say the end battle is AMAZING JACKIE STUFF... so for us Jackie nuts, well we have to go see it. But be forewarned it doesn't seem to be a DRUNKEN MASTER II good. This from Yow Ling Dung...
In response to the review of "Who Am I"-
I also saw Who Am I, and I was not impressed. I liked, but did not love, Mr. Nice Guy and was eager to see a big--budget Chan film. Unfortunetly too much was spent on the pretty cool CGI green Flubber shit and not enough was spent on getting good supporting players.
Highs
-Chan himself, he is always good
-The green shit is kinda cool
-The end is definetly a good climax
Lows
-Absolutely the worst Bad Guy ever in a chan movie. I thought that the Mr. Nice Guy drug dealer waas awful, but this guy and his ridiculously overly-stupid henchman is annoying to watch.
-The middle 45 minutes; NOTHING happens. Chan runs around and worries about his girlfriend.
-There are not very many stunts or fights until the end which makes it pretty boring
-Chans girlfriend is really whiny
If Columbia does release it straight to video, rent it to see how not to make an action film. If it goes to theaters, wait till video.
In the other review, Eric the Viking mentioned Poon Hang Sang, the cinematographer. His work in this is far below any of his other work, especially in the wonderful Heroic Trio.
The Heroic Trio is a terrific 1992 vehicle starring Michelle Yeoh and two other cool girls. Sony is in negotiation to remake the film with the same cast and crew. I'm not sure if you've heard about this yet, but it is exciting news since the original is such a great film.
This spy will be called UR FULA SHET
Been there, done that....
"Who am I" was released in Asia in February, lasted about 2 weeks, then died an ignonimous death. The movie is one of the worst films Jackie Chan has ever made ... it's almost as bad as A Good Man. The directing is shit; the writing is schizophrenic; and the plot is virtually non-existent. Humor?
The humor is all unintentional...who can take Jackie Chan even semi-seriously anymore - in every movie he has to have 2 women to save, and in this one he does not fail; he's the self-effacing clown but that's getting stale. He needs to invest in story now, not so-called family entertainment and good clean fun. And he definitely needs to stop writing his own material. Peeeeeeww!. The only reason to pay for this movie is to see the stunt sequence at the end, in the Netherlands, on that sloped building. The fight sequence is one of the best I've seen in a long time, and one of the fastest, most furious, and longest to boot. The kicker is the stunt where Jackie goes sliding down the face of the building with out any ropes, cables, or other safety harnesses.
In short, Eric the Viking has extremely poor taste in movies if he thought this was good. He needs to go rent Jackie Chan's Thunderbolt, which is leagues beyond this pap.
Finally we have Guy Incognito with this review....
Hi Harry, here's Guy Incognito with another review of Jackie Chan's latest Hong Kong flick, "Who Am I?". This one ain't as positive as the other one that was posted so, first off, lemme just say that I'm a HUGE Jackie Chan fan. In fact, most of my life is pretty much devoted to watching his films, worshipping the man and converting my friends into Jackie fanatics. With all this admiration for him, however, I can still be brutally honest when I dislike one of his movies. I had a chance to see "Who am I?" about three weeks ago and I was very disappointed. I think Columbia is making the right move sending this straight to video. With "Rush Hour" coming out at the end of the summer, this movie could definitely hurt Jackie's waning popularity with North American audiences.
The movie is long. Very long. TOO long, in fact. Nothing much
happens
for the first hour or so and by the time the first action scene starts,
it's already too late to save the movie. The action, however, is great.
Jackie puts himself back in stunt mode for this flick and he ends up
doing some INSANELY inventive things such as turning himself into a
human yo-yo (has to be seen to be believed) and sliding across a busy
street in wooden clogs JUST as a huge 18-wheeler tears by (I nearly peed
myself on this one). The end fight is REALLY long and has some cool
stuff, though it's nowhere NEAR as good as the final fight in Drunken
Master II. It's just not as inventive and becomes very repetitive, but
the kicking guy he fights is Now that Jackie's filming his movies in English, the terrible
acting of
the supporting cast and the awful dialogue become more apparant. Though
the action/fight scenes are more intense, "Who Am I?" can't really
compare to "Mr. Nice Guy" as far as tight pacing and sheer enjoyability.
Add to this the fact that the movie's VERY serious and you see my
problem. In a comedy, I can forgive poor dialogue and crappy acting, but
in a drama, it's just unacceptable even WITH all the great action
scenes. All in all, I'd have to give this thumbs down which makes me
sad. Jackie is probably the most gifted physical performer in the world
and everyone knows it, so is it too much to ask to see him in a decent
movie with a well-written script?
I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Columbia does with this
flick, but they could EASILY trim about 40 mins.
Action: 8/10
Movie: 4.5/10
