Tuesday 21 May
 
 

Dexter: The Seventh Season

There's no way to discuss the seventh and penultimate season of Showtime's hit Dexter without acknowledging how the previous year ended. Therefore, if you haven't finished the sixth season, stop reading now. You've got work to do.
05/21/2013 | Comments 0

Nightfall

As Simon Lam gets older, he gets better. The veteran actor has appeared in such in seminal HK action films of the 1990s as Once Upon a Time in China (opposite Jet Li) and Bullet in the Head (directed by John Woo); in the aughts, he graced audience and critical favorites Election and Ip Man.
05/20/2013 | Comments 0

Grand Duel

Lee Van Cleef enjoyed a secondary career in Italy cranking out spaghetti Westerns, with little regard to quality. However, 1972’s Grand Duel — aka The Big Showdown — is deserving of its Grand label. No wonder Quentin Tarantino borrowed its sweeping theme song by Luis Bacalov for Kill Bill; you'll recognize it in two notes.
05/20/2013 | Comments 0

The Last Stand

Early in The Last Stand, the small-town sheriff played by Arnold Schwarzenegger says, "It's my day off. Should be a quiet weekend." That's the new way of saying, "I've got one week to retirement," because it signals — with flashing neon and everything — that life is going to royally upend those plans.
05/17/2013 | Comments 0

Texas Chainsaw

One of the most inconsistent franchises in movie history is the one beget by Tobe Hooper's 1974 classic, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. How does one follow all those less-than-beloved sequels? Lionsgate's latest in the series — the seventh — has a solution: Ignore 'em.
05/17/2013 | Comments 0
Home · Articles · Movies · Action · Kung Fu Dunk
Action

Kung Fu Dunk


It's kung fu and basketball? How could this go wrong?

Rod Lott January 26th, 2011  

Most critics agree “The Green Hornet” has no sting, but that its Kato, Taiwanese pop star Jay Chou, is its greatest redeeming factor. For even more of him in action, local moviegoers have one chance only as the Oklahoma City Museum of Art screens his fifth film, 2008’s “Kung Fu Dunk,” at 7:30 p.m. Thursday.

Roughly (read: unofficially) based on the “Slam Dunk” manga and anime series, the Hong Kong flick finds its center in Fang Shijie, orphaned as an infant and raised in a martial arts school where he is taught the “Altering Universe” fighting style. This allows for the disassembly and reshaping of atomic particles at will, giving the user the ability to freeze and reverse time.

Ergo, Shijie (Chou) uses it for mad hoops skillz. The kid can’t miss!

With a homeless man (Eric Tsang, the “Infernal Affairs” trilogy) serving as his agent and surrogate father, Shijie is admitted to First University as an Oliver Twist-style hard case, whereupon the press dubs him as “The Basketball Orphan.” He clashes with arrogant teammates jealous of his court prowess, thereby threatening their chances at coming together to win the championship.

You know exactly what will happen, but seeing it play out is all the fun, and the scene in which Shijie’s masters use their gravity defying moves on a rival team is nothing if not fun. While there’s an overreliance on silly slapstick, there’s also plenty of impossible action as only the Asians can deliver.

“Dunk” is not up to the greatness of Stephen Chow’s “Shaolin Soccer,” but how often do such films hit the big screen here? Represent.

 
  • Currently 3.5/5 Stars.
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
 
 

 

 
 
 
Close
Close
Close