"Black Mask" - Jet Li as Kato

[Fearless Freep]

Last night I watched "Black Mask", a decent Hong Kong Martial Arts flick starring Jet Li.


The premise of the movie is that a bunch of government -created genetic super warriors are to be destroyed, but several escape.  One, played by Li, attempts to go 'legit', hides his past, and becomes a librarian, and pasifist.  The rest go underground for a year before resurfacing; they've banded together and are killing Hong Kong druglords as a part of a rather convulted plot to take over the city.  I say convulted because it actually makes no sense if you think about it, so..dont.  Li is forced back into action as a fighter against the others because he's the only one strong enough and well trained enough to fight them.

The plot is a bit senseless, but the action is very good.  Jet Li does well, and his relationship with various people is handled pretty well.  An interesting point to the movie is that Li tries to keep his 'new' life of librarian and his 'secret' life of crime-fighter seperate by donning a black mask and uniform (prompting the "Kato" comparison, by someone in the movie, although I think "Zorro" is just as apt).  This doesn't work and most of his friends figure out who he is anyway; whic I think is more realistic then usually handled in 'super hero with secret identity' contexts.

Anyway, a lot of good action and special effects, a rather senseless plot, some good 'personal' scenes between the fights, and a sense of humour*.  Worth watching if you like MA action


*A lot of humours quips thrown in.  The most mermorable to me is after the cop handcuffs one of the bad guy's hands to some heavy equipment, the badguy slices his own hand off at the wrist.  The cop just kinda looks and says "I *had* the key"

[lester1/2jr]

It's a really good movie.  brutal

[trekgeezer]

I'm not crazy about Jet Li because of all the wire work, because , well, you can tell it's wire work.

[Wence]

I am a great fan of MartialArtsMovies, especially those of Jet Li.

Wire work? Who cares! As long as the action is great.

Compared to the fun I had (and still have) when watching the ultra-exaggerated fights in MartialArtsMovies I was nearly bored by the effects in MATRIX.

[Fearless Freep]

Wire work doesn't bother me, no more so than any other technique.  It can be used well or poorly, and that's really up to the skill of the people using it.

I mean, if I can buy the premise of the movie, about genetically or chemically modified super-soldiers, then I can go a long ways

The way I try to deal with most movies is that they take place in a parallel universe that is usually pretty similar to ours, with occasional differences in the laws of physics and sometimes  logic