Wednesday, 04 November 2009

  • Movie Review: Chocolate



    This is my first ever movie review. So, yeah. My dad came to my brother and I and told us to watch "Chocolate". At first I was wondering, "Why?"
    Usually, when my dad wants us to watch a movie, it's something about conspiracy theories or 2012 or aliens. However, the movie he wanted to show us was a martial arts movie. Also, Thai. Since my brother and I are HUGE Tony Jaa fans, we decided to give it a whack. Hey, if The Protector was a Thai martial arts movie, lets give "Chocolate" a chance.  Maybe it'll be just as good as a Tony Jaa movie. So we did, and here's what I think of it:

    "Chocolate" is a Thai action movie starring JeeJa Yanin. Simple enough, the girl she plays in the movie can watch Bruce Lee on the television, and become a living weapon.

    This movie is  definitely underrated and buried from rest of the world. It's got the best choreography that I've ever seen, executed by somebody totally unexpected. All the beautiful martial arts is bolstered by an interesting story. The heavy, sentimental drama builds early on. A thai, mob-woman, Zin, the local crime kingpins girlfriend, breaches her code by having an amorous ties with an enemy (A Japanese Yakuza). Somewhat Romeo and Juliet-ish. Under complete respite, pregnant Zin leaves the gang and her lover. Zin births Zen, an autistic child who retains special skills from her autism; acute hearing and an ability to re-enact physically what martial arts she sees visually. Zin falls to cancer and to pay for her chemotherapy, Zen and her bosom buddy Moom take on the bad men who owe her mother money. She soon unleashes her wrath on to the wrongdoers that brought misfortune to her mother and refuse to pay their debt. A big hearted, clumsy sidekick initiates the missions and they're out to boot some booties. This movie sets all of the recent heroine movies back to the stone age. There are no shaky cams to speak of, in which disguises the fight-impaired actors. Nothing but sheer intensity of authentic stunts done by the actors. Very minimal stunt doubling and a whole lot of awesomeness!

    The thing that freaks me out about the movie "hero" isn't that it's a little girl kicking grown men in the face, but the fact that she's AUTISTIC. Sure, the autistic bits are somewhat badly-acted. It kind of threw me off when the little girl would ask for mom's money in a childish-manner, and once the guy says, "No." POW! Right in the kisser! And she almost becomes a completely different person once she turns into an ass-kicking machine.
    One thing I really like about the movie was all the references to Tony Jaa movies like "The Protector". Sure, I'm not a big fan of the earlier half with the love story, but the rest of the movie was pretty good.
    It was hard to take the antagonist seriously due to the fact that it was a mafia of transvestites. Oh Thailand! However, tranny or not, these ladies were vicious!
    Story was alright (my mom needs money for chemo, prepare to get owned!), most of the acting was alright, but what stands out to me the most was the fighting. The actress did all of the stunts HERSELF. The fighting was also very reminiscent of Tony Jaa and very-well choreographed! There was this scene in a freezer where she pulled the typical Bruce Lee "WooooOOOoh! Wa-TAH!"

    She looked so cute doing it.

    I'll give this movie 7/10 kicks in the face. Pretty average. Mostly because I love foreign films and the actress was just so talented in the area of martial arts. Being cute was also a plus. I found the ending kind of corny, though.

    If you like touching stories about small children suffering from autism combined with ass-kicking on a Tony Jaa/ Young Jackie Chan level. This is the movie for you. Or even if you just like watching it for the violence, that's okay too (because my brother certainly did).

    As a final say, I believe this movie is actually BETTER than the action movies I've seen coming from Hollywood. The fights were just so well-executed and some of part of the fight can make you cringe in pity of the guy who received a kick through the ice-cutter. I recommend it! Thailand can teach the U.S a thing or two about fight scenes.

    - Kunoichi

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