The Master
Director: Tsui Hark
Year: 1992 (released)
Rating: 6.0
There must be something in the water or the food
or the air in the United States that makes Tsui Hark’s mind go blank. Or
perhaps it is just being away from his Chinese roots. Double Team,
Once Upon a Time in China and America and this film would constitute a pretty
weak track record. That’s a little odd because one might think that Tsui,
who went to film school in Texas, would have fewer problems than most of
the talent from Hong Kong in adapting to the US. By watching this, one would
never guess that it was a Tsui Hark film. It displays none of his visual
flair or dramatic mythmaking that many of his films do. It has the look and
plot of a typical B American martial arts straight to video film. It does
though have a few redeeming factors that still make it worth a viewing. For
one, it comes at an interesting point in Jet Li’s career. He had realized
some success in the earlier Shaolin film trilogy, but had floundered since
then and had actually moved to San Francisco in hopes of kick starting his
career. Sort of Bruce Lee in reverse. He met up with Tsui Hark and
they produced this film on a miniscule budget. The film though produced in
1990 was actually not released until 1992 after the two of them had collaborated
on the much more successful Once Upon a Time in China series.
The plot is simple and has been done in
various forms a thousand times. Jet comes to San Francisco to visit his sifu
(master) who has opened a school. The sifu is Yuen Wah and it is a pleasure
to see him as a good guy for a change. Yuen Wah is reason number 2 to check
out this film. A competing martial arts school run by this huge American
thug (Jerry Trimble) has broken up the school and badly hurt Yuen Wah. Somehow
Jet, who has much to his dismay has picked up three Latino barrio worshippers,
is unable to locate his sifu and hooks up with Crystal Kwok. He finally does
find him and of course they have to face off against the other school.
There are a few decent mid-level fights
against gangs until the final big one. If you were watching this in Hong
Kong, you might decide never to go to Los Angeles because it is depicted
as having a gang on every corner wanting to beat you up. This last fight
would be reason number three to see this film. It is absolutely terrific
and therapeutic. Jet Li and Yuen Wah team up to take on the entire school
of the bad guy – probably some forty students. They mow through them like
a reaper through a wheat field or make that a bone field as they break bones
left and right. In the end it comes to a showdown between Jet and the villain
and it is quite a fabulous bash.
The forth reason the see this film is Jet
Li without a lot of wires. I love good wire work and Jet probably does it
better than anyone, but it is quite a joy just to see how fast and agile
he was and what he could do on his own. Some of it is quite amazing. And
some poor stunt guy has balls of steel - that fall from the building as the
camera folows him down for what seems hours was incredible. Trimble is an
impressive fighter with an impressive physique. Twice he was the World Kickboxing
Champion under the name Golden Boy. He has been in many films - I would guess
usually as the villain - such as Heat, Charlie's Angels and Mission Impossible
III where he and Cruise fight off. He is still acting.
And the fifth and final reason to watch
this film. Jet is actually very charming and funny here in that innocent,
boyish, unworldly way of his and he shows what a great smile he has on a
number of occasions. So if you can get through a banal plot and some
dreadful acting by all the gwielo actors (what, they can’t even find good
gwielo actors in the States?) and non-existent sets, this is still worth
ninety minutes of any Jet Li fan’s time.
