Home :: DVD :: Art House & International :: Asian Cinema  

Asian Cinema

British Cinema
European Cinema
General
Latin American Cinema
The Duel

The Duel

List Price: $19.95
Your Price: $17.96
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 3 4 >>

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Duexellent
Review: This is an awesome movie, It's funny and has some pretty cool effects. I like the way the chinese make the martial artists fly... it isn't real but makes for good fantasy. I mean you can only punch and kick a guy in so many ways. This movie also has a good story to it, its kinda modern and kinda in the past. It is a must see. And definately buy it. It's worth it. 5 Stars

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: More Ekin Cheng and Andy Lau, less Cheung Ka-Fai!
Review: This is the story of two swordsman, played by Ekin Cheng and Andy Lau, and their epic duel in the palace of the Emperor.

I must admit, I am a huge Ekin Cheng fan, but there were relatively few scenes with him in it until the end. Most of the scenes were dominated by Cheung Ka-Fai delivering bawdy lines. *Yawn.* I am not opposed to a little humor in movies, but the constant jokes ruined the tone at least, for this viewer, and earned it a negative star.

Back to the story! Holy Sword, a famous swordsman, requests to fight God of Sword (another famous duelist) at the palace. Unfortunately, when people start dropping dead, Agent 009 must investigate and discovers there is a conspiracy afoot!

I must admit, the costuming and Ekin's and Andy's white streaked hair was quite beautiful. The tragedy of Holy Sword's life, had me sympathizing with him, even though I'm a huge fan of Ekin's! Scenes between the two master swordsmen and their lady loves were marvelously acted and poignant.

Overall, visually stunning, movie, with some great acting by Ekin and Lau. I only wish they had edited Cheung's character out!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: messy messy messy (what happened to serious movies, HK?)
Review: This movie (...). Plain and simple. I saw the trailer and was pretty interested by the (you're gonna hear it again) Matrix-esque action scenes. So, i went out and spent 20 bucks on it. Basically I spent 20 bucks on the last 5 minutes of the movie (where all the good action is). The story is pathetically juvenile. The humor is not "warm and fuzzy" but just plain stupid. Unless you like the Wong Jing brand of nonsense, not one second of the aforementioned is funny. The movie tried so hard to be so many things ala wong jing that the whole production didn't involve you in one single aspect of it. It ended up being totally trite. This new trend in HK movies to produce just style and no substance is really annoying. I didn't get into this stuff to see hollywood style big budget CG junk. However a movie that uses this formula and works on a fun level is Tokyo Raiders, see that instead. And another thing...blah blah blah. If you are curious (it's allowed the trailer is good) go rent it and find out if you are in the new or old school of HK movies.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Stupid Movie
Review: This movie suck...first the comedy is not even funny, they'll do anything to make you laugh. The acting is horrible, the fight scene suck, none of these actor know how to fight. Princess Phoenix is the most annoying person in the world. Avoid this movie at all cost.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: hey...
Review: this was GOOD movie, i saw it in Mandarins, that was the language they filmed it in..can anyone tell me if this DVD is in mandarin or not?
thanx a bunch
Cyrene

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: eh...its Ekin Cheng and christy again....with Andy LAu???
Review: Tsui Hark is a genius, and i mean it. he has made so many distinguished films that i respect. o check out his remake of his old 'Zu', Legend of Zu starring, Louis Koo, Ekin Cheng, Cecilia Cheung, Kelly Lin and sammo hung. o and Andrew Lau is a very creative director too...its jus that when he makes a movie with ekin in it....u cant tell the difference....

anyway, the duel starts off with a very nicely 'computer' choreographed fight scene, which i enjoyed( lil bit). Agent 9 kills the thief of the royal mark, with a help of his friend who is a swordmaster( ekin Cheng).
Andy Lau is cousin or somewhat a relative to the emperor and requests that he duels Ekin to see who is the best.

you should see this movie along wit 'Stormriders'. Stormriders has more CGI stuff which is visually breathtaking...so much that annoying ...

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Disappointing; a flashy B-movie
Review: Watched this after seeing an exciting trailer, which is always a dangerous way to select a film to see, and I got burned. The premise is promising: the two greatest swordsman in China, played by Andy Lau and Ekin Cheng, will challenge each other to a duel on top of the Forbidden City, and the emperor will allow only eight people to witness the fight. But in the days leading up to the duel, the emperor's right hand man Dragon 9 (played by Nick Cheung) begins to uncover a conspiracy which may threaten the life of the emperor. For me, the main draw was the promise of more thrilling swordplay choreographed by Ching Siu Tung, responsible for the frenetic swordfighting in the remake of Dragon Inn.

But instead, the film spends a lot of time on some bad Cantonese humor and some pointless romances for each of the duellists. The swordplay, which is rare, is of the supernatural type, which I don't really care for. Instead of swords colliding, we witness Andy Lau pointing at his opponent, strange lights flashing, and suddenly everything explodes and he is victorious and flying off into the sky. Maybe in the early days of cinema that would have been interesting, but with the high quality special effects available now, it's strictly amateur. A real disappointment.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Wow!
Review: With as many big names in this I thought it would be amazing....well, it is a corn ball adventure..its set in ancient times yet one man beats someone up, flies off whips out a pair of modern day sunglasses and puts them on and POSES!! (shakes head) its things like this that REALLY hurt the film for many kung fu/hong kong film fans. I REALLY wanted to like this film but couldn't get past the ridiculousness of it. Now corny can be ok at times but this is just rubbish.


<< 1 2 3 4 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates