Tin lung baat bou

SAKRA is another labour of love from star and director Donnie Yen, and I wish he'd give up making them. This is one of those flabby, bloated wuxia-style movies that's all over the place. After a totally random back story we meet Yen's expert swordsman, a king of beggars type, who finds himself set up by unknown enemies and forced to fight for his life. The plot beats play out ridiculously here and the whole thing has a strong air of embarrassment about it. The action scenes are unsurprisingly dominated by less than effective CGI, despite which a few are quite exciting, but it all goes on forever at a slow pace which makes it feel like four hours. And the way it refuses to end is unforgiveable.

International martial arts and action superstar, Donnie Yen, wrote, Directed, and stars in this martial arts epic adaptation of Louis Cha's Chinese fantasy novel. It is an action packed, larger than life tale of a respected warrior, betrayed, and forced to defend his name and honor.

The film is visually stunning and packed with fantastic martial arts fight scenes, fanciful costumes, and epic sets. It is a large scale, family oriented action fantasy, despite its significant martial arts and sword violence. It is an ambitious project with a lot of heart. It deliberately has many of the tropes of Chinese Kung Fu films, such as revenge, honor, and the desire to right a great wrong, even at the cost of the star's own life.

The production of the film is somewhere between American Western and Chinese martial arts fantasy, and it works for what it is. What it is not is the gritty, realistic type martial arts action film that Donnie Yen has become known for in recent years. While the cinematography and fight choreography are very good, they are not similar to his work in Flash Point, or John Wick 4.

Yen and the acting from the supporting cast is very good, but it is appropriately hyperbolic to match the script, the story, and the genre.

The film is very enjoyable. If you love Wuxia films add an additional star, and if you love Donnie Yen, add one more. While I am not a huge fan of Wuxi films, or high wire based, martial arts action films I do love DONNIE YEN and this was worth seeing.

This international Wuxi fantasy is distributed by Well Go USA and is in Chinese with English subtitles.

It's an adaptation of Jian Yong's Demi God and Semi Devil, most chinese or Asian would have knew the story path, it's like the story of Arthur and Merlin... Without even any plot twist jumbled into a 30 minuted movie. The original normally spans 40-50 hours long with lots of plot twist.

And the protagonist fails to even decide whether he wants to be a kungfu practitioners or a wuxia fantasy inner strenght no hit everybody fly around

The female protagonist cant act, Donnie has a bit of charisma but lacking acting range.

Overall a convulated mess. I'd still pay to see it for the action but it's nothing more than a superhero movie.

He was written as strong but not all conquering strong.

The only problem , for me, remains the beginning of story. It is pure unrealistic and seems only pretext for choreography of fights.

The real good point remains the elegant hommage to classic films of genre. And , sure, the return to history of Song dynasty , suggesting the context and the difficulties of period.

So, against temptation to be critic, a correct martial art film, including for romance and for performances, silly in few scenes, exagerated in others but , the target being clear, to see it as poor movie starting from the story reduced at sketch level ( or only petext ) can be pretty unfair.

Sakra, a martial arts fantasy film produced and co-directed by Donnie Yen, delivers a grounded and gloriously detailed vision of Louis Cha's wuxia world, featuring spectacular martial arts choreography and beautiful production design.

While Sakra soars with its action, it falls short on storytelling. The script starts solidly but rushes to set up the sequel in its final act, sacrificing character depth for scope.

Adapted from Louis Cha's classic wuxia novel Demi-Gods and Semi-Devils, the story is set during the Song Empire. Qiao Feng, the orphan leader of the Beggar's Sect, is framed for murdering sect leader Ma Dayuan and his adopted parents.

Qiao Feng is revealed to be a Khitan, the warring enemy of the Song Empire, and is banished from the Beggar's Sect. Wrestling with his new identity, Qiao Feng seeks the murderer of his adopted parents among the martial arts clans...

For Sakra, Donnie Yen drew from his experience choreographing 2006's comic book adaptation Dragon Tiger Gate and absorbed the lessons from the CGI-driven Storm Riders series, and creates a realism with its own set of rules.

There are long horse riding sequences through real Chinese landscapes, in which the film invests its time in. This grounds the wuxia world and presents a sense of geographic scale where heroes ride for days.

Every martial arts move, whether realistic or fantastical, is motivated, has weight, and flows well.

The stunt team has meticulously worked out all the power levels for the fighting. The way the fights escalate from sparring to superhuman feats to eventual chi blasts flows exceptionally well. You never question why a fighter didn't begin with their ultimate finishing move as there are physical limits in place and using a powerful move comes with immense strain.

People do fly, but sparingly. The way the film presents chi, as a steamy wave of hot air, was perfect.

All that said, the appeal of Louis Cha's wuxia stories is story and characters, not just fighting. The biggest challenge of adapting Louis Cha is condensing the material, which is why the best adaptations have been for TV.

Sakra uses its screentime disproportionally, devoting a lot of time to developing the Qiao Feng character in the first half. As we move to the second half, the script struggles to downsize the immense scale of Louis Cha's novel and plays like a showreel. New characters pop up to set up the next movie in a Marvel-like fashion. Being unfamiliar with the source material, I was confused and lost.

While there are many great things about it, Sakra ends up being a big missed opportunity and will be remembered most for its fight sequences. A Louis Cha wuxia cinematic universe would be awesome.

You know when a football player is about to score a goal and then fumbles the ball, and the sports fans scream passionately at the television? Sakra made me feel that way.

It's... almost there... if it can only... Sigh...