Il était une fois en Chine : Le Tournoi du lion

After seeing this, I realized Tsui Hark really has a knack for period films. Jet Li is Master Wong in this third part of OUATIC series. Honestly, I really enjoyed the scenes with Wong and Aunt Yee (played by always lovely Rosamund Kwan). The way they play off each other is so innocent that you can't help have a smile on your face. It's also a chance to see a jealous Jet Li which adds to the humor. You really root for him to get the girl (lucky Jet).

The action is on point as Jet Li displays his martial arts prowess as he battles a lot of enemies. Great use of a jacket to ward off a street battle and the restaurant fight scene is classic Jet Li (you gotta love that shadowless kick). The Lion dance ceremony was interesting and I enjoyed how chaotic it was as all the dragons battled to get the bait. Foon adds comic relief and Club Foot was a cool character who knows how to get his "kicks".

Overall, I had to see this one after watching part one and two. Even though I expected to see superb fighting, I really enjoyed the romance in the film as well.

It's the turn of the century Beijing. China, under the rule of the Dowager Queen, is besieged by Western powers. She decides to hold a Dancing Lion competition to showcase China's physical prowess. Wong Fei-Hung (Jet Li) and sidekick Chung arrive and meet up with 13th Aunt (Rosamund Kwan). They find the Cantonese Association ransacked and his father injured by Clubfoot.

This is mostly good. I like Jet Li and Rosamund Kwan. It's a cute romance. Jet Li is doing a more traditional character. I like his jealousy over the Russian. I would rather not have the Russian turn full villain, but it is a way to amp up the drama. The final battle is rather chaotic. I couldn't tell one lion from another. I thought they would do it tournament style with Jet Li facing off against Clubfoot in the final battle. That would have been better. This has some good fun in the first half and I stayed engaged until the end.

...but still entertaining for the most part. This third move in the series is the weakest and least ambitious of the group, seeming satisfied to ignore the actual politics of China's tumultuous 19th century in favor of some made-up nonsense about Russian spies.

There is a martial arts tournament at the movie's center which Wong Fei Hung (Jet Li again) enters and must win for some reason, plus the always welcome Rosamund Kwan is back as Aunt Yee and the movie contrives to put her into danger again and again to keep things lively. The resulting mish- mash of a plot is rather hard to keep straight and honestly there is little profit in doing so. The producers themselves seemed to have a poor awareness of where everything was ultimately leading.

Enjoy the good period look and the quite impressive martial arts on display in the tournament and try not to take anything too seriously.

As far as the fighting is concerned, I thought that this one was a little unimpressive. It's pretty slow, overall. I'd really only recommend it to big fans of the first two. There are some good bits of humor and we see some actual romance between Wong Fei-Hung and Aunt 13, but I don't think that that sort of thing is the main reason we watch this sort of movie. And even if it were, there's just too little of it.

I really think that Jet Li's talents are wasted when you try to use goofy camera angles to make it look like he's doing superhuman feats. The man is practically superhuman already. I think you're better off showing off the amazing things that he can do rather than focusing on trying to make him look like a cartoon. I'm sure that his work in the movie was very demanding, but it just didn't come off as too impressive on the screen in my opinion.

And way too much lion dancing.

Though nowhere near as good as its predecessors, episode three of the legendary series does have some memorable moments, though they may appear few and far between. On this occasion, Empress Dowager tries to cause hostility between foreign powers settling in China by holding the ultimate Lion Dance competition set to restore Chinese pride and heritage, only to have it quashed by martial madman Chiu Tin Bai who's intent is to annihilate the competition and win the Lion Dance himself. Wong Fei-hung steps in after his father is beaten down by Chiu's crazy henchman Clubfoot, and the stage is set for Wong's single-handed onslaught of all evildoers and the restoration of some kind of sanity in this crazy town. There's plenty of colourful lion dances to please the eye and Jet is still the most exciting thing around, yet what it really lacks in is purpose, setting no real moral high ground and merely acting as a relentless cash-in on its previous successes.