Ngai sing

"Call of Heroes" is an entertaining wuxia film with cool characters and good enough action scenes that help overcome its shortcomings (they being bad acting, in the overacting category, thin as they come plot, and a too long running time).

The army has left Pucheng undefended to fight in the war, and the local governance is in the hands of the local militia and its leader, Colonel Yeung. Cho, the son of a military governor, who seems to just go around for the sake of killing people, gets to the city, and after doing some of his nasty stuff (so, killing innocents), is put in prison by Colonel Yeung, guilty of murder and condemned to die at the next day's sunrise. Cho's army will try to stop this.

You can see almost every plot development, fight and showdown in "Call of Heroes" from moment one. You know who will fight against whom, and how the plot will develop. However, director Chan and everyone involved do a great job with the rhythm and the pace and the little scenes between fights, to keep things fresh and including one or two little twists that make things feel original enough. The use of locations in the fights, and the cool action direction by Sammo Hung (who gives himself a blind-and-you-will-miss-it cameo) makes for really good showdowns every moment the tension rises and the action unleashes.

It helps that we have here some of the most famous faces in Hong Kong action movies. Ching Wan Lau as Colonel Yeung does a great job in the 'I-am-a-calm-and-stable-leader' mold. But the movie belongs to Eddie Peng and he embodies the hero of the story in a too-cool-to-be-true manner. His acting may look simple (raising eyebrows and little smiles), but it fits the character perfectly, and makes the viewer connect with Ma Fung, elevating the character to one of those you would like to see at least in a couple more movies. The same cannot be said of Louis Koo's Cho Siu-lun, Louis Koo having taking a page of the 'unleashed Jim Carrey' school of acting. Louis Koo munches his dialogue as if he was hyper after having two litters of coffee and half a pound of chocolate. He is probably having too much fun with the character, but it makes the viewer disconnect from the story, as the histrionics go to a level not much seen before.

"Call of Heroes" is a very entertaining movie, that is not trying to reinvent the wheel, but just entertain the viewer. And the fan of the genre will probably enjoy it.

Call of Heroes has been on my radar for a long time. Lau Ching Wan is one of my favorite Hong Kong actors, probably only behind the legendary Chow Yun Fat. Then I started reading some reviews that made some comparisons to Rio Bravo and Kurosawa. I got even more excited! But could it now live up to my ever-heightened expectations?!? I am proud to report that I thoroughly enjoyed the film, somehow meeting my expectations and in some ways surpassing them.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that Call of Heroes is a perfect film. I am saying that when it was over, I told my wife that I had enjoyed the film immensely and she wholeheartedly agreed. This is what I call a crowd pleasing entertainment! It was funny at times, quite unexpectedly shocking at other times; it had some really good action scenes, and I always like some good tough guy posturing, and it had that in spades. For the positives, I would start with Eddie Peng's somewhat scruffy and amusing performance as the Monkey King hero. The performance is broad to be sure, but very likable, and I now count myself a fan of Eddie. I've already professed my biased fanboy status for Lau Ching Wan, but he brings the necessary gravitas and strength to his role as the sheriff / guardian of the city. He could probably play this role in his sleep, but I do think he brought some good stuff to the table. The primary negative to me was Louis Koo's over the top performance. I like Louis but his performance seemed a little overboard, even in a movie like this. That being said, his initial arrival in town is one of the more surprising scenes in my recent cinematic universe. I won't say anymore about that!

A fun movie filled with broad performances, some unexpectedly surprising events, and over the top action sequences, Call of Heroes is one of the more entertaining movies I've seen this year!

This is an interesting Martial arts movie in that it follows a tradition used by many Martial Arts producers to copy old Sergio Leone type movies.

The lone traveller enters a village where evil outsiders set out to destroy the town and kill many ordinary innocent people. A clash of good over evil where the town's folk eventually pull together to defeat their attackers.

It has all been done before and the irony is that Sergio Leone was himself copying from the early samurai movies when he produced his now famous spaghetti westerns. This movie very much copies that mould and even the background music is reminiscent of those old Sergio type westerns.

The story is good and the characters are interesting. However the evil of the Louis Koo character is shockingly evil and there are some unexpected moments. For me the weakness was the two friends (or were they brothers?) I just could not believe that one could go along with the unnecessary evil of the warlords son, but apart from that they were good characters.

The Martial arts was of a high standard, as you would expect with the great Sammo Hung directing the action scenes, and Ching Wan Lau was outstanding as the whip cracking Sheriff. Eddie Peng is very good in his Clint Eastwood role. All the other supporting characters were well acted and the Direction was excellent. There is some CGI but this is not overused as it is in many modern movies of this genre.

So over all not a bad Martial Arts movie.

The story is too straight without any guile. Set in 1914 following the collapse of the Qing dynasty, the film tells the story of a group of villagers standing up to a cruel young warlord. It stands knee deep in hero-talk, melodrama and posturing. The story is not memorable but it hearkens me back to the Shaw classic no-nonsense wuxia films of the yester-years. Those are great years.

Sean Lau, the ever dependable actor, makes all the skull-numbing hero-speeches feel like nuggets of wisdom. Eddie Peng actually has a slight breakthrough with his wandering hobo character, adding delightful charm and comic relief. Wu Jing, who proved in SPL 2 that he can carry a movie on his own, puts in an unstated performance. His and Peng's back story is one of the highlights of the movie. Louis Koo, probably HK's busiest actor, lays on the ham with extra cheese and froth. His portrayal of the warlord nearly crosses into parody. But please take my words with a pinch of salt because I probably don't know anything. When Koo finally gets his comeuppance, the people around me were actually cheering.

The one thing I hate the most in kungfu movies is the CGI-created landscape and all the impossible kungfu moves made possible by CGI. Special effects is the shite in martial arts films. Call of Heroes doesn't do that and it is good old action stunt work and wire-fu. Sammo Hung's action choreography here is excellent. There are two particular set-pieces, a fight on a bamboo-cage bridge and one on a mountain of clay urns, that are stand-outs.

The studios don't make movies like this anymore - a stand-up and be counted old- fashioned wuxia flick.

I liked the lead actors a lot. I thought they all did a good job, as opposed to the usual Chinese acting in movies in the genre. And I thought the basic concept of the film was great! There is this evil killer that just gets put in jail in the first part of the story, but then the fact that he is an important political figure starts to stir all kinds of things. It was almost a censure of the Chinese political system.

However, this is where the good things end. The plot was convoluted enough to never learn much about the individual characters, thus they are hard to empathize with. Time management isn't great either. Half of the movie happens in a day and the second is not clear, since a guy has time to travel with children to the capital and back and save the day. The kung-fu was minimal and still a bit too much. For example there is a scene where they destroy all munitions so that they have the opportunity to fight hand to hand.

Bottom line: it was enjoyable and I liked the underlying message, but the film was pretty bland.