Silver Hawk

Asia doesn't have many bona-fide superheroes in their fantastic fiction; they tend to have kung fu masters and such, but apart from Black Mask (which was very mediocre) I don't think I've seen any other real Asian superhero movies except for this one; Silver Hawk. It is a true combo of kung fu and super-heroics, as the main character, Lulu Wong (Michelle Yeoh), has excelled in the martial arts since childhood and have found a way to use her martial arts for the good of all society as the silver-costumed hero Silver Hawk.

The movie takes place in the future, where they have holographic mahjong and some brand-new mind-reading devices. Stylistically, everything is entirely kept in ice-blue glass and metal, which all looks sleek and cool, but also rather cold and inhuman.

A human dimension is added, however, in the childhood flashbacks, where a lot of connections are drawn to Silver Hawk's adult life. For instance, the reason she wears a mask is because she did so as a kid, too, to disguise her identity when she was kung fu brawling in defiance of her teachers' orders. This cross-time dimension with her childhood works very well indeed, also because she runs into her childhood friend again as an adult, his having become a police chief. Initially he wants to catch Silver Hawk, but as soon as he finds out who she is, he starts working with her.

The bad guy (supervillain, really), Fire Wolf, is quite dull, and his plan not very well described. There are a couple of plot holes in the story, too, and while the action is pretty good, the fighting isn't spectacular. But still a relatively good and watchable movie. I rate it a 6 out of 10.

I'm very interested in movies that combine kung fu and science fiction. My list so far includes Silver Hawk, Avenging Fist, Jet Li's The One, and, of course, the Matrix Trilogy, and Equilibrium. And also, Star Wars, sort of, since the Jedi abilities are a form of martial arts... I hope to discover more movies with kung fu and sci-fi combined.

In this movie, Michelle Yeoh plays Lulu Wong, a much-idolised rock star and philanthropist by day, and a super heroine, Silver Hawk, who fights injustice in skin-tight black leather outfit as her alter-ego. Richie Ren plays police detective Richman, who has an uncanny instinct and incredible wit, but he hates Silver Hawk for being always two steps ahead of the police. Both of them, however join hands to fight a baddie, Wolfe (Luke Goss) who wants to dominate the world through a special microchip in mobile phones which will broadcast subliminal message to users.

Directed by cinematographer-turned-director Jingle Ma (Hot War, Tokyo Raiders, Summer Holiday, Goodbye,Mr.Cool and Para Para Sakura), the action scenes are beautifully choreographed, especially the one where a group of bungee jumpers armed with hockey sticks attacking our heroine in an outdoor arena. The opening sequence is also awesome with Yeoh riding a motorcycle and jumping over the Great Wall of China. There's also ample use of CGI to enhance the action sequences throughout the movie. Although the script is pretty straight forward, Ma succeeds in presenting the story in an entertaining way with constant flashbacks to the past when Lulu and Richman were studying at a Shaolin Temple. The two kids who play them are excellent, especially the boy.

Yeoh is a delight to watch. She looks great in her well-designed outfits and executes her fighting scenes with style and finesse. Her experience in martial arts helped tremendously. Providing comic relief is Brandon Chang, who plays a computer whiz kid who constantly pops up to annoy Richie Ren. Wolfe's role was downplayed. Instead his two assassins played by Bingbing Li and Michael Jai White (Universal Soldier: The Return and Spawn) got most of the action. Surprisingly, both of them had no dialogue in the movie.

Nonetheless, Silver Hawk is an entertaining movie which promises good laughs and visual delights for this Lunar New Year.

I've been a fan of Michelle Yeoh ever since I saw 'Supercop' a few years ago. In fact, having not previously heard of 'Silver Hawk', I bought it based solely on the fact that Michelle Yeoh was featured on the cover in a kick-arse pose. I regret nothing.

Lulu Wong (Michelle Yeoh) is a Hong Kong celebrity who happens to have a secret: She is the masked super-hero Silver Hawk. Silver Hawk just happens to be in the neighbourhood whenever there is trouble ('neighbourhood' can refer to a Hong Kong alley, the Great Wall of China, etc). The Hong Kong police are out to catch Silver Hawk, as it seems she's been making them look like fools. I don't see what the problem is: if I was a Hong Kong cop, I'd sit back and let her do all the work, and I'd be paid to do nothing. Coincidentally, the new police superintendent Richman (Richie Ren) happen's to be a childhood friend of Lulu's - they were orphans together at the Shaolin temple (really, how can a crime-fighter be taken seriously if they haven't studied at the Shaolin temple?).

Meanwhile, Professor Chung (Daming Chen) publicly shows off his latest: invention: an AI chip that can scan a person's body, and then decide (better than the person themselves) what is good for them. The Professor doesn't quite understand why the AI chip is poorly received by the crowd, until he runs into trouble with Alexander Wolfe (Luke Goss) an English pop star turned super villain. Wolfe's sinister scheme is to combine the chip with the latest in mobile phone technology, so he can brainwash the population, unless Silver Hawk can stop him.

'Silver Hawk' is a bit odd for a kung-fu film. It is sleek but silly, occasionally suffers from an awkward imbalance between a serious and silly tone, and then switches from reality to over the top super-heroics. Sure, these are characteristics found frequently in Hong Kong kung-fu movies, but 'Silver Hawk' seems a bit different. I can't quite put my finger on it. It is fun, but it seems like HK cinema borrowing from 'The Matrix' (rather than 'The Matrix' borrowing from HK cinema).

'Silver Hawk' features some pretty cool action scenes, namely Michelle taking on villains on bungee cords, or an evil in-line hockey team. The fights are generally fun (I'll get to those in a minute). A lot of the comedy and character interaction - especially between Michelle and Richie - seemed rather awkward, but it was entertaining anyway. I think the main strength of 'Silver Hawk' is that it looked like Michelle was having a lot fun filming. I mean, she got to play with Batman-esquire Hawk-erangs - who wouldn't have with those?

I mentioned the fight scenes being fun to watch. Conversely, they also present one of the film's weaknesses: 'Silver Hawk' goes for too much of flashy, Hollywood look. It looks sleek, but I couldn't help but think that it could have been done better. The villains were generally unimposing and uninteresting, and the story could have been better polished.

'Silver Hawk' may not be the best super-hero, or kung-fu, or Michelle Yeoh movie around, but take it for what it is: a fan way to kill time. Recommended for fans of Michelle Yeoh - 6/10

Silver Hawk is an enjoyable Cantonese take on the superhero genre. As such it's much more enjoyable than recent US additions like Spiderman 2 or Daredevil, taking a very Blade-like 'Good vs Evil in a knock-down drag out fight' approach as opposed to going for the 'tortured hero' take on things American directors seem to dig. If you want depth you are firmly looking in the wrong place (go for the original 80s Batman maybe?), but if you want action, humour and incredibly sharp fight choreography, you've come to the right place.

It's similar in style to both Blade and Sam Raimi's Darkman, also taking cues from recent Hong Kong movies like Twins Effect. It has a fantastic look, good strong characters and a simple but effective plot that keeps you glued to your seat. Additional praise must be heaped on leading lady Michelle Yeoh. Much like Jackie Chan, despite many would-be successors coming and going since her debut in the 80s, she still has what it takes to front an action movie in spades. She not only makes Silver Hawk a genuinely likable and unique presence, she's also still a mesmerizing fighter to watch. The fights in this movie are really good, some of the best non-period kung-fu I've seen since the likes of Versus. They're played with humour by Yeoh, with Silver Hawk cockily dancing around baddies before kicking their teeth in, but they're still imbued with an impact missing from many similar films.

So why the 6? Firstly, Silver Hawk is incredibly lightweight. If it wasn't for the balletic and convincing fight scenes, this movie could probably have been a 12A or even a PG, it's like a Bond movie only with a female lead. Get boy, send bad guys home with bloody nose, end. It's simple, and that's why it works so well, but it doesn't have much depth, and I'll mainly re-watch it to enjoy the great fights and Yeoh being cool as she always is.

Then there's the dub. It's not, as I originally thought, an entirely Americanised dub. It's like Gen X Cops 2, in that it's dual language, always has been, and was intended for dual release. However, much like a lot of Jackie Chan's movies and Jet Li's earlier films, it's dubbed in quite a slapdash fashion, in a sloppy manner that makes it obvious all the actors except Yeoh and Luke Goss have been re-dubbed by voice-over actors, and that Yeoh and Goss voices were added at post-production instead of using the original recordings. It's not awful, and it compares favourably with some more suspect re-dubs, but it's still glaringly obvious that most characters are not being voiced by the original actors, and that the voice-over wasn't done in sync with the film, it was done off in some studio somewhere with just a script. If you think you can put up with that better than I did (I couldn't help wincing during certain scenes, such was the complete disconnection between dialogue and on-screen action) add a point to the score, and if you don't watch subs, add two. That's the best way to approach it really.

Basically Silver Hawk is really good fun, a cool superhero movie with a great heroine played by a great actress. It's fast, funny and has really good fight scenes, but you could get put off by the awkward dub. It's good enough that I think it's worth the effort, and I'll definitely be watching it again soon.

I love Asian action movies. So when I saw the case for this, I had to check it out and picked up the DVD. I wish that I had just rented it. I was hoping for something as much fun as Returner. Silver Hawk, however, is not it. The movie is decent, but other than a couple of moments in the movie, it just doesn't fare too well. In some fights the action is pretty good but in others it's just overly cheesy. Don't get me wrong, I like cheesy stuff sometimes, but some of this was just bad. The editing and slow motion parts in the fights were crappy. Another problem, and this is the fault of the DVD makers and not the movie itself, is that the DVD did not contain the original language track. So I had to contend with a really bad dubbing job as well. Despite all that, there is some fun to be had. Michelle Yeoh and Richie Ren looked like they were having fun, and there was some good unintentional humor. It wasn't a total waste of money, but if I could go back I wouldn't have bought it. The bottom line is, it's not the worst movie I've ever seen, but it's no where near the best either. It's merely forgettable, and that's worse than being horribly bad. If you want a good fun action movie go get Returner which stars Takeshi Kaneshiro and Anne Suzuki. Let Silver Hawk be a renter.