O Protetor

As a coherent , well acted film tom yum goong is a failure.As an opportunity to see tony jaa completely and utterly destroy his opponents in the most awe inspiring and brutal ways possible, its a huge success! The action in tom yum goong is phenomenal to say the least - tony jaa proves that ong bak was no fluke!The part where jaa does battle with a gang of bikers and roller bladers is an exciting sequence , reminiscent of jackie chan in his police story days. The fight where he battles his way to the top floor of a restaurant in one continuous tracking shot, is a truly amazing piece of work that demands to be re-winded more than once .The fight that pits jaa against dozens of suited henchmen is a bone crunching, applause worthy spectacle that proves what ong bak fans already know- TONY JAA IS THE MAN !!!!! These fights are just some of a collection masterful action sequences .

As for the rest of the film...lets put it this way- if the action was no good then tom yum goong would be unwatchable. The action makes up for the moronic , near pointless plot . I know that we don't watch these sort of films for plot, but tom yum goong takes the cake with its "one man looking for his elephant" story!And don't get me started on the acting, particularly the lines spoken in English.Tony jaa needs to work with a decent script writer in future....

Weak on pretty much everything else except the fights , tom yum goong has Superior action and confirms that tony jaa is an amazing performer.

The makers of 2003's Ong-Bak are back with bang, a crash, a couple of elephants and many, many cracks. In fact, every other word spoken appears to be "Argh!". Muay Thay expert-extraordinaire Tony Jaa returns to lead us once again, as his sacred elephants are poached from Thailand and sent to, of all places, Australia. As our hero Kham, he must travel there himself to basically kick the living snot out of anyone who steps in his way. And that's about it.

The maker of this film, Prachya Pinkaew, is either a really shoddy storyteller, or has clocked on to the fact that no one goes to see martial arts films for the plot. Warrior King has an almost identical structure to his first film Ong Bak: a good 25 minutes or so of religious Thai imagery, villagers roaming around with animals before someone comes along and messes everything up. Petchtai Wongkamlao essentially reprises the comedy role he played in the previous release, although this time he hogs all the comic moments, as the wafer-thin script offers little in compensation for its action scenes. All the English-spoken acting is terrible. With that said I'm assuming most of the foreign language acting is terrible too, but for obvious reasons the Australian acting stood out more. The script is full of age old Hollywood clichés such as cops being taken off the case, only to go vigilante, gold-hearted prostitutes and a whole host of colourful looking gangsters (former WWE reject Nathan Jones makes a hilarious cameo) that wouldn't look out of place in a straight-to-video Steven Seagal flick.

And yet despite the glaring faults with a film as silly as this, none of the criticisms truly matter for one simple reason: Tony Jaa is absolutely amazing. Watching our protagonist fly kick the hell out of everyone before performing all sorts of acrobatic stunts will have your jaw on the floor. The man can obviously smash through thin plot points as fast as he can human bones. The film isn't badly shot either. Apart from getting a nice sense of Thai culture and a splendid view of Sidney, Warrior King is expertly choreographed. There is one remarkable sequence in which our protagonist battles his way through four stories of the same building absolutely smashing the hell out of anything thing that moves, which seems to go on forever, taken all in one single steady-cam shot. It would make David Lean jealous.

Granted if you've seen Ong Bak watching Muay Thay for a second time won't have the same head-crushing impact. Whilst Warrior King boasts plenty of superbly choreographed action sequences, it doesn't peak as well as the much more pure Ong Bak managed to. The movie does, however, generate a sense of darkness amidst the stalking threat of campy buffoonery. So it's an impressive sophomore effort, obviously catering more towards an ever increasingly cognizant western audience.

Ong Bak was a fantastic achievement by the young Thai fighter America has come to embrace as Tony Jaa. Fantastic stunts, amazing fight choreography, and an overwhelming sense of brutal martial arts action that has been missing in fight films since Jackie Chan's Rumble in the Bronx. However, the overall success of Ong Bak was diminished by the lack of intriguing characters and a fluid story that actually made some sense. Tom Yum Goong starts off on the same foot, but then takes the viewer in an entirely different direction…an example of one of the most explosive and entertaining martial arts movies of ALL TIME.

To go into intricate detail about the plot outlines of TYG will do you no good, it will not make you want to see this movie. What makes me so passionate about Tony Jaa and his visual appeal is his overall dynamic nature in the fight scenes. As told in the plot outline, his elephants get stolen, and he must fight to get them back…and fighting is what he does like no one else I have ever seen. It doesn't matter how many opponents appear before Tony, he takes them all in stride, and excels in dramatic fashion, either by his flying acrobatic kicks or his powerful breathtaking punches. But what truly makes this film unique is Tony's ability to embrace a new type of Muay Thai made especially for the movie: Muay Kotchasan.

Although this may not make much sense to you or interest you, trust me, when you view this film and see Muay Kotchasan put into action, you will witness something never before seen on film. Tony's moves are so brutal at times, you can't help but grimace and wonder how the stunt men could take such punishment. He breaks elbows, rips quadriceps, destroys ligaments, cracks vertebra…I could go on, but the movie pretty much speaks for itself. But, if I had to choose the most exciting part of TYG, it has to be Tony's second bout with Nathan Jones. Learning from his mistakes in the first fight, Tony's adapts his fighting style to his smaller frame, and uses Nathan's size against him in a chilling display of David vs. Goliath…it is quite a sight to behold.

Overall, Tom Yum Goong is an awesome spectacle of Tony Jaa's fighting ability, and if you truly enjoyed Ong Bak, then be ready to be blown away by something far better.

In Bangkok, the young Kham (Tony Jaa) was raised by his father in the jungle with elephants as members of their family. When his old elephant and the baby Kern are stolen by criminals, Kham finds that the animals were sent to Sidney. He travels to Australia, where he locates the baby elephant in a restaurant owned by the evil Madame Rose (Xing Jing), the leader of an international Thai mafia. With the support of the efficient Thai sergeant Mark (Petchtai Wongkamlao), who was involved in a conspiracy, Kham fights to rescue the animal from the mobsters.

"Tom Yum Goong" has a silly, flawed and absurd story, where gangsters do not use guns, but sticks, clubs, rollers, bicycles, motorcycles or whips. Further, they just fight in sequence against the hero, one by one, to have their arms and legs broken. The criminal Johnny simply vanishes without any further explanation. However, the choreography of the fights is amazing and very realistic, making this movie a worthwhile entertainment. Tony Jaa is probably the successor of Jackie Chan and Jet Li, and I believe this movie could be less "serious" and have more humor like in Jackie Chan's films. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "O Protetor" ("The Protector")

There are parts of Tom Yum Goong (or, as we like to call it, WHERE'S MY ELEPHANT) that amateurish and distracting; especially in some of the camera work and editing. However, those are but minor nit picks in a movie that has some of the best fight sequences I've seen. One, in particular, stands out as it involves a continuous tracking shot of a huge mêlée involving a 4 or 5 story building and a long staircase that winds up all the floors. The entire sequence is one shot, with no cuts or edits. It's worth watching the movie through again just for that sequence.

The story is pretty basic, but really, what at we going to see? This is no Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but it doesn't aim to be. The story is adequate to get you from one sequence to the next.

Tony Jaa is outstanding. His skills in the fight scenes are particularly astonishing given the overall lack of editing in these sequences. He's obviously doing all these things himself, and mostly in real time.

One minor note that I found amusing, though it might only be funny to fans of the movie BABE, the name of the production company is "Baa-Ram-Ewe"