Fighting Fish

A lot of this movie was made before it came out, as it's the first martial arts film from the Netherlands. After watching there can be 2 conclusions made: 1. it will probably be the last M.A. film from the Netherlands as well and 2. there's a reason for that.

Let's look at the story first. Boy and girl fall in love. Boy has to 'do something' for honour of the family. Girl gets beaten up by gang. Older brother forbids the formerly 'bad guy' to stay in her life. In the end it all works out.

I know, booooriiiiiing. So let's look at what should have made this movie special. Should have, because this movie is everything but special. Now, these martial arts fighting scenes are so silly, the camera-work is so dull and the fights way too long... one can only wonder, 'what were they thinking'?

The movie got slammed both by the critics as well as the public, and there's a reason for that...

2/10.

Wow, I just walked out of a screening of "Fighting Fish" because it truly is a horrible movie. This is the "first dutch martial arts movie", and if this is the best they can do, it should also be the last.

It's a story about an ex-triad member who comes to Rotterdam to avenge his brother. Trow in some power hungry son of a triad leader, a dutch girl (oooh, Chinese and dutch people don't mix, don't date her!), and a lot of people who never have acted in a movie before and voilá: "Fighting Fish".

Cheesy dialogs, horrible martial arts (why don't they pretend that they want to hit each other?), boring storyline. Only good thing about this movie is the location (Rotterdam), it was fun to see my own city in a Kung-Fu movie. If you don't live in Rotterdam (or never been there) you probably don't care (so one less reason to see this film).

I didn't expect anything good from this movie, Still it was extremely disappointing. Not recommended for anyone (even for lovers of bad martial arts films playing in Rotterdam). If you are so eager about seeing a martial arts film in Holland, see "Who am I" instead.

Well, let's see, this film has some nice fight scenes, very original indeed. The art direction makes for some great images, especially the scenes where Kim Ho Kim fights with the three bad guys after he accused them of killing his brother looks much like a real Hong Kong setting. The music is also very good, it's very original and of a high quality level.

As far as the story goes, it's predictable and nothing special really... the acting is not great, and some dialog is really bad... but Jennifer the Jong is not all that bad.. They better use the fighters from this movie in a production with a better script.

I got the DVD for a few euro's, and it contains a lot of bonus material, a making of and documentary, and the short feature "Buren" which is from the same director. I think Buren is a very nice short film, which also has nice art direction, and a good performance by Esmeé de la Bretonière. All in all a rather nice DVD.

This movie its story feels like a very lame excuse to bring some material arts fighting sequences to the big screen. You know how Star Wars fan films are always used as a lame excuse to do a lightsaber fight, well same goes for this movie, only it aren't lightsaber fights in this movie but its material arts instead. The movie really feels like a amateur movie at times.

All of the fight sequences were nicely choreographed, no doubt about that and its obvious that director Jamel Aattache has a passion for material arts movies but all of the fights in the movie felt simply pointless and they really came out of nowhere at times. It's good to watch as a material arts demonstration all but as a movie this movie is simply terrible. Because of this all the story never really flows well which makes the movie almost impossible to watch at times.

The story is extremely weak and simple and the romantic elements of the movie between Kim Ho Kim and Chantal Janzen simply don't work, because there is no chemistry between those two and their love seems very unlikely to happen.

The acting was also completely horrible. Kim Ho Kim doesn't have enough charisma as an actor for a role like this one. Chantal Janzen was simply terrible in her role and the person who decided to give Ron Smoorenburg so many lines should had also been fired. Ron Smoorenburg is a great material arts fighter but he simply isn't much good as an actor. It's also due to director Jamel Aattache that some of the acting was really lame at times, he simply isn't a very good actors-director.

The cinematography by Peter-Jan van der Burgh was good and gave the movie a very professional look at times. the city Rotterdam is a perfect background for movies, this one included. They really should make some more movies and series in this city. It's a great charismatic and atmospheric background for movies and series, not a great place to live in though.

Also the musical score by Yorick Goldewijk was very good and suited the movie perfectly.

But unfortunately some great cinematography and the good musical score aren't enough to conceal the movie its almost none-excising lame story. It makes "Fighting Fish" an absolutely horrible and pointless movie to watch. Probably the only ones who can still find some pleasure in this movie are persons who love material arts. It has some good material arts moments in it but as a movie this one is a complete failure that also suffers from a terrible amateur look at times.

3/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

A really great Martial Arts movie. Especially concerning the budget.. I really don't get it why so many people on here are SO negative about this movie. Looks a lot like a 70's classic (in the Bruce Lee style), so what do they expect..The Matrix ?!?...

It's mostly the fighting scenes that REALLY stand out here. NOT the storyline. So you know.

It's a great movie if you love M.A. if you don't you won't like it at all. I don't like horror movies so no matter HOW good such a film is, I won't like it. It's the same with this one here. Either you like it or you hate it. It's purely based on personal taste. And I love it!!! ;-)