Legendary assassin

This is not an art-house movie nor the most amazing action movie you will ever see. But it is a good, solid, entertaining action movie.

The relationship between Jacky Wu and Celina Jade was nice, the café scene was both funny and with great action, the scenes at the police station were a mixture of tension and comedy, and the climax fight scene was ridiculous but who cares?

I'd never seen Jacky Wu before and I found his silent stoic character rather enjoyable. This appears to be Celina Jade's first film and she was excellent, as well as rather attractive. Secondary characters played there roles acceptably (although the blonde policeman seemed to be in the wrong film).

The point is that I was thoroughly entertained for the duration, and even my wife enjoyed it. Overall I think that's pretty good.

Being a big fan of Wu Jing, I've waited nearly a year for Legendary Assassin after his dazzling moves in Fatal Move left me in limbo. I'm not sure how big a role he played as co-director in this film, but the direction and the story was fairly mediocre. It takes place on an island where he meets the girl cop (Celina Jade), and gets chased around by the bad guys. They are trapped on the island because a tropical typhoon has shut down all the ferries. It feels a bit like Assault on Precinct 13 but nowhere near as intense or exciting. A 6 to 6.5 rating is about right.

The thing about Jacky is that he always seems to fall short of making that 'big break' movie that truly shows how great an actor he can be. In Legendary Assassin, his acting is pretty much exactly the same as in Fatal Contact, whenever someone talks to him he smiles and waits a few seconds before replying. He plays the underdog secret assassin/kungfu master alternate identity that is in danger of being typecast nowadays. The big difference is that he talks a lot less than in Fatal Contact, and therefore in my opinion it is a step back. He actually took a step back from Fatal Contact. There should have been much more dialogue between him and Celina. The fighting scenes were slightly above average, nothing spectacular. A lot of people knock Fatal Move, but I thought it was intended to be over the top and ridiculous, like something out of a Japanese comic, CGI blood spraying all over the place. His fighting scenes were much better in Fatal Move and SPL. I guess I'm a bit spoiled by Donnie Yen, at the moment if Jet Li is considered to be retired, then Donnie reigns supreme (both on the screen and as producer/director) and Jacky is just behind him. In a leading role, Fatal Contact is probably still Jacky's finest, so he needs to step back and evaluate which direction his career should be headed. Perhaps he should take on projects with a solid script and director. I'm a huge fan of Jacky Wu and hope his next project can truly take it to the next level, and break more barriers.

A pleasant surprise is Hong Kong born newcomer Celina Jade making her debut, who is half Chinese and half American. Besides her natural beauty, she can also speak three languages (English, Cantonese, Mandarin). Perhaps because of the fact that she was actually born and raised in Hong Kong, she performed admirably in Legendary Assassin and looked very natural on the screen, never fazed or looking out of place alongside a solid cast with some old time faces. Besides those dreamy eyes, her language and culture is her greatest asset, as despite playing a naive cop, you take her seriously as she delivered her lines with sincerity and realism rather than just being silly or trying to look cute. She also displayed a wide variety of emotions convincingly, and is definitely one to look out for in future Hong Kong productions.

From IMDB: "A female cop befriends a mysterious martial arts drifter, who turns out to be a deadly assassin."

Starring Jing Wu (Wolf Warrior) and newcomer, Chinese-American Celina Jade. Wu followed the same path as Jet Li to China's School of Wushu (Kung Fu) at age six, so is quite an accomplished Martial Artist. Jade was taught Taekwondo by her father, so is no slouch in the fighting dept.

For a small budget movie, there is plenty of scenery and action, at times non-stop. Wu is an assassin who carries his 'trophies' around with him, and the main plot is that one of his kills' relatives wants it back. The final 'fight' is completely over the top and his romance with Jade is kept on the back burner.

All in all, well worth spending 90 minutes of your time.

It doesn't make you think really nor cry, but it does provide with some good old fashion ass-kicking...

And what ass-kicking it is!

Very well orchestrated fights but of course it's not just all random fights it does have a story, and the story is fairly good although at times a little confusing possibly because of the way it was edited, it does feel a little bit like there was a scene missing here and there.

Not to the point that it takes you out of the movie or anything though.

2 likable leads in the shapes of Wu Jing and Celina Jade, who both do very well as does the rest of the cast.

Not flawless by any means, but enjoyable.

This movie was a disappointment from the start. The direction was very poor and the simple story line was uninteresting. All the unnecessary slow motion scenes with bad cinematography just didn't work. The relation ship between the two lead character was the only thing of interest but even that was superficial. Plenty of better movies to spend your time than this one. It's hard to be positive about any thing in the movie, but there were glimpses of good action scenes but most of them were wasted by poor decision making by the director. I was hoping for something much better considering the exposure and the involvement of Jacky Wu. But what i got from this film was utter disappointment.