Tekken 2

I am an avid Tekken player, and I too loved the story line of the games. This movie had nothing to do with the games, and it was just a waste of time. I barely made it through. The first live action movie they made wasn't great either, but it had a lot more to offer than this did. At least in the first one there were more than 2 of the original players in the game, and there was an actual tournament! Fight scenes were poorly done, and believe it or not, I would rather the first 'porn' actor that played Kazuya than the guy they got for this one. If you have to, watch it because you liked the games, but trust me, don't expect anything out of this.

As if the production credits alone are not a clear warning sign of the type of quality we are expecting here........A while ago, this movie was to have been directed by The guy who did ONG BAK, that excellent Muay Thai movie. Instead we got that hack who made one of the worst movies of all time BALLISTIC: Ecks vs Sever.

TEKKEN 2: Kazuya's Revenge aka A Man Called X is a movie with an identity crisis. Ironic that the movie itself features a main character with a similar identity crisis. TEKKEN 2 is not a sequel, and has little to do with the beloved video game franchise it claims to be based on. The "man" in question is called "K", not "X" and "Kazuya's Revenge" is possibly the worst case of spoiler in the title, especially since the main plot is about K rediscovering his identity as Kane Kosugi, oops sorry, I mean, the titular Kazuya, after an unexplained bout of amnesia.

Waking up In a dystopian corporation run future which looks an awful lot like a present day south East Asian slum, K (who is obviously Kane Kosugi) is haunted by an obnoxious voice in his head, hunted by rent-a-cops in old army wear, and discovers he knows kung fu. Still he gets knocked out and recruited by a criminal Organisation run by "the minister". This Organization (consisting of mostly homeless Asians and stunt people) pits its members against one another in fights to the death. The victors are sent on assassination missions, something about cleansing the world or some dope like that. So when K gets tasked to take out Gary Daniels (who everyone mistakes for a Tekken character called Bryan Fury) he finds out that the Minister is not the holy man his followers think he is.

There's a bit more to the story about K discovering he is really Kazuya and a showdown with Tsang Tsung.....erm, wrong franchise....Cary Hiroyuki (although he claims to be one Heihachi Mishima) and a couple of thugs but one's patience would be truly tested by then. The story is just THAT badly paced that it actually comes across as tiresome. For example you have this whole 10 minute sequence of K taking a walk through Slum Town.......doing nothing. For 10 whole minutes while the voice-over from the Minister goes on and on about how his army of homeless beggars, sorry looking ruffians and old ladies are going to rid the world of evil. It is laughable, really.

Laughable too his how this movie is obviously not related to the Tekken franchise at all. The first TEKKEN movie starring John Foo and Ian Anthony Daniel at least looked like Tekken. Despite the mixed up story, Characters looked like how they do in the games, they wore familiar costumes and hairdos, and many familiar set pieces are showcased. In TEKKEN 2, it is a completely unrelated movie which had some characters names changed to names from Tekken.

Martial artist actor Kane Kosugi is wasted on this misbegotten prequel. Having had nothing but supporting roles so far, Mr Kosugi deserves a good movie as a main character to really showcase his skills. He does his own stunts, he is a trained martial artist with a flair for movie fighting. He could have been Hollywood's Donny Yen or at least followed in his father's footsteps (Sho Kosugi) in becoming a cult classic Kung fu star. Instead, he gets shoehorned into a production directed by "Wych Kaos".

Instead of looking like a Hollywood movie, The whole film has that "shot in my backyard" feel and visual nature akin to those cheapskate Malaysian or Singaporean TV productions. Some good camera-work does show up in the fight scenes, eschewing the usual close ups and jitter cam for wide sweeping angles that gives you full view of the fight. Unfortunately many of these scenes are edited like some amateurs on YouTube. You have a scene where K lifts his leg to kick but when the blow connects, the next cut shows K punching the guy.

Boring for the most part, tediously paced, and obviously done on the cheap, TEKKEN 2 would not have been judged any less harshly had it discarded the video game's moniker and presented itself as a martial arts movie. Kane Kosugi's fights and stunts are impressive no doubt, but their impressiveness is undermined by amateurish directing and editing. Take this sorry excuse for a movie, splice together all the Kane Kosugi fights, then trash the rest. You'd get a far more entertaining short film than TEKKEN 2.

The fact that TEKKEN was not a perfect movie isn't shocking, but it is surprising how significantly worse its successor is. Director Wych Kaos is not exactly known for making great films and his video game movie does not bolster his reputation. KAZUYA'S REVENGE is not so much an adaptation as a lazy spin off, and though it does some things very well, its deficiencies are overwhelming and make this an unenjoyable outing for all but niche viewers.

The story: Haunted by confusing memories, an amnesiac martial artist (Kane Kosugi) is kidnapped by a crime organization and turned into an assassin.

The best thing that can be said about this movie is that Kane Kosugi is, at least, a much more apt choice for the lead role than Ian Anthony Dale was before him. A stellar performer just coming off one of the best fight scenes of the decade in NINJA II, Kosugi does what he does best in delivering fights that range from endurable to pretty good. The low number of characters from the series limits the dream matchups this one can present (and the one it does give us – Kosugi versus Gary "Bryan Fury" Daniels – is rubbish), but Kane manages some respectable bouts with genre regulars Ron Smoorenburg, Eoin O'Brien, and Brahim Achabbakhe. Karate fans won't be completely bored.

Normally, my satisfaction for that regard would garner at least an average rating, but the movie is a metaphor for how a table cannot stand on only one leg. Aside from the fact that the plot in no way resembles the TEKKEN series and would probably make more sense without the label, the screenplay of KAZUYA'S REVENGE appears to have been written with a license to pad and instructions to only tell a fractional story... Many scenes are given over to time-killing flashbacks and montages of Kazuya aimlessly wandering around. The motivations of and relationships between characters are frustratingly enigmatic. Several times, Kazuya will enter a new locale, and with some unclear understanding known only to the characters, he will engage in an unprompted and unexplained fight scene. The movie ends without any resolution, clearly teasing another sequel that I hope will not see production – at least not under the same director.

The upcoming reboot – THE KING OF THE IRON FIST TOURNAMENT - will constitute the third TEKKEN-inspired feature within a decade, and the fact that fans are a lot less happy about this than you'd assume says a lot about the missed opportunities of the series as a film franchise. The creative decisions this particular one makes are genuinely frustrating, and sends the impression that not only did the producers not care about representing the characters, they did not even care about telling a coherent story. Perhaps the politics of direct-to-video filmmaking are to blame, but no one ought feel compelled to sit through this.

As a player of the game Tekken from the introduction of the very first game I was excited as all get out when I saw the first Tekken movie which was animated. After feeling like my hard earned money was wasted I still had faith in the people who would make a great Tekken movie. I believed that SOMEONE would do this game the honor it deserves and produce a great film adaptation. I saw Gary Daniels connected to the film and having loved his work for years as a big screen martial artist I had reasonably high hopes for this film to at least be bearable. This movie was not. I applaud the success of those who were able to bring their vision to life, but this was really really bad.

If you've seen the first Tekken movie - whether you liked it or not - and expect a similar content, you will be disappointed. This movie felt like a waste for over 90% of its runtime and comes nowhere near to the first Tekken movie.

It seems like a low-budget movie. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with that, sometimes even the opposite. After finishing this movie it felt like I was stuck for ages in slow motion visions of the past. Half of the whole movie seemed to be filled with these probably due to alck of content, so try not to fall asleep if you take upon the challenge of watching it. Other than that there's a few good fight scenes (not the first ones) but way too few to make any difference and rescue the foreseeable and almost non-existent plot.

Overall an anticlimactic experience, best suggested to be ignored or watched while being pre-occupied. If you like to get papers done, or study with some background-noise, this might be the right movie for you.