JACKIE CHAN - MOVIE REVIEWS: THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM

MOVIE REVIEWS: THE FORBIDDEN KINGDOM

The traditional violence of martial-arts films has been toned way down for the family film The Forbidden Kingdom, starring Jackie Chan and Jet Li. Critics are expressing mixed reaction about the results. Kyle Smith in the New York Post says th at the film amounts to "chop-socky bordering on chop-schlocky, but it's good-natured myth-making cut into kid-size pieces." Most other critics have a similar take. "The story is thin as a bamboo reed, but it works," writes Rafer Guzmán in Newsday . A.O. Scott in the New York Times offers this lukewarm recommendation: "If you've never seen a movie like this, it might satisfy your curiosity." "Kung fu light," is the way Kenneth Turan describes it in the Los Angeles Times, concluding, "If you've been looking for a martial arts film to take granny and the kids to, this might be the one, but a Jackie Chan-Jet Li collaboration deserves better than that."

18/04/2008