Black Mask

Save yourself and your money. This film is an insult to the mylar it's printed on. If this is a showcase piece for Jet Li he can end his career now. The cinematography is terrible, the story is under-played, and the action scenes take place in environments that make them difficult to follow. If you're expecting a Jackie Chan style film, you will be sorely disappointed. Jet Li is an outstanding martial artist, but his skills can't draw this howler up from the depths it plays at.

Once a part of 701 squad, an elite group of super-soldiers/assassins surgically altered to feel no pain, Tsui Chik (Jet Li) now works as a librarian; but when the remaining members of 701 squad (whose number include the rather gorgeous Francoise Yip) turn to crime, bumping off drug lords to corner the narcotics market and stealing police files to sell to other criminals, Tsui Chik takes on the guise of superhero 'Black Mask' to fight his former comrades. Black Mask is a frenetic comic-book martial-arts actioner from director Tsui Hark, a rather chaotic film with a plot that makes very little sense but which still succeeds in being highly entertaining thanks to a huge helping of silliness, loads of insane wire-enhanced fighting (choreographed by Yuen Woo Ping), and a fair amount of gore. Amongst the craziness on offer: characters are blown to pieces, crushed under vehicles, killed by razor edged CDs, and hack off their own limbs to escape capture; Jet Li has a brief but very impressive battle in a graveyard and also performs an jaw-dropping kung fu routine using a high voltage cable as a weapon; and crime-lord King Kau (the brilliant Anthony Wong) is sent his daughter's severed legs in the post!!! One more thing... if possible, try to find a subtitled version of the film—the dubbing is atrocious.

What more could I say? The Americans totally hated it because the U.S. cut was so bad, although you could detect the underlying goodwill in it. Talking about the U.S. theatrical release(along with the newly released Blu-ray Disc version), it's faster and tighter than HK cut, the background musics were all changed from the dark, grim HK musics to Hip-hop musics; and there were a lot of gruesome scenes cut out. Though, the dubbing was a notable job given that they tried to capture the original actor's voice and tone. But, the problem is Hak Hap(Black Mask) the movie was designed and meant to be dark, grim, super-disturbing and totally gruesome. Very unfortunately the U.S. release just skimmed the cream they wanted, which in return completely changed the movie's undertone(HK release was rated 18+) to be even more comical and amateurish. Now let's talk about the original HK release. This movie is like a hidden gem, a prototype for the whole "matrix" tide and era. The fighting scenes are totally awesome even the camera works were a bit "old-school" among HK movies. However the style the movie created was a unique blend of Kungfu and pop culture. With all the leather, black costumes and decorations, this movie features a batman-like superhero in a black mask against a run-of-the-mill gang of multinational super-soldiers lead by a punk heavy metal rock star boss. Yes it sounds like imaginations of a retarded child, but it works. It's so impressive that the whole movie's gonna give you nightmares featuring foreigners fighting a bloodbath battle in leather coats. In year 2002 they made a sequel which had a PG-13 rating, but without Jet Li and Liu Qing Yun. And you know how bad that was because Li and Liu were the core characters in the movie and had strong personalities and an interesting friendship. And, did I happen to mention Francois Yip? Her roundhouse kick was totally cool, even cooler than the villain boss because she didn't use a stuntman for all the fighting. Did I mention she was also smoking hot? Anyway, there are a lot of things to like about the movie. However, the movie also suffered from a lot of problems. First off, it's a mediocre script made at its best potential, which means this production team deserved a better screen-writer. There are a lot climaxes in the entire 100 minutes but they often felt like far-fetched and don't totally make senses to the audiences(US version was even worse because all the character developments were cut). Anyway, you can't ask too much out of a comic-inspired action movie. Also, this movie is entirely improper for children. I won't recommend it to you if you are less than 20 years old. It's saturated with disturbing contents including blood, gore, sado-maso costumes, extreme brutal violence and so on. Along with the style of the movie, it can be called a wet dream for heavy-metal rock music fans and action fans. (the U.S. cut was milder, but if you want to see it, see the HK release for what it is.) 7/10. Status: inspiring, hidden, undervalued, adult.

The only purpose to release this three-year-old action flick from Hong Kong to America is to capitalize on Jet Li's success after "Lethal Weapon 4." Unfortunately, it did not work. Li plays a librarian who tries to escape his past as the so-called hero. There's plenty of action, but it's just so predictable. Why is this film poorly dubbed? Check out "Fist of Legend" instead. My evaluation: ** out of ****.

Black Mask is one of my personal favorites in Jet Li's filmography. This is easily , in my opinion his best gun fu film. Black Mask is very much in a sci fi /comic book style , but not in a PG13 Spider Man style . Black Mask is a brutal , ultraviolent wall to wall action classic that should please both fans of shoot em' up, detonation maximum bullet ballets as well as kung fu / martial arts fans. With Yuen Woo Ping choreographing the action and Jet Li as the lead , the fights /action are as good as it gets. There is enough blood and gore to satisfy the most bloodthirsty of action fans as well as some of the finest choreographed wire fu insanity of the period . Black Mask is for me a perfect blend of both styles of HK action . Also, a good job from the cast which has Lau Ching Wan and a cameo from Anthony Wong. The subtitled HK version don't look as good as the US version , but plays much better as a film without lousy English overdubbing and record scratching.