The Tai-Chi Master (1993)

This is a film I've always wished I liked more - on paper it should be a banger, Jet Li at the peak of his career with Chin Siu-Ho and Michelle Yeoh, with Yuen Wo-Ping directing. On screen... not so much.

I think the main problem is that the character is a poor fit for Jet, and you can tell he doesn't really know how to play him. As a result he never really feels like a person, and it's hard to have any emotional connection with him. This reaches a nadir in the "crazy" section which is positively cringe, and makes it hard to stay engaged with the film.

To be fair none of the other characters are anything other than paper-thin, so I guess the writer and director are at fault too. Yuen Wo-Ping certainly can't escape taking blame here as the direction is pretty weak all around, with no real style or panache.

This is a problem for the action, which features some imaginative choreography that leans hard on gimicky wirework, as it is filmed and edited in a rather lifeless way that makes it feel insubstantial.

Poor dubbing, even in the original Cantonese, hurts the film too - frequently out of sync with the actors performances, which adds an extra barrier to establishing any kind of connection with the characters.

That's not to say there's no fun to be had here, the action is pretty wild in that early 90's Hong Kong "anything goes" way, and there is plenty of it. There are plenty of worse examples of the genre - it's just that the talent involved sets expectations high, and it falls short when compared to films like Fong Sai Yuk, Swordsman II and Kung Fu Cult Master... and is barely fit to be mentioned alongside Once Upon A Time In China or Fist Of Legend.