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Cast: Donnie Yen, Louis Fan, Wang Baoqiang, Charlie Yeung, Lau Wai-Keung, Yu Xing
A vicious killer stalks the streets of Hong Kong, methodically executing top martial arts competitors. Xia (Donnie Yen), a convicted killer and kung fu expert, offers to help police find the killer and put him behind bars – in return for his own freedom. The killer eludes them again and again, taunting the cops - and Xia, his new target - to discover his next moves. Xia refuses to play his lethal game…until the killer threatens the woman he loves most.
As the film opens Donnie Yen's character, Xia enters a police station battered and beaten. He is there to confess that he killed a man. The film goes a head two years and Xia is still in prison. The TV news is on and they are talking about a car accident and a possible murder. Xia seems to know right away what is going on. A killer is hunting down martial arts competitors and killing them one by one. Xia asks to talk to the police woman in charge of the case because he claims to know which martial artist will be next. He claims he can help hunt the killer down if they release him and let him hep on the case.
That is all you need to know before watching the movie. I was looking forward to seeing this one because it looked like Yen's best film in a while and it was a pretty good watch but it was not without its flaws.
The story could have used a bit more work because it doesn't go into enough details about why Xia murdered the man and why the killer was hunting down and killing these martial artists. The two characters were not fleshed out enough and the story suffers from it.
Now the good stuff, The film has some very nice fights scenes in it but they are mostly from the killer. Yen doesn't have a whole lot to do until the big fight scene at the end. Production wise the film looks and sounds fantastic and again the fight scenes are very well done as usual.
Donnie Yen has taken a bit of a slide as far as good films go. "Kung Fu Killer" is one of his better films as of late but it still could have been a lot better. I still recommend seeing it if you are a Yen fan or a fan of Asian films in general. Available on Blu-ray and DVD with Special Features that include:
Making Of
Trailers
Original Language: Cantonese
Dubbed Language: English, French, Spanish
Subtitle: English, French, Mandarin, Spanish
You can order the Blu-ray HERE and the DVD HERE.
Released by Well Go USA
*** 1/2 Out Of *****