Fearless (Hong Kong, 2006)

Officially this is Jet Li‘s last martial arts movie. Unless, he says, is presented with an exceptionally good script. Meaning it does not mean much.

Li plays Huo Yuanjia, a real martial arts figure, who becomes very popular by beating the world’s top fighters at the begining of the twentieth century.

For Jet Li’s fans, this is a very good film. Though the story is quite simple it serves its purpose of bringing many fights to the screen. One problem is the cool editing technique used to shoot those fights. There are too many cuts and too many different angles to allow the audience to clearly enjoy the choreography of the fight. That is all Hollywood’s fault : it is the style of editing that is mostly used nowadays to portray action. Sad really, Jet Li fighting is a beatiful thing to watch. At least, this fast paced editing is not used in all of the fighting scenes, making it possible to enjoy some of them very much so.

The rest is excellent in its execution. Mind you, it is a standard period martial arts film, don’t expect too many twists and surprises. Most enjoyable, nontheless. Could be a good introduction to the genre, it is easily accessible and most people are familiar with Jet Li.

Really worth the watch.