Martial arts films tend to be rather over the top and fantastic in tone as a norm. As such it's refreshing to see one taking place in recent history and featuring actual historical people.
Fearless tells the tale of Huo Yuanjia, the prodigious son of a long line of martial arts practitioners, who grows in the late 19th century China, in a nation that's buckling under the Western pressure and occupation. We see him growing from a cocky young fighter into a man that in his own way tried to preserve and protect the ideal that was and still is China.
In my opinion this is Jet Li's finest film. He's everything the role needs him to be and then some. Absolutely perfect casting and one of the films where you can see that he actually has a lot of acting talent as well. Sure he can probably identify a lot with the role, but that only makes him so much better for the role. He can also pull off the more serious tone of the story in comparison to usual martial arts ware. Someone like Jackie Chan would be too comical and not arrogant enough for the role.
Aside from that, it's a professionally done film. The production values are very high, the whole film looks and sounds great, the story has enough soul and depth behind it to convince and it's interesting to follow. The need to follow a historical story does make some of the plot twists seem a bit weird, because the film doesn't have enough time to give us the whole context, but that never becomes a major problem.
Fearless is an excellent film to pick if you're looking for a more serious take on the martial arts genre, without giving up any of the quality or enjoyability.
Fearless tells the tale of Huo Yuanjia, the prodigious son of a long line of martial arts practitioners, who grows in the late 19th century China, in a nation that's buckling under the Western pressure and occupation. We see him growing from a cocky young fighter into a man that in his own way tried to preserve and protect the ideal that was and still is China.
In my opinion this is Jet Li's finest film. He's everything the role needs him to be and then some. Absolutely perfect casting and one of the films where you can see that he actually has a lot of acting talent as well. Sure he can probably identify a lot with the role, but that only makes him so much better for the role. He can also pull off the more serious tone of the story in comparison to usual martial arts ware. Someone like Jackie Chan would be too comical and not arrogant enough for the role.
Aside from that, it's a professionally done film. The production values are very high, the whole film looks and sounds great, the story has enough soul and depth behind it to convince and it's interesting to follow. The need to follow a historical story does make some of the plot twists seem a bit weird, because the film doesn't have enough time to give us the whole context, but that never becomes a major problem.
Fearless is an excellent film to pick if you're looking for a more serious take on the martial arts genre, without giving up any of the quality or enjoyability.