meganbmoore | Dragon Tiger Gate(Donnie Yen Donnie Yen Donnie Yen Donnie Yen) (Reply)

Just finished the HK movie Dragon Tiger Gate. To be perfectly honest up front: the plotline is bare bones, but I loved it. And Yes, the fact that Donnie Yen is the only HK movie actor I'm attached to(blame Iron Monkey) influences that.

But the hair...oh, the hair...I think part of the hairstyles here wereto try to make sure that the only guy whose good looks we noticed was Nicholas Tse. Anyway...

The movie is based on a long running chinese comic about heroism, and is about two brothers, Dragon(Donnie Yen) and Tiger(Nicholas Tse) who had the same father but different mothers. When they're children, Dragon's mother takes him and leaves Dragon Tiger Gate, the martial arts school/bastion of justice where both lived. AFter his mother dies, Dragon is taken in and raised by Ma Kun, a gangster who works for the (naturally) evil Shibumi. He's loyal to Ma Kun and protects him and his daughter, Xiaoling but manages to avoid outright breaking the law. Tiger grows up with a strong hero complex(ok, they say sense of justice, I say hero complex...) and he and Dragon meet again when he defends people being harassed in Ma Kun's retaurant and is saved by Dragon, who instantly recognizes Tiger as his younger brother but thinks the life he's lived makes him unworthy of reclaiming that relationship. At the same time, the brother's meet Turbo, a nunchuk wielding teen with a hero complex of his own.

Tiger figures out who Dragon is soon enough and tries to reestablish their relationship with the help of Xiaoling, who he recently met(Plot contrinvance? Love triangle? Who cares?) but is rebuffed. Soon though, Ma Kun wants out, and in response, Shibumi sends assassins to kill him, Dragon and Xiaoling. The assassin he sends after Dragon, however is his adopted daughter, Luosha, who loves Dragon and tells him-after she thinks it's too late to save Ma Kun and Liaoxing-what's going on and he rushes to save them but is too late to save Ma Kun. Now, here's where TPTB kinda went wrong for anyone inclined to ship: Donnie Yen and the assassin have a nice little "doomed enemies" thing going and Xiaoling has a bit of a crush on Tiger and it seems to be reciprocated. In the ensuing fight to save Xiaoling and get revenge for Ma Kun's death, Dragon is injured so badly that he's coughing up blood but he still carries her through fields and streets to take her to Tiger and ask him to care care of her and then he flees, still thinking he's not good enough to be Tiger's brother, and feeling that he failed Ma Kun and Xiaoling. Seriously, for the bulk of my flist that's inclined to ship, is there much that would make us any more inclined to scream "OTP!!!" at the top of out lungs? (Incidentally, as far as romance goes, they seem to be rather leaving it open...on the one hand, Xiaoling and Tiger seem to like each other and are actually quite cute about it, but in their-fewer-scenes there seems to be more of a connection between her and Dragon-which, granted, could easily simply be his being around her whole life- and in addition to that scene, when Dragon, Tiger and Turbo return to Dragon Tiger Gate at the end, she specifically zones in on Dragon in the "happy you're all back" look and after Dragon gives Tiger a bit of a hard time for shooting googly eyes at her, he still looks up to where she is. Who knows, maybe it's just not determined who she ends up with in the comic.)

Anyway, after that Shibumi launches a full scale war, the brothers and Turbo get some more training in, power up, and go kick bad guy butt. The storyline is good, but mostly, it's about three goodlooking guys seriously kicking butt.

And the characters...well, i loved Tiger. All around nice guy who just wants to help people and get his brother back? I'm all for that. But Dragon? Angst ridden guy who lost his home, his brother and his mother in a matter of weeks and then was raised to become something he hated but remained out of love and obligation for the man who saved him, and as a result, feels he's unworthy of...well...everything? AND he's played by Donnie Yen? Just be glad I even noticed there WERE other characters.

And...well..Tiger's issues? They basically boil down to wanting to find and reconnect with his brother, and later, to avenge his master's death. Makes him a likable guy and good hero, but compared to the damage and loss that's been Dragon's entire life? Yeah, I'd probably still be all about Dragon if he weren't played by Donnie Yen.

Turbo, if it weren't for that horrible hair of yours and the fact you're playing back up to Donnie Yen and Nicholas Tse, I'd squee about you too. Sadly, I just really like you. The hair...oh the hair...

The hair, oh the hair...