Months back at New York Comic Con, I saw TGH trailer for the first time. I didn’t know what to make of it. Especially in 3D, something I’m not a fan of unless it comes after ‘TRON: LEGACY. IN…’ However, as the months went by my anticipation for the movie grew.
Today I went and saw TGH in the early afternoon. After paying $6 for my regular 2D movie I took a seat in the theater. The movie started. Oh boy. We start off with an 8-year-old Britt Ried is escorted into his father’s office at a newspaper company, where his father scolds him for getting into another fight (which we later learn, was him coming to the rescue of a girl in his class). Twenty some years later, we see Britt “grown up” and throwing a pretty sick party, with broken flat screens and girls in tight clothing. After being scolded by his father, again, his father dies of a bee sting. After the funeral ceremony for him, a statue is revealed in his honor. At some point Kato comes in, does some bad ass stuff with coffee, and 10 minutes later the two are cutting off the head of the statue.
I would love to go and Wikipedia the plot for you guys, but it needs to be said that the first 30 minutes of this movie are pretty boring, and easy to forget. They build the who, where, what, and why, without giving you much else. Of course this could make the average movie goer angry, but I’m rather charmed by it. The bullshit was moved out fairly quickly, and is paced like a real graphic novel. We’ve seen this before with the likes of ‘Batman and Robin’, but here it actually works. No dragging things out ala ‘Iron Man’ and ‘Batman Begins’. It gets to the point quickly. To that, I applaud Seth Rogan.
The only thing that was pretty un-cool, is that Seth Rogan’s Green Hornet is kind of like a Mary Sue fan fic on the big screen. Seth basically plays himself (not always a bad thing) and lives out his fantasy of being a superhero, in his case, Green Hornet. While my knowledge of Green Hornet is limited to the few GA books and the show with Bruce Lee, I’d like to think I know enough to know that this is not the Green Hornet I’m familiar with. That being said, he was enjoyable to watch, as his enthusiasm for the characters was very evident.
The same can’t be said for some of the other cast members. Christoph Waltz plays a very forgettable and uncharismatic Chudnofsky, who I guess was supposed to be Russian. Waltz blew me away as Hans Landa, but he literally brought nothing to the table in this movie. He didn’t even sound Russian, he sounded like himself reading lines off a piece of paper and putting little to no emotion behind them. He was pretty much useless. Cameron Diaz was good, but aside from being a love interest offered little else until the very end of the movie. Her character was wasted, and could have had much more potential (and conflict)!
That being said, Jay Chou stole the show. He blew me away as Kato, and he is in no way shape or form a rip off of Bruce Lee. He is Kato. He made it his own, and I enjoyed watching him on the screen. Adorable, kick ass, and a great counterpart. I would very much so enjoy a Kato movie, as he could easily carry it by himself. Oh, and Black Beauty was great and amazing. There were some cute nods to the original show (as well as Bruce Lee), but if you blink you will miss them.
Overall this is an enjoyable movie. It was a great way to set up a franchise, and I hope there is another movie. But I would wait until it comes out on DVD, or at a second run theater (or $2 theater, whatever).
-Lauren
Girls With Comics 