The Forbidden Kingdom

For other uses, see Forbidden Kingdom.

The Forbidden Kingdom
The Forbidden Kingdom poster
Directed by	Rob Minkoff
Written by	John Fusco (screenplay) Wu Cheng'en (story)
Produced by	Ryan Kavanaugh, Lynwood Spinks, Casey Silver, Yuen Woo-Ping Raffaella de Laurentis, David U. Lee, Philip Lee, Zhongjun Wang
Starring	Jackie Chan Jet Li Liu Yifei Collin Chou Li Bingbing Michael Angarano
Cinematography	Peter Pau
Edited by	Eric Strand
Music by	David Buckley
Distributed by	Lionsgate The Weinstein Company
Release dates	April 17, 2008 April 17, 2008 April 18, 2008 April 24, 2008 June 25, 2008 July 11, 2008 July 26, 2008
Running time	1 hour and 53 minutes
Countries	United States China
Language	English / Mandarin
Budget	$55 million

The Forbidden Kingdom (Chinese: 功夫之王) is a 2008 Hollywood martial arts-adventure film from Lionsgate and The Weinstein Company directed by Rob Minkoff. It is the first film to star together two of the best-known names in the martial arts film genre, Jackie Chan and Jet Li. The action sequences were choreographed by Yuen Woo-ping.

The movie is distributed in the United States through Lionsgate and The Weinstein Company, and through The Huayi Brothers Film & Taihe Investment Company in the People's Republic of China. It is set to be released on DVD on September 9, 2008.

Plot

The film opens during a battle between Sun Wukong, the Monkey King (Jet Li), and heavenly soldiers amongst the clouds. It is then revealed the sequence was a dream when a young teenager, Jason Tripitikas (Michael Angarano), awakens in his room plastered with vintage kung fu movie posters. After getting dressed, he makes his way to a pawn shop in South Boston's China town to buy some new kung fu DVDs. There, he converses with Hop (a prosthetics-laden Jackie Chan), the shop's elderly owner, and, while thumbing through some DVDs, he is drawn to a room full of antiques and notices a golden staff. Hop tells him that the staff is to be delivered to its rightful owner and then closes the door. On his way back home, Jason is attacked by local bully Lupo (Morgan Benoit) and his cronies who force him to take them to the store so they can steal some money from the old man. Feeling betrayed, Hop tries to attack the thieves with the staff, but is shot by Lupo (much to both Jason and Lupo's cronies' shock). He tells Jason that he must deliver the staff to its rightful owner. Jason takes the staff and runs from the thieves. On top of a building, he is surrounded by the bullies, with Lupo warning Jason that he "saw nothing" (out of fear Jason may turn them in to police). Before Lupo can shoot Jason, he is suddenly pulled off the roof by the staff and travels back through time.

When Jason wakes up he has been transported back to ancient China, dressed in old-century clothing. There he is attacked by Jade Warriors who try to take the staff from him. He is helped by the Drunken Immortal, traveling scholar Lu Yan (Jackie Chan). Later that night, seated in a teahouse, Lu tells Jason a story of how the Monkey King caused havoc at the banquet on the Five Elements Mountain celebrating the Jade Emperor's forthcoming 500 year period of meditation and drank of the elixir of immortality. The Emperor took a liking to the Monkey King and decided to award him a heavenly title, much to the chagrin of the Jade Warlord (Collin Chou), a heavenly general. The Emperor then left the Jade Warlord in charge of heaven before retreating to his period of seclusion. The Jade Warlord later challenged the Monkey King to a duel, and turned him into stone by tricking the Monkey King to set aside his magic staff, Ruyi Jingu Bang. But before he was fully immobilized, the Monkey King cast his staff into the mundane world. Lu Yan ends the tale by stating a person known as the "Seeker" will be the person to find the staff and free the Monkey King. Lu Yan and Jason then get into a fight with the Jade Warriors who track them to the restaurant and are saved by a mysterious young woman, who turns out to be the Orphaned Warrior, Golden Sparrow (Liu Yi Fei). Sparrow's family was killed by the Jade Warlord, and she has vowed vengeance against him.

The Jade Warlord is notified by his men that they have seen the magical staff. The Jade Warlord then sends his bounty hunter, the white-haired witch Ni Chang (Li Bingbing), to retrieve it for him. When Jason wakes up in the morning he is attacked by a person dressed in white clothes, who takes the staff away. Jason, Lu Yan, and Sparrow follow the trail of the mysterious man. They reach a temple where the man is meditating. There, Lu Yan and the man, the Silent Monk (Jet Li), fight for the staff. The Silent Monk later learns that the staff is meant for the traveler. The four head towards the Five Elements Mountain in a quest to free the Monkey King and end the reign of the Jade Warlord.

On the way to the Mountain, Lu Yan and the Silent Monk teach Jason kung fu. After crossing a great desert, they are attacked by Ni Chang and the Jade Warriors, but the four escape on their horses with the staff intact. Ni Chang fires an arrow after them, and Lu Yan is hit and falls from his horse. They take refuge in a monastery where they find out that only the Jade Warlord's elixir of immortality will heal Lu Yan, who admits to being a mere mortal. Jason, desperate to help Lu Yan, heads toward the palace with the staff to exchange it for the elixir. Once at the palace he learns that the elixir was promised to Ni Chang if she brought back the staff, but since Jason brought it he has to fight Ni Chang to the death, the winner getting the elixir. The Silent Monk discovers that Jason has left with the staff and pursues Jason along with Sparrow. Back at the palace, Jason and Ni Chang fight. Though Jason had developed a good measure of skill in the martial arts and holds his own, the more experienced Ni Chang defeats him. But before she can kill him, the Jade Warlord orders her to stop and, instead, sets his own men on Jason. The boy's life is once again saved when the Silent Monk and Sparrow arrive (with Lu Yan in the rear being carried by monks from the monastery who join in the fight with the Jade Army) and intervene. The Silent Monk duels the Jade Warlord while Sparrow fights Ni Chang. During the fight, Jason manages to grab hold of the elixir and throw it to Lu Yan, who drinks it and becomes immortal, regaining his strength and energy. Lu Yan then fights Ni Chang on the balcony. The Silent Monk is mortally wounded during his battle with the Jade Warlord and throws the staff to Jason. Jason takes the staff and shatters the Monkey King's statue form, freeing him from his imprisoned state. The Silent Monk dies of his injuries and reverts into a golden hair, revealing him to be a magical human familiar created by the Monkey King prior to his imprisonment. The fight between the Monkey King and the Jade Warlord commences. Sparrow tries to kill the Jade Warlord with a mystical jade dart, but is countered by chi. After a long battle, Lu Yan dispatches Ni Chang by sending her off the palace balcony and Jason is able to kill the Jade Warlord with the dart and dropping him into a pit of lava. Jason reaches Sparrow, who thanks him before dying. He is then praised by the Jade Emperor for fulfilling the people's prophecy. As his reward for his bravery, Jason chooses to be transported back home to modern day Boston.

When Jason wakes up, he is lying flat on the ground below the building he supposedly fell from and is attacked by Lupo's gang, but this time he uses his newfound kung fu skills, fights back, and defeats Lupo single-handedly. Hop manages to survive the gunshot (the medics stated that the bullet missed his heart), and is taken to the hospital, but not before stating he is immortal and thanking Jason for completing his mission. Before Jason leaves the scene, he sees a girl who looks like Sparrow. She congratulates him for his bravery and tells him she will see him later. She then goes into her store (the Golden Sparrow). Jason, surprised but delighted to see her, leaves and goes home, where he practices his kung fu on the roof with a staff.

Cast

Actor	Role
Jackie Chan	Lu Yan, the Drunken Immortal/Hop, the pawn shop owner
Jet Li	Sun Wukong/The Silent Monk
Collin Chou	The Jade Warlord
Michael Angarano	Jason Tripitikas, the Traveler
Liu Yi Fei	Golden Sparrow, the Chinatown girl
Li Bingbing	Ni-Chang, the White-Haired Witch Assassin

Production details

Pre-production

While the character Sun Wukong came from Wu Cheng'en's famous classical novel Journey to the West, in an interview with Screen Power magazine, actor Collin Chou denied that the plotline would be related to the novel. The details of the plot were devised by screenwriter John Fusco along with actor Jet Li. Li explains,

The screenwriter is a good friend of mine and we have been sparring partners for the past three years. I was among the first to get hold of the story and later we were joined by Jackie and others. The screenwriter and I discussed how to turn the story into a fantasy and dream-like film. He is a superb screenwriter and has been learning Chinese martial arts for more than 10 years. He has roughly put across in the film some of my basic understanding of martial arts and principles of Buddhism.

In a behind the scenes article he wrote for Kung Fu Magazine, screenwriter John Fusco also stated he derived the surname for the Jason Tripitikas character from “the wandering monk, Tripitaka, from Journey to the West.”

Production

Production began in early May 2007 in the area around the Gobi Desert in China. Before filming began, the entire cast did a costume fitting and a script read through, certain dialogues were altered to suit the different actors' English speaking abilities; this was due to the majority of the cast having English as their second language. Chan described the first day of shooting as "very relaxing" because the shots only required drama and walking, with no action.. When the two martial arts veterans (Chan and Li) did film action scenes together for the first time, they both expressed how easy it was to work with one another. Chan explained:

I have not worked with someone whom I’m comfortable with, in terms of movements, rhythm and natural reactions, in the last 10 years. I have done many fight scenes with others but there were usually more than 10 takes, which is a waste of time as the person may forget his moves and unnecessary injuries. When I fought with Jet, our actions were quick. We also didn’t have to do the same stunt over 20 times.

Filming finished on August 24 2007, and the film went into post-production on September 29, 2007.

Promotion

Among other titles, the film was given the working title, The J & J Project, before being officially titled The Forbidden Kingdom in April of 2007.

Several teasers and trailers have been released to the web, with the latest one currently playing on the official site. There have also been a number of posters released, each based on one character from the film with their own distinct color background and tagline.

Critical reception

The response to The Forbidden Kingdom, by both critics and audiences, has generally been positive. As of May 12, 2008, the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 62% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 101 reviews — with the consensus being "Great fight scenes, but too much filler." Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 57 out of 100, based on 26 reviews — indicating mixed or average reviews. The movie received an average score of 60.9% from 48 film critics according to Movie Tab.

DVD release

The forbidden kingdom will be on DVD and Blu-ray September 9, 2008. It will be sold on 1-disc and 2-disc special editions. The 1-disc edition will have no extras but contain widescreen and full screen presentations on one disc. The two disc special edition will include a commentary by director Rob Minkoff, deleted scenes with commentary, Featurettes (The Kung Fu dream team, Dangerous Beauty, Discovering China, Filming in Chinawood, Monkey King and the eight immortals), a Previsualization Featurette with commentary by director Rob Minkoff, a blooper reel, and a digital copy for Itunes/Apple/Quicktime, and for Windows Media. A Blu-ray 2-disc special edition will also be sold with identical features of the 2-disc special edition.

Box office performance

As of June 30 2008, The Forbidden Kingdom grossed a total of $105.6 million worldwide — $52 million in the United States and $53.6 million in other territories. In its opening weekend in the United States and Canada, the film grossed $21,401,121 in 3,151 theaters, ranking #1 at the box office (for one week) and averaging $6,792 per theater.

See also

• Jianghu

External links

• Official site
• The Forbidden Kingdom at IMDb
• The Forbidden Kingdom at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Forbidden Kingdom at Metacritic
• The Forbidden Kingdom at Box Office Mojo
• The Forbidden Kingdom at AllMovie
• Review at Working Author
• Official Bebo Page
• Info from Jackie Chan's website
• Info from Jet Li's website
• Info from Collin Chou's website
• Interview with Composer David Buckley at Tracksounds
• Official Kung Fu Magazine "Behind the scenes" article by Gene Ching
• Soundtrack Review at Tracksounds