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It's the
future. We no longer have only one universe. We have a
bunch of universes, and each contains one of us. That's right,
each universe contains one of you-- someone with the same face, body
and everything. Jet Li (the bad Jet Li) is the man who
wants to get rid of all the "hims" that exist in each
universe. For every one he kills, he gains strength. Right
now he's rendered virtually invincible and only the last existing
"him" (the good Jet Li) can stop this menace. The
fate of the world is in his hands....or something like that.
OK, now what can you expect out of a story like this? Not
much, but then again I wasn't expecting that much in the first place.
You watch a film like this for the fast-paced, tongue-in-cheek,
slam-bang action. And a few of the action sequences are
spectacular. The opening scene emulates the same action style
made popular in "The Matrix" while the song "Let the
Bodies Hit the Floor" pounds in the soundtrack. Now, as I
tell everyone, I'm a sucker for fast-paced action scenes set to
really cool music (usually heavy metal).
Unfortunately, the overall aesthetics pretty much ruin the film.
The dialogue is downright awful. I don't normally pick out the
plot holes and continuity errors on the first viewing of a movie, but in
this case they were as clear as day. For example, in one scene
the good Jet Li (dressed in a cop uniform) gets a CAT scan. So
he changes into a gown. When the bad Jet Li comes to wreak
havoc, he changes back into his clothes and he ends up wearing the
same clothes as the villain. He wasn't wearing those clothes in
the first place! That was just a cheap tool to bring up a case
of mistaken identity, making the cops chase after the wrong guy.
Yeah, nice try.
Jet Li is a great martial artist, but like many foreign actors-- he
doesn't have great command of the English language. But unlike
those other actors, Jet tries to play it cool like he has an extensive
English vocabulary. In some scenes, he sounds like a
malfunctioning robot.
I'm not going to totally knock this film, and it's pretty good for its
(macho guy flick) standards. I don't watch movies like this to
be enlightened; I watch them to be entertained. But a good deal
of the scenes are so downright silly that it became hard fully
engaging myself--even with lowered expectations. However,
"The One" has its moments and the action is very
well-choreographed. And it is one wild adrenaline rush...but the kind
that's waiting for you at the video store.
-- Matt
( 2 1/2 out of 4 pops )
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