CRIEnglish.com reported, “The overwhelming box-office success of the action-adventure flick “The Forbidden Kingdom” has prompted its producers to shoot a sequel.”

“Sources from the film’s Chinese investor and distributor, Huayi Brothers, said Tuesday they will once again collaborate with Hollywood for part two of the Jackie Chan-Jet Li film, the Beijing Times reported.”

“The two action heroes will appear in the follow-up film, together with actress Li Bingbing, who made her major Hollywood debut with “Forbidden Kingdom.”

“The sequel is likely to feature a romance between Jet Li and Li Bingbing’s characters, the Beijing Times report says.”

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The Associated Press reported, “Martial arts adventure “The Forbidden Kingdom” ruled over the box office in North America this weekend as the movie featuring Chinese superstars Jackie Chan and Jet Li together for the first time debuted about 20.9 million dollars over the three-day period, preliminary figures released Sunday showed.”

“The film, jointly released by Lionsgate and the Weinstein Co., tells the story of a modern American teenage hurtled back in time to ancient China, where he is charged with a task to free the fabled warrior the Monkey King with the help from kung fu masters played by Jackie Chan and Jet Li. ”

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CRIEnglish.com reported, “Two of China’s best-known action film stars, Jackie Chan and Jet Li, appeared together on Tuesday in Hong Kong to kick off promotions for their first collaboration, “The Forbidden Kingdom.”

“Director Rob Minkoff and female leads Liu Yifei and Li Bingbing also attended the press conference, the film’s first in Asia.”

“‘The Forbidden Kingdom’ is being heavily promoted as the first film starring both Jackie Chan and Jet Li, an opportunity Li said both he and longtime friend Chan had waited 15 years for. He said working together made them even closer, like brothers.”

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According to the Associated Press, “Jet Li said he has changed the script of his upcoming movie with fellow action star Jackie Chan to better suit Western tastes, an online news site reported Thursday.”"Li said “The Forbidden Kingdom” was conceived as a film about Chinese mythology’s monkey king and he thought the idea of a kung fu fighting monkey was too far-fetched for Western viewers, according to an interview transcript posted on the Chinese news Web site Sina.com.”

“Li said he altered the script, inspired by the classic Chinese novel “Journey to the West,” to turn the story into a child’s dream about Chinese mythology. He said this would make characters with special powers like the monkey king more believable to a Western audience.”

“The West can’t accept a traditional interpretation of ‘Journey to the West.’ Westerners can understand Superman, Batman, but not this — a monkey that’s so dominating,” the actor was quoted as saying.

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BUY THIS DVD

MOVIE COMPANY: Golden Harvest
CAST: Starring Jackie Chan, Michelle Ferre, Mirai Yamamoto and more.
DIRECTED BY: Directed by Jackie Chan and Benny Chan
PRODUCED BY: Leonard Ho and Barbie Tung
RATING: Rated PG-13
INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE URL: http://us.imdb.com/Title?0127357
TYPE OF MOVIE: Action, Comedy
DURATION: 108 minutes

Left for dead after a brutal CIA double-cross, a lone commando (Chan) must struggle to regain his memory and expose an international espionage ring before they can unleash a powerful and lethal new energy source.  With the aid of two beautiful sidekicks, Jackie fights his way across continents and faces armed assassins and sinister plots at every turn.  For blistering action and adrenaline-pumping excitement nobody does it better than Jackie.

DVD EXTRAS:

• Region 1 encoding (US and Canada only)
• Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby, AC-3
• Theatrical trailer(s)
• Full-screen and widescreen anamorphic formats

KNOWN DVD SECRET(S): None that I could find.

DVD REVIEW:

When I bought this movie, I was expecting to see a really cool Jackie Chan flick and you get that and more with this movie.  There is a lot of action and certain fight scenes that makes you think…WOW!  How did he do that?  So, in the fight scene category, Jackie Chan delivers!  But in the acting department… this is one of the worse acted English-speaking Jackie Chan movie I have ever scene and no, I’m not talking about Jackie Chan…I’m talking about the other actors.

The moment when you start seeing the military characters act, I was wondering if it was dubbed over or what because the acting is so bad.  Also, this is one of the worst I have seen from the female characters, especially when you get to scenes of the women trying to jog Jackie’s memory.

The actual storyline is pretty cool and the many different areas that this movie is shot is pretty cool.   But unfortunately …(sigh)…the US release has been cut. So, we are not seeing the true version and unfortunately that just plainly sucks.

As for the DVD, the video quality is very good.  No major artifacts and the movie is colorful.  In the audio category, I’m glad that the movie was in Digital 5.1.  As for special features, again I don’t count trailers, menus, scene selections or foreign languages/subtitles, special features.  They should be there on the DVD.  So, leaving it at that…you don’t get squat in the special features department but the trailer and the added French track.  So, this is disappointing.

So, all in all this movie gets high marks for the action.  The movie is interesting but poorly acted in many categories.  Columbia did a great job with the GEN-X Cops DVD and I was hoping they would do the same with WHO AM I? but unfortunately, the lack of any special feature brings the rating down a bit for this movie.

THE MOVIE:  B-
THE DVD EXTRAS:  D-
THE DVD OVERALL:  C-

BUY THIS DVD

MOVIE COMPANY: New Line Cinema
CAST: Starring Jackie Chan, Chris Tucker, Tom Wilkinson, Chris Penn and Elizabeth Pena
DIRECTED BY: Directed by Brett Ratner
PRODUCED BY: Roger Birnbaum
RATING: Rated PG-13
INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE URL: http://us.imdb.com/Title?0120812
TYPE OF MOVIE: Action, Comedy

One’s all talk…the other’s all action!…Jackie Chan (Rumble in the Bronx, First Strike) and Chris Tucker (Money Talks, Friday) mix punches with punchlines in this hilarious action-comedy!

Culture’s clash and tempers flare as these two cops from different worlds quickly discover one thing in common: they can’t stand each other.  With time running out, they must join forces to catch the criminals — if they don’t kill each other first.

DVD EXTRAS:

• Region 1 encoding (US and Canada only)
• Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby
• Commentary by director Brett Ratner
• Isolated musical score with commentary by composer Lalo Schifrin
• Theatrical trailer
• Deleted scenes
• Original featurette “A Piece of the Action: Behind the scenes of Rush Hour”
• Short movie Whatever Happened to Mason Reese (1990) by director Brett Ratner
• Music video: “Nuttin’ But Love” by Heavy D
• Music video: “How Deep Is Your Love” by Dru Hill
• Widescreen anamorphic format

KNOWN DVD SECRET(S): None that I could find.

DVD REVIEW:

I really enjoyed this movie when it first came out and when I found out that this DVD was going to be jam packed, I couldn’t wait!

All I can say is this movie is definitely worth the wait because not only do you get a cool movie with pretty good colors and good sound, you get a DVD that’s fully packed and this is what I mean.

First, let’s talk about the music videos.  You get the two music videos but you get director’s commentary on the music videos.  You don’t see that too much.  Also, you get Brett Ratner’s short movie that he did back in college.  The featurette is pretty long and full of information. Especially how Tucker improvises a lot and you get to see how Jackie suggests and feels about certain action scenes.  Very cool!

There is so much more to this DVD and if you love Jackie Chan and Christ Tucker, you can’t go wrong with this DVD.  Also, you start to gain respect for Brett Ratner because you get to see how how this director really cares for his two actors.  Very cool!

This DVD is highly recommended!

THE MOVIE:  A
THE DVD EXTRAS:  A+
THE DVD OVERALL:  A

BUY THIS DVD

MOVIE COMPANY: Touchstone Pictures
CAST: Jackie Chan, Owen Wilson, Lucy Liu
DIRECTED BY: Tom Dey
WRITTEN BY: Miles Miller, Alfred Gough
RATING: PG-13
INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE URL:  http://us.imdb.com/Title?0184894
TYPE OF MOVIE: Action, Western, Comedy
DURATION: 110 minutes

A 19th century Western directed by Tom Dey, Shanghai Noon stars Jackie Chan as Chon Wang, a clumsy Imperial Guard to the Emperor of China. When Princess Pei Pei (Lucy Liu) is kidnapped from the Forbidden City, Wang feels personally responsible and insists on joining the guards sent to rescue the Princess, who has been whisked away to the United States. In Nevada and hot on the trail of the kidnappers, Wang is separated from the group and soon finds himself an unlikely partner with Roy O’Bannon (Owen Wilson), a small time robber with delusions of grandeur. Together, the two forge onto one misadventure after another. (IMDB)

DVD EXTRAS:

• Region 1 encoding (US and Canada only)
• Color, Widescreen, Dolby, Surround Sound, Digital Sound, Closed-captioned
• Commentary by Jackie Chan
• Commentary by Owen Wilson
• Commentary by director Tom Dey
• Music Video
• Production Stills
• Deleted Footage
• 3 Making Ofs: “Making an Eastern Western,” “The Shanghai Kid,” “Western Stunts, Eastern Style”
• Full-screen and widescreen anamorphic formats

KNOWN DVD SECRET(S):

Mini-game bonuses:
Select the “Special Features” option at the main menu, then choose the “Shanghai Surprise” selection. Successfully complete the “Roy’s Revenge” mini-game to view a pre-production look of a train crash scene that was planned to be included in the film. Successfully complete the “Chon’s Challenge” mini-game to view a translated version of the drinking game scene from the movie.

DVD REVIEW:

I remember how I enjoyed this movie when it first came to the theaters.  I could remember people debating if this movie or “Rush Hour” was better.  Needless to say, it’s another good US movie from Jackie Chan and the more he is paired up with talented actors instead of English speaking bad actors, the movie is going to be a hit.

As for the DVD, this DVD is packed.  You get the commentary from Chan, Wilson and the Director Tom Dey.  7 Deleted Scenes which include selectable commentary.  Behind-the-scene featurettes, Shanghai Surprise game which leads to two goodies, a music video and more.

The DVD’s video quality was brilliant and colorful.   The ratio is 2:35:1 Widescreen with Digital 5.1 surround for English and French language tracks.

If you love Jackie Chan films, this is one to have in your collection.  The extra features are a definite bonus if you enjoyed the film.

THE MOVIE: B
THE DVD EXTRAS: A-
THE DVD OVERALL: B+