Film #043 - Kung Pow!: Enter the Fist (2002)
Okay, so Kung Pow! is not for everyone. It is, in the final analysis, an extremely silly movie. Writer/director/star Steve Oedekerk (of Ace Ventura, Jimmy Neutron and “Thumb” movie fame) bought the rights to Hong Kong action film Hu hao shuang xing (aka Tiger and Crane Fist or Savage Killers) and reworked the scenes and redubbed it to tell a new, comedic story. If this sounds a lot like Woody Allen’s What’s Up Tiger Lily?, it should. It’s the same basic idea. There are, however, two significant differences. First, virtually all the new voices are provided by Oedekerk (even the majority of the women). Secondly, Oedekerk actually digitally inserted himself into the footage, effectively replacing original actor/director Jimmy Wang Yu in many of the scenes.
The new story tells of “the chosen one” (Oedekerk) and his quest to defeat Master Pain - aka Betty - (Fei Lung), the man who killed the chosen one’s parents. When he allies himself with Master Tang (Hui Lou Chen), the chosen one finds himself falling for the beautiful Ling (Ling Ling Tse) and possibly bringing the wrath of Betty and his mysterious benefactors down upon Tang’s school. During his quest, the chosen one battles many enemies, from nameless hordes to a kung-fu fighting cow. He also finds another friend in the beautiful, single-breasted mystery woman Whoa (Jennifer Tung).
It was a massive undertaking on a minimal budget. The original sets had to be completely rebuilt for scenes in which Oedekerk could not use the original footage. There are also many, many effects shots. Although Oedekerk used the same low-cost CGI that powers Jimmy Neutron, still taxed his resources. In fact, Oedekerk literally ran out of money and had to film one scene with his personal camcorder just to get the film done. It’s cheap nature doesn’t show. Due to the conscious decision to mimic the visual style of the original film, including film degradation, any lack of quality actually helps the overall effect. And it must be said that Oedekerk does a great job of not straying from the very static camera originally used by Yu.
I should say something about the acting in the film. The work by the original Hong Kong actos seems very strong. If they had been awful, I don’t think the comedy would work as well. The cast for the new footage sells it just as strongly, with the exception of Oedekerk, who carries most of the comedy himself, using everyone else primarily as a massive army of straight men. And while most of Oedekerk’s choices for the character voices (Whoa is the only character for whom he doesn’t provide the voice) is good, but the squaky voice he gives to romantic interest Ling can be quite grating, although it gre on me with time. On the other hand, his voice for Master Tang (also used for narration) is excellent and provides some of the best material in the film.
As for the humor, if you’ve seen any of Oedekerk’s productions, you will knwo what to expect. If you haven’t, you’ve probably never experienced anything like Oedekerk when he just cuts loose as he does here. It’s an almost non-stop barrage of jokes, striking in such rapidfire succession that you are either doubled over with laughter or switching off just to catch a break. Of course, if you’re the kind of viewer who doesn’t enjoy jokes about an anthropomorphic tongue with the power to save humanity, you probably won’t get far enough to care about that. The opening with the Kung-Fu fighting baby will undoubtedly shake you off right away.
Kung Pow! is, to me anyway, a very funny movie that I often put in for a quick laugh. My sense of humor lines up very well with Oedekerk’s brand of nonsense, but (as indicated) I can see that it’s not for everyone. But if you like your comedy over-the-top and don’t mind a little friendly mocking of the kung-fu genre, there’s a lot of fun to be had in this film.