Shinjiku Incident

Shinjiku Incident is the third movie I've watched in three consecutive days.
First, it was He Is Just Not That Into You, and second was Confessions of a Shopaholic.

All three had obvious contrast plot wise. While He Is Just Not That Into You was a romance movie, Cofessions was a chick flick based on its chick-lit book, Shinjiku Incident was more of an action packed movie and spoken in three foreign languages - Japanese, Mandarin and Cantonese.

I'm neither fluent in any of the three. But, I did watch it because of raving reviews I received from friends and from the movie critics. Furthermore, I read somewhere about Japanese fans running up to Jackie Chan crying because they didn't want him to die at the end of the show. Come to think of it, I've forgotten how he died.

One things for sure, Daniel Wu's role in this movie was pretty contrasting to the other film he has done before. I'd say this movie was a booster for him in his career. Having his handsome face slashed across with a knife and getting his hand chopped off - That's the most vivid memory I have of the movie. Then, he acting as a hippy drug addict - Not the same man we usually see in his other movies. Kudos for him.

As for Jackie Chan, he needs to know that he is old. Too old to be having crushes or romantic scenes with oh-so obvious younger chicks, on screen, I mean. There wasn't any chemistry between them, making me avert my eyes everytime one of his mushy scenes happen.

Yes, reviews have told us that he doesn't do much of his pro martial arts in Shinjiku Incident. When I read about him being weak in the movie, I expected him to be really weak. But, he was actually the sort-of hero for the bad side.

In conclusion, it was tough for me to relax when every word uttered, I had to read the subtitles to get the meaning. Furthermore, some parts were draggy but I couldn't close my eyes or make my mind wonder off because I had to concentrate on the subtitles, hoping for an awesome interesting scene to come. Other than that, it would have been a nice movie if I didn't read the reviews beforehand, thus putting my expectations of the movie on a much higher bar than it really was. On the other hand, it does give me an idea of what goes on in the dark side of Japan. It really exist, from what I heard.