A popcorn action film not meant to impress and not bad enough to hate on. It’s a 96-minute action comedy meant to entertain and in that case, I was entertained.
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TITLE: Enter the Fat Dragon
FILM RELEASE DATE: 2020
DURATION: 97 Minutes
DVD INFORMATION: Color, 16: widescreen, Cantonese 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio, Subtitles: English, Chinese
COMPANY: Well Go USA Entertainment
RELEASED: July 14, 2020
Directed by Kenji Tanigaki
Written by Kin-Hung Chan, Koon-Nam Lui, Jing Wong
Produced by Connie Wong and Donnie Yen
Executive Producer: Alvin Chau, Virginia Lok, Jing Wong, Zhenhua Yang
Co-Producer: Alex Dong, Le Yang
Cinematographer as Yuen Man Fung, Takuro Ishizaka
Edited by Ka Wing Lee
Art Direction by Kin-Wai Lee
Costume Design by Pik Kwan Lee
Starring:
Donnie Yen as Fallon Zhu
Niki Chow as Chloe Song
Teresa Mo as Charisma
Jing Wong as Thor
Jessica Jann as Maggie
Qiunan Lin as Little Tiger
Louis Cheung as Commander Huang
Naoto Takenaka as Inspector Endo
Joey Iwanaga as Shimakura
Tetsu Watanabe as Grandfather
Enter the Fat Dragon is a hilarious chronicle of the events that transformed super-fit super-cop Fallon Zhu (martial arts phenom Donnie Yen) into a glorified records clerk with a major snack cake habit. After a desperate request from an old colleague, Zhu teams up with a wily, wok-wielding restaurateur to solve a mysterious murder and take his one last shot at regaining both his job and his fiancée.
Action choreographer Kenji Tanigaki is known for his work on films such as the upcoming “Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins” and “Rurouni Kenshin: Final Chapter” films (as well as previous films) and more.
But now the Japanese action choreographer will now be reunited with Donnie Yen, who he had worked with in the 2005 film “SPL: Kill Zone” for the 2020 film “Enter the Fat Dragon”.
The original “Enter the Fat Dragon” film starred a young Sammo Kam-Bo Hung about a farmer who ventures into the city and helps a family fight gangs of thugs.
For the 2020 version, the film stars Yen, Niki Chow (“Love Battlefield, “The Virtuous Queen of Han”, “Feel 100% II”), Teresa Mo (“Hard Boiled”, “Tomorrow is Another Day”), Jing Wong (“The Man from Macau”, “Colour of the Loyalty”, “Crying Heart”), Jessica Jann (“Easy A”, “Leverage”), Louis Cheung (“Ip Man 3”, “Keeper of Darkness”) and Naoto Takenaka (“Muno no Hito”, “119”, “Shall We Dance”).
And now the film has been released on Blu-ray courtesy of Well Go USA.
The film revolves around Fallon Zhu (portrayed by Donnie Yen), a Bruce Lee fan, a dedicated police officer who is dating actress Chloe Song (portrayed by Niki Chow) and you would think that this guy has it all.
Unfortunately, he is a bit overzealous when it comes to his police work, which tends to result in a lot of damage. Also, because of his hardcore dedication of being an officer and being a hero, he doesn’t put much time into his relationship with Chloe.
And then everything falls apart for Fallon, during a case when he tries to capture bank thieves, he nearly kills a higher up of the police force, which results in a demotion to work in a file room as a records clerk. He also ends up in an argument with Chloe, which leads to her getting injured after he hurts her pride as an actress and loses her.
Working in the file room, Fallon becomes action hero to no action at all and gains a lot of weight.
When an old colleague gives him the opportunity to leave the record room to work on a case of delivering an individual back to Japan, it should be an easy job for Fallon, as he works with translator Maggie (portrayed by Jessica Jann) and Inspector Endo (portrayed by Naoto Takenaka). But what Fallon doesn’t expect is how certain police officers are working with the yakuza and their head Shimakura (portrayed by Joey Iwanaga) is wanting the man because he recorded footage of an illegal drug operation.
To make things worse, his ex-girlfriend Chloe, now a popular actress has been hired by the yakuza and Fallon ends up having to team up with Thor (portrayed by Jing Wong) who knows how things are in the underworld of Japan.
Can Fallon regain his pride of being a police officer?
After watching “Enter the Fat Dragon”, I can see Donnie Yen wanting to try different types of roles. Not surprising considering Jackie Chan did the same, not wanting to be pigeon-holed as an action star, he was willing to try different dramatic roles or something where it didn’t rely him to be an action-star.
“Enter the Fat Dragon” is more of an action comedy. Donnie Yen in a fat suit and once a ripped police officer getting a lot of action, he’s now a records clerk, overweight, but still retains his action style.
But this is not the first time seeing a major talent putting on a fat suit. Both Sammi Cheng and Andy Lau did the same for the 2001 romantic comedy “Love on a Diet”.
In today’s political correct society, not sure if film fans may have a problem with the way the characters are portrayed but let’s move away from the PC and evaluate “Enter the Fat Dragon” as is.
And I have to say that “Enter the Fat Dragon” seemed like a Chinese New Year film, which are films tend to be family entertainment, nothing serious or to deep and if anything, they are not the best that Chinese cinema has to offer but they feature top talent and storylines that are fun and entertaining or storylines that are just lackluster.
For me, it was fun to see Donnie Yen to take on a new role and to see Niki Chow playing such a role of an actress that eventually changes through the duration of the film. To see Teresa Mo as the argumentative restaurant owner Charisma, while Jing Wong plays the cigarette/corrupt cop with a heart of gold, Thor.
While the film is a Chinese films, it is directed by Japanese filmmaker Tanigaki Kenji, known for his action choreography and the action is a major part of this film as fight scenes are creative, fascinating and of course, seeing an overweight Donnie Chen pull out crazy action is unbelievable but that’s the point of the film, action hero to overweight records clerk, but yet still retaining his awesome fight skills.
Unlike “Love on a Diet” which does poke fun on obesity, “Enter the Fat Dragon” doesn’t make the character Fallon as a glutton wanting food all the time. He is a dedicated police officer that wants a chance to prove he is a dependable police officer and to show his ex that he can balance both police life and relationship. Or can he?
Actor Takenaka Naoto plays the character of “Inspector Endo” and Los Angeles actress Jessica Jann (who appeared on “Easy A”, “Kickboxer: Retaliation”, etc.) gets her chance to be part in a major Chinese film, which is cool.
The Blu-ray looks great, lossless Cantonese audio for this action film is also very good. While special features are nil, but the usual trailers. Which makes this a barebones Blu-ray release.
But the storyline is of course, something I expect from Chinese New Year film. A popcorn action film not meant to impress and not bad enough to hate on. It’s a 96-minute action comedy meant to entertain and in that case, I was entertained.
PURCHASE THIS BLU-RAY ON AMAZON
