Ong Bak 2 (2009) Review

SYNOPSIS:

Martial arts superstar Tony Jaa stars in and directs this epic tale of revenge set hundreds of years in the past. Featuring a huge cast and hordes of elephants, this prequel takes Jaa’s skills to the next level, showcasing him as a master of a wide range of martial arts styles - while proving him to be a promising director as well.

A few years ago, the original Ong Bak set out to turn back the clock on action movies, moving away from overcomplicated plotlines and focusing on delivering as much action as possible. Ong Bak 2 promises much of the same, but falters by offering up a tale that needed meatier plotting. To add insult to injury, a baffling local PG-13 mucks up the flow of Tony Jaa’s action scenes, leaving local audiences with a messy, incomplete version of an already troubled film.

Tien (Tony Jaa) is the son of a commander in the royal army. His parents were killed in a coup that placed a greedy prince on the throne. Tien is left orphaned and is soon picked up by slavers. But he is rescued by a group of thieves and martial artists whose leader sees something special in Tien, and raises him as one of his own. Tien grows up to be a fearsome warrior, and quickly comes to lead the thieves in their raids. He is next in line to king of the bandits, but the memory of his parents has not left him, and he cannot move on without exacting his revenge.

The plot is pretty thin as it is, but the script pushes it even thinner. The movie waits far too long to introduce the story elements of the film, perhaps too confident in the effectiveness of its action. And the action is indeed quite great, but the lack of context makes it feel like a blur. And when things ought to have been moving, the movie sticks us with momentum breaking flashbacks, making the entire second act feel pretty tedious. The movie actually has a somewhat interesting story, with a couple of twists that could’ve been dramatically devastating, but the script doesn’t do justice to its own ideas.

But let’s accept that nobody went into Ong Bak 2 hoping for a narrative masterpiece. This is all about the action, and for the most part, it delivers. There are a few camera issues, but all in all, action and martial arts aficionados should find little to complain about in this movie. Once again, Tony Jaa eschews wirework and CG and concentrates on filming people hitting each other. In many ways, everything here is far more impressive than what can be found in the modern Chinese martial arts epics. It’s just too bad that this movie is rated PG-13, and has some of its violence cut. I’m not particularly bloodthirsty, but the cuts ruin the flow of the action scenes, at times completely breaking the logic of the scene. It’s an absolutely baffling choice.

As there isn’t a lot of plot, there isn’t really a lot of acting in this movie. Tony Jaa mostly lets his body do the talking, his fists and feet enunciating his emotion better than his words. But Jaa also has an expressive face, and though he doesn’t really get to stretch his face much, it works well enough for the film. The supporting cast doesn’t really get to do much either, though there’s some real talent in there. Sorapong Chatree is pretty fun to watch overall. Sarayu Wongkrachang goes a bit overboard, but he makes it work.

For the life of me, I will never understand why the distributors pushed to get a PG-13 rating for this movie. The one thing Ong Bak 2 had going for it was its action scenes, where the visceral violence could somewhat make up for the movie’s general lack of plot. But the rating makes the action scenes incoherent, the fight logic thrown out the window as we skip over vital seconds of movement. I might be able to recommend Ong Bak 2 to die hard fans of fighting, but not in this form.

ONG BAK 2 (2009)

Starring: Tony Jaa

Director: Tony Jaa

Studio: Magnolia Pictures

Genre: Action

Rating: R (For sequences of violence.)

Release Date: September 25, 2009

Official Site: http://www.ongbaktwo.com/