ericthered01

What has happened to Tony Jaa? I guess Ong Bak and The Protector were lightning in a bottle type moments because his movies are getting worse. This movie is the opposite of what made him popular in the first place. It was him with no wires or CGI, doing amazing stunts and hard-hitting martial arts. This movie not only uses wires, but horrible looking CGI and scenes obviously shot in front of a green screen. Not only does the CGI look bad in this movie but Jaa's fighting abilities seem to have taken a hit too. He looks slower and even a little sloppy at times. JeeJa Yanin is completely wasted in this movie too. Why even put her in the movie just to get beat up most of the time? And the RZA? He took an already bad movie and plunged it to the bottom of the barrel. He's a terrible actor and shouldn't be anywhere near a fight scene. I keep waiting for the magic of Jaa's first two movies to reappear but sadly I don't think that day will ever come.

Mike Moeller is a good martial artist but this movie is unwatchable. Very low budget and very bad acting and story. Moeller wears one of the worst wigs I have ever seen for the flashback scenes. It looks like one of those cheap mullet wigs you can find in stores around Halloween. The editing and the camera angles for the fight scenes are noticeably off as well. You shouldn't be able to see space between fists and feet "hitting" the opponent. Too many jump cuts as well. Sometimes less is more. Keep the camera back and let us see the complete moves. It is a shame because you can tell that Moeller and some of the other guys are talented. Hopefully this guy can get into a decent flick directed by Isaac Florentine or someone who knows how to film a martial arts movie.

What a disappointment the two Ong Bak "sequels" have become. In my opinion, the first one is one of the best martial arts movies of all time. Part 2 wasn't even close to being as good as the original and now Part 3 manages to travel even further down the spectrum. Tony Jaa has one fight scene in the first hour of the movie. That's right....ONE fight scene! And just like the other fights in the movie, it's really nothing special. The Crow guy from part 2 is back and actually has the best fight scene in the movie but even that is hampered by obvious wire work. The showdown between he and Jaa ranks as one of the biggest disappointments of all time. I expected way more from these two great martial artists. The entire film contains too much slow motion, not enough action, too many scenes that drag on forever, too many scenes that make no sense, and most importantly, not enough of Tony Jaa doing what he does best. I don't know what "style" he uses for the second half of the movie but to me it looks like what I see orangutans doing at the zoo. I don't know why his character abandons all the styles he learned in part 2 but then again, nothing else makes sense either. Like when after an hour of pretty much nothing, an action scene has finally happened, only it didn't because the movie rewinds itself to take it away. I wish I could do the same.