The Warrior's Gate - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Enter The Warrior's Gate

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score: ​

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Movie
Do any of you remember back in the day when Jet Li and Jackie Chan were kings of martial arts films? The men are simply legends in the genre, but for some reason they never actually got around to making a movie together in their prime. However, around 2008 it was announced that they were FINALLY going to start together in a film called The Forbidden Kingdom. Every kung fu nerd in the world were pretty much bouncing out of their chairs in excitement and anticipation for the epic pairing. Then what we got was a cheesy comedy/action flick that starred a white boy getting transported over to a magical kingdom where Jet Li and Jackie Chan played second fiddle. Everyone was hurt, disappointed and really shocked at the turn of events (even though the movie isn’t THAT bad), being that we had spent literally DECADES praying and hoping that Jackie and Jet could come together and make an epic film filmed with awesome fights. Instead we got ….well….The Forbidden Kingdom. What does this have to do with Enter the Warrior’s Gate? Well, it could be because Enter the Warrior’s Gate feels like a cheap copy of The Forbidden Kingdom, just with even worse actors, and Dave Bautista.

If you’ve seen The Forbidden Kingdom then you know what to expect. White kid gets transported to a magical kingdom full of swords, sorcery and lots of Kung Fu (or at least a little bit of Kung Fu. There really isn’t that much). This time it’s a kid named Jack Bronson (Uriah Shelton), a bit of a loser who gets picked on at school, and is at risk for not going to college due to his mother’s failing career as a real estate agent. Jack tends to play video games for FAR too long instead of focusing on his academic studies, but things change when the Chinese man whom Jack works for gives him an ancient Chinese box from a dynasty far away. This box just so happens to be magical, and through said box pops the warrior Zhoo (Mark Chao) and the princess Su Lin (Ni Ni). It seems that a brutal war lord named Arun (Dave Bautista) has taken over her kingdom and wants to marry the princess in order to rule over the three kingdoms. Zhoo leaves the princess in Jack’s hands after mistaking him for the famed Black Knight (a character in the video game that Jack is playing).

Naturally Jack doesn’t have much experience in taking care of princess, but soon that option is wiped off the table, as Arun’s barbarians come and kidnap the princess. Following the captures down into the magic box, Jack is transported from his world over to hers, where he and Zhoo have to band together and save the princess before Arun takes over the entire kingdom. As you can probably guess, Jack is a bit of a disappointment fighting wise. He’s a limp noodle, and has no REAL fighting skills to speak of. However, that’s no problem in movies as Zhoo can teach Jack how to fight in a matter of mere days, and take on countless warriors with just the power of “I believe in you!” to fuel him along.

Enter The Warrior’s Gate is beyond ridiculous. I didn’t have much hope for it judging by the trailer, but I’m a sucker for low budget DTV films and was hoping for a cheesy good time. Sadly, it’s just a cheesy BAD time. Too much of the film feels like it’s a direct rip off of The Forbidden Kingdom, from the loser white kid transported to an all Asian world, down to the old man boss giving him an ancient tome, gaining confidence and strength on the other side, getting the hot Asian girl way outside of his league, and even the Karate Kid level of confidence when he comes back to the real world wherein he can stand up to the bullies pestering him.

I could live with the blatant copying of other films if it wasn’t for the fact that the dialog and editing of the video is sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo very bad. I honestly kind of feel bad for all the actors involved in the script as the dialog is just horrendous. Cheesy one liners, bad comedy, and ninja warriors trying to do the robot just left me speechless. And not in a good way. Bautista is horribly miscast as Arun, and the rest of the actors and actresses feel like they got the part just because no one wanted to show up for auditions, so they got it by default. Veteran actor Mark Chao as the warrior Zhoo is the ONLY one out of the bunch who feels like he gives a rip about his reputation, and actually puts forth a semi decent performance. It’s just sadly marred by horrendous scriptwriting and even lazier directing (I was shocked and embarrassed to see that Luc Besson was actually one of the co-writers of the script).




Rating:

Rated PG-13 for martial arts fantasy violence




Video:

The one nice thing about modern technology is that even mediocre DTV films can look amazing on home video thanks to advances in digital cameras. It used to be that if you had a shoestring budget all you could afford was grainy old film stock that didn’t measure up to the qualities of good 35mm and 70mm stock, but nowadays anyone with a few bucks can get a digital camera that can easily put forth demo material with a little effort. Enter the Warrior’s Gate is proof of that, and despite the cheap costumes and video game level CGI, manages to look REALLY nice. The costumes are a bit cheap, but the clarity and detailing on the low budget set pieces are second to none. Colors are bright and well saturated, and the light blue/green color grading looks magnificent contrasted with the golds and reds of the costumes. Black levels are strong and show almost no banding, giving the 2.39:1 AVC encoded Blu-ray a very sharp and clean look.





Audio:

Easily on par with the video, the 5.1 DTS-HD MA track is very aggressive with the bass and actually quite immersive. I wasn’t expecting much due to the DTV nature of the film, but the sound mix is quite pleasing, with waves of LFE that accompany the battle sequences as well as attaching itself to the generic Chinese themed score. Vocals are crisp and cleanly replicated in the center channel, and the surrounds show a goodly amount of activity ranging from the roar and hubbub of battle to the score itself. It’s a technically competent track and one that really has that aggressive nature of an action track.

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Extras:

• Deleted Scene
• "Beyond the Gate: Making Enter the Warriors Gate" Featurette
• "The Journey East: Bridging the Cultural Divide" Featurette
• Audio Commentary with Director Matthias Hoene

Final Score: ​

Enter the Warrior’s Gate is simply a bad film. I was hoping for a bad movie that was at least fun, but instead it’s merely a painful experience that I wish could be erased from my mind. Poor writing, lazy directing, and weak editing left the film hamstrung from the first few minutes, and the movie just can’t seem to catch a break the longer it goes on. There weren’t even any decent fight scenes AT ALL (which can cover up a lot of sins in bad movie), and the actors looked like they really wanted to be somewhere else (especially poor Mark Chao and Dave Bautista). The Blu-ray itself LOOKS and SOUNDS amazing, and there’s a decent amount of extras, but I would rent this at the very MOST, but personally think it’s not even worth checking out. Skip it.



Technical Specifications:

Starring: Mark Chao, Ni Ni, Dave Bautista
Directed by Matthias Hoene
Written by: Luc Besson, Robert Mark Kamen
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1
Studio: Lionsgate
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 105 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: June 6th, 2017

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• Michael Scott
• May 11, 2017

Recommendation: Just Run

 

[JBrax]

I don't think this is one that I would even remotely think about renting even before reading your review. Nope!

 

[Todd Anderson]

I agree with Jeff... one look at the cover alone and I'm heading the other direction. Based on Mike's advice, run!

 

[Michael Scott]

hey, sometimes bad movies are a blast. Sadly this was not one of them

 

[Todd Anderson]

Once again...

Collectors across the globe say: "Thank You"

 

[Michael Scott]

LOL!!