Genre: Martial Arts

This is another great slice of entertainment JC style, and was one of his best performances before his physical shape noticeably began to deteriorate in the mid-90’s.

If the rest of the film had been as good as the last half hour then ‘Prince of the Sun’ would be more fondly remembered.

Slickly made, ‘Prisoner of War’ may walk some familiar paths narrative wise but feels like a fresh spin thanks to a likeable supporting cast, solid direction, and a good amount of crisply choreographed fight action.

By no means unexciting, the choreography still lacks a stylish edge and tends to appear archaic at times. This is compensated by director Chai Ying Min’s brave concentration on the various relationships of the story.

Using the conventions of the 30’s Hollywood swashbucklers mixed with his insane stunts and sublime fight action, Chan produced one of his best ever films.

It was impossible to match the original classic, but Chan pulled out all of the stops to make sure he gave it his best.

Stanley Tong continues to show his skill in the action genre with more kinetic direction.

Scenes are chopped at strange junctures, the plot jumps all over the place and the simple act of allowing actors to have proper reaction shots to the drama unfolding is mostly absent.

A definite improvement over part 1, and other similar fare such as ‘China O’Brien’ – it makes for an adequate 90 minutes viewing – but ultimately reminds us why we love HK fighting so much more.

A bit of ‘Heat’ mixed with Chan’s own ‘Invisible Target’, ‘Raging Fire’ hits hard in both the action and drama, the much-missed director delivering one of his finest.

Despite the slick visual look, kooky set up and a little too much reliance on wirework and CGI enhancement come the last third, ‘Raging Phoenix’ is really what we loved about the fight flicks from Hong Kong’s golden age.

‘Rapid Fire’ is a pretty entertaining action movie, mainly thanks to Lee’s performance and some solidly handled fight scenes.