“Gucci, Gucci, Goo I said!”
Kung Fu Yoga (2017) is a fairly dull Jackie Chan epic / Indiana Jones riff. Chan plays China’s greatest, but very humble, archaeologist Jack. He and his retinue of young & agile students – I think they’re students – are recruited by Indian professor Ashmita to buy and evaluate a huge emerald. It’s stolen by Ashmita’s rival, evil and arrogant Randall, who might be a prince of India or something, and claims ownership of the emerald. There’s also the theft of a diamond from a trove, yada yada yada. I lost track.
Eventually, and there’s a lot of eventually here, fair warning, we find Chan recreating the third Indiana Jones movie’s scene of the invisible bridge. I think. At its end is a golden gazebo full of treasure – and after some acrobatic fighting, villagers abruptly appear, everyone, even evil Randall, says namaste, and they break into a Bollywood-style musical number. And that’s it.
Yeah. No kidding. I’m not making that up. It’s too insipid, really.
And the rest was sort of dull. Yes, lots of kung fu, escapes from tight situations, and I think my credulity was all stretched out of shape at the end. Don’t get me wrong, technically it’s well done, and the escape from the hyenas was fun.
OK, I hooted really loudly at the lion scene. I think I scared my Arts Editor, even. The lion might be worth the price of admission. If the price is fairly low.
But I won’t remember this ripoff of Jones for much longer, though.
