Keanu Reeves has went out to direct his first movie which is martial arts drama and Keanu (I mean Donako) is an evil owner of a security company in Beijing who runs an underground fight club   He sees Tiger Chen, a disciple of Tai Chi, and he manipulated Tiger to fight in Keanu’s underground fight club where the fights are broadcast over the internet to wealthy people.  Meanwhile, you have a pouting police detective (Karen Mok) trying to bring down the fight club in one of the subplots that is least interesting in the movie.

 

MAN OF TAI CHI reunites Keanu with MATRIX fight choreographer Yuen Wo Ping and stuntman Tiger Chen (who plays a fictional version of himself for the movie).   Keanu plays the evil businessman so well that I wish MAN OF TAI CHI was a little longer and we see more evilness from Keanu’s character (he just seems like invincible evil guy you can’t really beat until the climax).  The martial arts sequences are great even though I wish they developed some of the characters more because some of them come off as ciphers.   Still I think Keanu does have a second career as a director if he ever retires from acting.

 

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Feature audio commentary with director/ actor Keanu Reeves and actor Tiger Chen which yu can skip because it is a boring track.

 

THE MAKING OF MAN OF TAI CHI-  Keanu Reeves and Tiger Chen talk about how the movie got made and the making of MAN FROM TAI CHI

 

FINAL ANALYSIS:  MAN OF TAI CHI has some good martial arts action, but I wish Keanu Reeves had a better script to direct from since this movie shows he has a career as a director if he ever quits acting.

 

This DVD review is (c)12-14-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission.  Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com

 

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