Kung Fu Yoga movie review: Jackie Chan film is strictly for kids
Director: Stanley Tong
Cast: Jackie Chan, Sonu Sood, Disha Patani and Amyra Dastur
Expectations are generally higher when our Bollywood stars collaborate with international stars and when it’s Jackie Chan, you expect the unexpected. But ‘Kung Fu Yoga’ is no where close to what you expect from a much anticipated cross-border project.
Chan (Jackie Chan) is a famous archaeologist in China who teams up with Indian professor Dr. Ashmita (Disha Patani) and her teaching assistant Kyra (Amyra Dastur) to locate India's lost Bhima treasure in Tibet. Things change upside down when a badass villain, Sonu Sood, tries to acquire the treasure with his bunch of silly goons. Chan, Ashmita and Kyra escape from there and reach Rajasthan to unravel the Magadha treasure and what happens next is what 'Kung Fu Yoga' is all about.
Director Stanley Tong certainly thinks that Indian audience has no brains. Keeping Bollywood sensibilities in mind and signing Indian actors, this film probably indicates that according to international directors, Bollywood stands really low in terms of content and 'Kung Fu Yoga' is one such example. It is a pot-boiler which has no head or tail. It is horribly written and executed. There is so much to play with such a fascinating subject. The film has no thrill from beginning to end. The reviewer wonders why the film is called 'Kung Fu Yoga'. Jackie does Kung Fu in film but Yoga is no where in the entire film except for the one scene where Disha helps other actors to run away from the arrest of Sonu Sood.
Brain dead action sequences and impractical humour make the film look even more awful. The scenes where Jackie Chan does Kung Fu to scare a bunch of wolfs is silly. Chan’s car-chasing sequence with a giant lion in his car seated behind is annoying. The scene where Chan and Disha are chased by a VFX-generated orange snake while hanging on the roots just spoils the film. The only scene which looks real is when Amyra escapes from the cage surrounded by aggressive Jackals. The biggest hiccup of the film is that there are no subtitles while the film is in Chinese and English.
Over to the actors, this is probably the worst of Jackie Chan movies. Looks like, he took Bollywood too seriously! He is cute while dancing but nothing will get in your head because he is talking and singing in Chinese. Though the film got the biggest opening ever in his homeland China, it lacks logic in every aspect. He will surely impress the kids, must say. Disha Patani and Amyra Dastur look just pretty and the two have nothing much to act. Sonu Sood has played the villain several times before in our Hindi films but you will see him in an English-speaking villain's avatar for the first time and it is a total disgrace to the language. He is unpleasant to the core in his act. His sudden transformation from a villain to a good guy is laughable.
'Kung Fu Yoga' is definitely a waste of time but can recommend to kids over the weekend. Don’t expect logic even for a second, or else you will come out scratching your head.
PS: “Don’t mess with women’s hair.”
