Editorials > First "Trailer" for The Forbidden Kingdom

The Jet Li/Jackie Chan fight you've been dying to see since Once Upon a Time in China and Drunken Master is here. The Forbidden Kingdom has entered post-production, as this video explains at the beginning before getting into established shots of Chan as an unkempt kung-fu master, Li in his now-preferred "monk" role and a random American kid (Michael Angarano) about to get his head lobbed off. 

The plot gets better: the film begins in the present, where a bullied New York teenager who loves kung-fu films goes to a Chinatown pawnshop and finds the original staff of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King. From there he is transported back in time to ancient China where he becomes the disciple of an unkemp, rather drunken-looking master (Chan) and two others (including Li as a great "silent monk"), who follow the kid upon remembering a prophecy that The Monkey King will be freed from his prison by a foreigner with his weapon. The Jade Emperor learns of this and, determined to stop the Monkey King's release, sends out three elite killers led by The White Haired Demoness. 

…this is the strangest adaptation of "Journey into the West" ever.  At least we get to watch Jackie Chan and Jet Li spar–oh yeah, and it's in English.

-John Lichman 

-John Lichman