Dr Wai in “The Scripture
with No Words”
There is no doubt that this film was an attempt
to do something big and different. A great cast of Jet Li, Rosamund Kwan,
Charlie Yeung and Takeshi Kaneshiro were put together, some fabulous sets
constructed and definitely a few bucks thrown at this. But it never comes
together in a coherent manner and it never really connects at all on any
emotional level with the viewer. It has some brilliant parts, but the script
leaves the viewer so unconcerned with the characters that these parts lose
any dramatic tension what so ever. Basically, you are left with some good
special effects and a few good action set pieces, but if there is no emotional
investment from the viewer – what does it really matter.
These problems stem from the basic premise
of the story. Jet Li is a pulp serial writer who is undergoing writer’s
block. The main reason for this being that his wife Rosamund Kwan is filing
for divorce and it is breaking his heart. So his two assistants - Charlie
Yeung and Takeshi Kaneshiro – help him out and all three take various cracks
at writing the next installment. Everyone has there own agenda though and
wants to integrate themselves into it - thus causing the story to go off
in all directions.
The protagonist of his stories is a fellow called
“Dr Wai, the King of Adventurers” and he is basically a graduate of the
Indiana Jones school of film heros. The story stitched together takes place
in the 1930’s and the King of Adventurers and the Japanese are both after
a box with immense destructive powers (think Kiss Me Deadly). There are
some excellent action sequences as the King battles ninjas, sumo wrestlers
and other evils.
The film goes back and forth between the life
of the writer and the characters in the book. The same actors show up in
both strains of the story. Of the ninety-minute running time, probably
70 of it is devoted to the fantasy story. The problem is that neither story
has any heart. We never get to know the “real” characters well enough to
care about them and the fantasy story is so tongue in cheek, so disjointed
and is one extra level removed from reality. How can you care about characters
in a book within a movie? To some degree the fantasy story is used to resolve
the problems of the people in the "real" life section, but that "happy
ending" was much too simplistic to believe.
I would still rent this if you can. It has some
good wire/special effect action scenes and definite ambitions but at the
end of the day that is about it. It’s a shame really because if they had
just dropped the writer part of the film and made the fantasy the guts
of the movie and then done it with a little care this could have been a
hell of a film.
My rating for this film: 6.0
