Review of Silver Hawk

Introduction

A silver clad heroine on a computerised motor cycle jumps the Great Wall of China, stops a truck, beats up six men and rescues a stolen panda. Say hello to Silver Hawk, an female oriental superhero with no super-powers, just lots of smart moves and lots of gadgets.

Silver Hawk, as with all true superheroes, has a secret identity and hers is Lulu Wong (Michelle Yeoh). Wong is a wealthy socialite who appears on the front cover of all the right magazines. On the jet back from this assignment (where did the bike go?), Wong meets the brash and flirtatious Inspector Rich Man (Richie Yen). Although Rich Man doesn`t recognise her, Wong remembers their great friendship in their youth at a Shaolin temple academy where they learnt martial arts prior to Wong being sent away. Rich Man is in town on a new assignment to arrest Silver Hawk due to the decrease in morale throughout the Police Force as Silver Hawk is catching all the bad guys instead of them. This amuses Wong greatly, and makes sure to show him up as soon as possible.

Wong`s unsuspecting Aunt is always trying to set her up with someone, and this time she introduces her niece to the incredibly boring Professor Ho Chung (Daming Chen) who is also a genius and has invented a new AI chip that can literally take care of all your needs by suggesting exercise or a particular diet by reading your body signs. The downside of this tech is that it is designed to make choices for you rather than giving the user the choice, so this upsets Wong a bit, much to Chung`s chagrin. Luckily for him, he has an admirer in Alexander Wolfe (Luke Goss). Unluckily for him, Wolfe is the archetypal megalomaniac super-villain with a secret hi-tech hideout. Wolfe wants Chung`s tech and wants to put into the new SZ-9000 phone made by Wong`s uncle Akira. The two combined will allow him to send subliminal messages and turn the phone`s users into mindless drones.

Rich Man and Silver Hawk must learn to work together, alongside Chung`s annoying young assistant Kit (Brandon Chang). In yet another of those movie coincidences, Kit is a computer genius and soon the three are on their way to rescue Chung and beat up loads of villains on bungees, with stainless steel hockey sticks, bad wigs and a range of hardman poses that would make five year olds happy and elder children grimace with embarrassment.

Video

Lots of bright colours for that slightly futuristic feel to match the abundant technology shown off here. Primary colours are bright whites and silvers, which works well and shows off Yeoh in the right light but you may need sunglasses for some of it.

Audio

Choice of 5.1 or DTS soundtracks, the 5.1 soundtrack is pretty punchy. The music soundtrack is like a trip back to the 80`s, lots of synth and Simmons pads against a slightly more modern beat. The early theme at the beginning has very heavy synth and feels like a bit of an homage to early Carpenter soundtracks such as Assault On Precinct 13.

Features

Trailers for Silver Hawk and Born To Fight

Silver Hawk slideshow

Could really have used a decent Making Of featurette

Conclusion

This is clearly not a film that takes itself seriously one bit, and for that I`m thankful. I`ve not been exposed to many films from this market but this would not have worked as a serious film. It`s seems to work as a female Jackie Chan film, but more flash and with a female lead (obviously). Most of the bad guys are Western in origin and the lead villain is, of course, British.

Some of the dialogue is risible but if you treat it as seriously as the creators intended then it works quite well. There are some obvious flat jokes, but most of the humour works well in this action comedy. Rich Man and Kit get most of the funny work, Wong/Silver Hawk is quite cool, and Wolfe is just way too serious as is the way with your average supervillain.

Michelle Yeoh is now in her 40`s according to IMDb, but she plays a character in her early twenties and remarkably it works. I can`t remember when I`ve seen Yeoh look as fabulous as she does here, the lighting and costume playing its part in accentuating the actresses natural beauty. She moves gracefully as well, some of the stunt work is quite phenomenal with her reputation of doing her own. My only regret is that Yeoh didn`t, for whatever reason, take on some of the bad guys in the manner that they attacked her. The villains who attack her on bungees for example. She is left to dodge the bouncing villains, until she nicks a bungee from one of them to make a Zebedee-like escape at the end of the sequence. It would have been a lot better if she used one to join in the fighting, that would have allowed for some stunning visuals and an exciting sequence.

The supporting characters all work well in their own way, particularly Rich Man and Wolfe. Luke Goss seems to have picked a slightly more rewarding and long-term career than his brief pop career, currently with a couple of films due out in the near future. His über-serious villain is the perfect foil for the chaotic comedy action going on around him, he even falls for the simplest of tricks at the denouement which show him up to be the straight-laced tightly wound repressed man he hides beneath the long silver coat, coloured contacts and big boots.

Overall an entertaining film that had me laughing for the majority of the time, and laughing in the right places too. This film apparently dived in its native theatres upon release, maybe it will pick up a good following on DVD as it certainly deserves to. The only drawback in my book is that the extras could have been much much better. The very least that this sort of film should have is a Making Of featurette, I`d be surprised if many major films are now made without the parallel filming occurring.

An entertaining hour and a half in my book.