Ong Bak

Aka, this is Tony Jaa.

The plot of this Thai film is much a fetch quest: A small village sends their best fighter (Tony Jaa) to retrieve a part of a relic that was stolen from them by some random goon. Luckily, said random goon works for a crime syndicate which prolongs the quest and makes it violently entertaining.

Some really good sequences here.

Definitely one for martial arts fans, the strongest parts are the thrilling action sequences and while the climax isn't that spectacular, the road getting there is. Plot wise everything works fine and the funny bits are decent. There are many scenes that could be shortened or cut though (the gambling one in particular) and the main female lead has a shrill voice for me (nails on chalkboard type).

Only minor issues for an otherwise extremely entertaining film. If you are not an martial arts or action movie fan, stay away as there's not much here for you. If you enjoy watching people get beaten up spectacularly then this is not one to miss. I give it three flying knee pile divers out of five.

Chocolate (2008)

A Thai movie that states "Disabled kids kick ass. Literally."

Born from forbidden love, Zen (played by Yanin Vismitananda) is a mentally handicapped girl who happens to be a savant at physical reflexes and later on, beating the shit out of people. In her quest to get money to pay for her mom's medical fees, she basically visits various groups of random thugs (with escalating weapon types) to rob them.

She's quite dangerous.

There's a tiny bit more depth to this martial arts flick but not much so I won't go into it, lets just say the story is "ok". Instead I will focus on how nice it is to watch the awesomely choreographed fight scenes and all the poor stunt actors injuring themselves, especially in the final showdown part. Yep, gravity hurts!

If you like beat em ups, you will enjoy this though it requires some suspension of disbelief for that little girl to have so much power in her strikes. I give it two and a half smarties out of five and would definitely watch it again. Especially the part where the two autistic kids fight each other. Lol. It sounds mean, but it really is very cool.