Silver Hawk (2004)

I love this movie so much

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Blistering performances.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

I won't lie. I LOVE Michelle Yeoh. I would watch a ninety minute movie in which she simply reads a phone book (not two hours, though...I'm not that big a fan). From the beginning of this movie to the end, they give you what you want: Michelle Yeoh, kicking butt...Her Silver Hawk costume is simply silver cloth and hotpants. The best special effect is her motorcycle. My son was immediately reminded of Batgirl.But, Yeoh is fun...smiling as she beats up villains, giggling with her female friends...far from the solemn character that she was in Crouching Tiger. Her personality was much more like Wing Chun.The martial arts sequences are good and you can see that Yeoh did a lot of her own stunts. The villain looks particularly villainous. There is very little death in this and the violence is cartoonish.A joy to watch!

In the 90s, you could often see American martial arts films being influenced by Hong Kong action cinema. But these days, it seems that this trend has been reversed, and now we have Hong Kong movies trying too hard to be like Hollywood. From the fight scenes, which suffer from too much fast cutting, too much CGI, too much imitation-Matrix style, to the outrunning-the-explosion finale, "Silver Hawk" is one such movie. However, there are still a few glimpses of the old-times HK brilliance to be found, and the film certainly scores in the eye-candy department: Michelle Yeoh looks dazzling (if a little too made-up at times), Bing Bing Li (appearing each time with a different hair color, but always in a mini-skirt - thank God!) is easily one of the hottest bad chicks of the current decade, and there is also a female police officer (with a very limited role) who is simply gorgeous. In fact, I would go so far as to say that EVERY girl in this movie is pure beauty. But the film as a whole is not as entertaining or action-packed as "Black Mask 2", in which the computer effects are also more justified by the mutated heroes' superpowers. Watch that one first. (**)

Silver Hawk is an enjoyable Cantonese take on the superhero genre. As such it's much more enjoyable than recent US additions like Spiderman 2 or Daredevil, taking a very Blade-like 'Good vs Evil in a knock-down drag out fight' approach as opposed to going for the 'tortured hero' take on things American directors seem to dig. If you want depth you are firmly looking in the wrong place (go for the original 80s Batman maybe?), but if you want action, humour and incredibly sharp fight choreography, you've come to the right place.It's similar in style to both Blade and Sam Raimi's Darkman, also taking cues from recent Hong Kong movies like Twins Effect. It has a fantastic look, good strong characters and a simple but effective plot that keeps you glued to your seat. Additional praise must be heaped on leading lady Michelle Yeoh. Much like Jackie Chan, despite many would-be successors coming and going since her debut in the 80s, she still has what it takes to front an action movie in spades. She not only makes Silver Hawk a genuinely likable and unique presence, she's also still a mesmerizing fighter to watch. The fights in this movie are really good, some of the best non-period kung-fu I've seen since the likes of Versus. They're played with humour by Yeoh, with Silver Hawk cockily dancing around baddies before kicking their teeth in, but they're still imbued with an impact missing from many similar films.So why the 6? Firstly, Silver Hawk is incredibly lightweight. If it wasn't for the balletic and convincing fight scenes, this movie could probably have been a 12A or even a PG, it's like a Bond movie only with a female lead. Get boy, send bad guys home with bloody nose, end. It's simple, and that's why it works so well, but it doesn't have much depth, and I'll mainly re-watch it to enjoy the great fights and Yeoh being cool as she always is.Then there's the dub. It's not, as I originally thought, an entirely Americanised dub. It's like Gen X Cops 2, in that it's dual language, always has been, and was intended for dual release. However, much like a lot of Jackie Chan's movies and Jet Li's earlier films, it's dubbed in quite a slapdash fashion, in a sloppy manner that makes it obvious all the actors except Yeoh and Luke Goss have been re-dubbed by voice-over actors, and that Yeoh and Goss voices were added at post-production instead of using the original recordings. It's not awful, and it compares favourably with some more suspect re-dubs, but it's still glaringly obvious that most characters are not being voiced by the original actors, and that the voice-over wasn't done in sync with the film, it was done off in some studio somewhere with just a script. If you think you can put up with that better than I did (I couldn't help wincing during certain scenes, such was the complete disconnection between dialogue and on-screen action) add a point to the score, and if you don't watch subs, add two. That's the best way to approach it really.Basically Silver Hawk is really good fun, a cool superhero movie with a great heroine played by a great actress. It's fast, funny and has really good fight scenes, but you could get put off by the awkward dub. It's good enough that I think it's worth the effort, and I'll definitely be watching it again soon.

I've been looking forward to this for over a year, and it's region 2 DVD release finally came a week or so ago.It's an Asian take on the traditional superhero movie, with Michelle Yeoh as a Batman-esquire crimefighter. Of course, there is also more emphasis on martial arts. And although it's Asian, all the actors speak English.The Good points...The action scenes. Great martial arts, all sorts of different weapons and situations, all number of different fighters, and the actors all know how to fight properly. You know the problem with modern action movies is the too-fast editing? Silver Hawk gets that just right, so you can see exactly what is happening in one shot, but no more than that, and then it changes. It's perfect. There is a fight on top of a moving truck, a fight with men on bungee cords from the ceiling, and a fight with guys on rollerblades with hockey sticks. This shows Batman & Robin how it's done - but Christopher Nolan could learn a lot from it too.The music. Surprisingly good and lush sounding.Silver Hawk's background. Her history is told in flashbacks throughout the film, Highlander style. It's simple but effective, nicely creating the relationship between the two principal characters as children at martial arts school.The Bad points.The actors speak English. This is not as bad as dubbing, but it's very obvious some of the actors don't speak English whatsoever.Comedy. Very, very bad. And even Silver Hawk is messing around and making jokes by the end. One of the characters has a very bizarre, supposedly funny martial arts stance with a weird noise he makes, and we're shown this repeatedly, much to the audience's dismay and embarrassment.Tone. Silver Hawk is good when it's serious, it's dramatic and exciting. Silver Hawk is no way near invincible, and she has to escape from the bad guys at one point. But then we have jokes and Silver Hawk smiling during the climactic fight. There is a silly scene where the main police officer tries to catch Silver Hawk - by dressing as a woman. And then they have a fight. Which is taken seriously. Silver Hawk is only good when it's serious, and that's only for the last thirty minutes.The bad guys. Michael Jai White (Spawn) and Luke Goss (Blade II) are wasted on very 2D cartoon characters. They are decent for a fight, but White doesn't even talk, and Goss plays an English Blofeld with bionic arms.Finally, Michelle Yeoh as Silver Hawk is debatable. No question she has the charisma, as well as the physical and actorly skills to pull off the role. But she is much too old for the role, as Silver Hawk seems to be about thirty in the narrative.So my verdict on Silver Hawk is......meh. It's entertaining enough, and the action scenes are exactly what you wanted to see but didn't in all those Batman/Catwoman/Daredevil movies. But it's just not serious enough to take seriously most of the time.Of course it's much better than Supergirl (1984) or Catwoman (2004), it's a solid 7 out of 10 movie, which makes it the best female superhero movie so far. A dubious honor.