Intensity	Stupidity:Nudity Ratio 3:1	Budget Medium

Kung Fu Hustle starts with a bang. We find out right away that the police have no control of the city. A gang beats the crap out of a bunch of cops inside the police station. Upon leaving the station, that gang falls prey to an even larger gang. After some very stylized violence, we suddenly get a short dance/music interlude that depicts how the gang continues to grow. This technique is not repeated again. The movie changes styles pretty frequently, characters show up and go away, the tone goes from serious to comedic to romantic. If you have not seen the movie, don't finish reading this review until after you have. I will be examining the film pretty closely and there will be several spoilers.

Once we have established that the Hatchet Gang is the controlling force in the city, we are introduced to the residents of a slum in an area of the city that is too poor to be of interest to the gang. Some very broad almost slapstick scenes with the slum's landlady and the residents show us that the usual rules of physics are not going to apply here. Her husband, in particular, takes a tremendous amount of abuse. After being thrown off the top floor of the building, a flower pot drives his face even further into the ground. At this point he decides to play possum for a while to let the old girl cool down some. We also meet the three characters that we think are going to be pivotal in the movie. A couple of small time hoodlums tries to shake down a shop owner. When they are rebuffed they call for reinforcements from the Hatchet Gang. During the ensuing melee our three heroes manage to drive back the Hatchet Gang. The landlady is furious that they have brought the area to the gang's attention and kicks them out. However, a duo of assassins has already been sent to the slum.

When I first saw the next scene I was amazed. One of our heroes walks by a couple of street musicians who seem to be warming up to play a large two-person Koto (a 13 string six-foot long instrument). As he passes them by there is the sound of the wind and some leaves fall a tree. The next time the pair strike the strings we see a cat jump off the roof of a shed and as the cat goes out of frame, we see its shadow cut in half and blood sprayed on the shed. Finally our hero realizes he is in danger but as he turns around to face the duo, he is decapitated.

At this point you will either be captivated by the movie or disgusted by it. The story structure is dramatically different than what you would expect in a Hollywood movie. These are not minor characters being killed off, we have grown to care about them and their death leaves us bewildered. Who is going to pick up the narrative and win the day? What do you mean the landlady and her husband are Kung Fu Masters. Why are we spending so much time on the backstory of the world's most inept petty thief? It turns out that he is so bad at being evil because he is good incarnate. The landlady and her husband have forsaken their Kung Fu because they saw their son die in a fight. These three team up and continue the battle against the Hatchet Gang. After watching the film a couple of times and spending a fair amount of time thinking about it, I have come to realize that a Kung Fu master in this movie is not like the ones I am used to. For starters, you don't really have to practice. You also don't really have to even know that you are a Kung Fu master. Think of it as a superpower, you either have it or you don't. No matter how much I may want x-ray vision, staring really hard at women does not let me see what they look like in their underwear. (And no, just because you can do an internet search and see what the Pussycat Dolls look like in their underwear does not mean you have a superpower.) Here the characters either have Kung Fu mastery or they are pretty normal people. While the masters all have skills with different weapons, the one thing they have in common is taking a lot of abuse. The landlady's husband gets the crap beat out of him early and often.

I was constantly surprised by this movie. The story always kept me guessing and the visuals were often breathtaking. Eventually the story all comes together and the final battle takes place. Even this scene has a touch of humor in it. A last thought on how Kung Fu Hustle differs from American mainstream movies; while the good guys don't take monetary advantage of their Kung Fu mastery, neither does the evil Kung Fu master.

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