Shaolin Soccer

Stephen Chow!! He's such a hilarious guy. This movie is probably one of his funniest.

Iron Head and sing trying to rouse up the Kung fu spirit in gangsters

Fung (Ng Man Tat) used to be a famous soccer player, but because his rival teammate, Hung (Patrick Tse) set up an event that led to his cripple leg, he now is a human foot-stool for Hung. Fung meets Sing (Stephen Chow), who has an amazing "Mighty Steel Leg" and gets an idea to use Sing's Shaolin Kung fu to beat Hung's soccer team and win the tournament. Sing agrees because his ultimate dream is to teach people to incorporate Kung fu into their everyday lives to improve it. After some major encouragement, he gathers his Shaolin brothers to train with Coach Hung. They're a bit rusty on the Kung fu and can't play soccer for their life, but Sing manages to bring their butt-kicking spirit back to fight play against Hung's "Evil Team" (such an evil name).

The Shaolin Bros get their game on.

Now don't let the language barrier stop you from watching this movie. The subtitles are pretty accurate, but I have to admit..knowing Chinese makes this movie perfect. I have watched Stephen Chow's mo lei tau (Chinese wordplay) movies and I understood it like an American: I had no idea what was so funny. Shaolin Soccer, however, doesn't use much mo lei tau. The humor is mostly physical and slapstick, so I kept laughing throughout this whole movie. Having the director be the star of the film really gets things done. There is really no one that can star a Stephen Chow movie than the man himself. He works great with Ng Man Tat and Wong Yut Fei (Iron Head). The romance between Mui (Vicki Zhao) and Sing seemed a little rushed, but Hey, kung fu attracts girls, right? The action scenes were very cool. Even though the CGI isn't as polished as the movies nowadays, the scenes are so over-the-top that they're hilarious. I recommend you see the full 102-minute version of the film (not the Miramax 80-minute version). I don't know why they would cut 20 minutes of great scenes.

This is Empty Hand (Bruce Lee Danny Chan Kwok Kwan)