A Movie Review: THE PROTECTOR

Ahhh......Tony Jaa. A simple man who makes simple movies. The basic plotline for all of his movies seems to be this: Tony is the protector of X. X gets stolen by some fashion challenged gangsters. Tony Jaa implements his simple method of conflict resolution: Kicking Everybody's ass until he either gets X back or is himself dead. Did these people whose asses are kicked have anything to do with X disappearing? Who knows? But if you are looking for social commentary or deeper meaning don't look to Tony Jaa. I mean, he can't speak English, but he has the nerve to come to our country and beat up our thugs?

Anyway, THE PROTECTOR is pretty much a film length version of Tony Jaa using Muay Thai to Elbow, Knee, and Kick entire armies of goons into submission. The X in this case is an elephant. The elephant is kidnapped. Tony Jaa needs to get it back. In between variously placed fight scenes, there is some kind of greasy film that is supposed to be a plot or character development or something. Let's just say this: I've seen better plots in films that would end up on your screen if you are foolish enough to leave Ken unattended in your hotel room.

But you didn't go to this movie to see plot or character development either. You want to see bad guys get their asses kicked. Well, this film delivers that in spades. In fact, the choreography is nothing short of insane. There is even like a 5 minute continuous shot that is eerily similar to this:

Yup. Fighting your way up a dojo level by level to get to an elusive boss. Like I said-No plot.

Anyway, I am sure Tony Jaa would be content to not have to kick the crap out of half of Australia if he didn't have to. Just give him his elephant back and he'll go away. But then the bad guys make an even bigger mistake. They make it personal. Before Tony was just beating people up. Now he is radioactive pissed. Needless to say it gets ugly. Real ugly. Nausea inducing ugly. Then Nathan Jones shows up and throws an elephant. That's waht you pay to see. **** out of 5.