The Warrior's Way (2010)

Ninjas and cowboys and clowns, oh my! The Warrior’s Way is a comic book colored Western Wuxia mash up.

Jang Dong Gun is the mysterious man in black, the world’s best swordsman. After wiping out a rival clan he spares the last member, a baby girl. His clan declares him a traitor and starts hunting him down. He travels to America and settles into the nearly ghost town of Lode, a town being reclaimed day by day to the endless desert. The town is populated with an assortment of outcasts including a carnival troupe. A young woman with a past played by Kate Bosworth helps him to learn how to live an ordinary life while she has him teach her how to use a sword. She is seeking revenge against the dastardly ex-confederate colonel who killed her family.

Of course, peace doesn’t last long and eventually it’s a three-way fight between assassins, the Colonel’s gang, and the townspeople.

The movie is heavily stylized to the point it often looks artificial. The color saturation, slow-mo, and green screen effects work at times and not so much in others. You’re always aware it’s on a studio lot.

The music ranges from the Sailor’s Hornpipe ( how did they not have a Pop-Eye cameo!) to spaghetti Western inspired music to opera.

Jang had enough presence to pull off the almost silent assassin learning to acclimate to his new life. Bosworth’s Annie Get Your Gun, er, Sword felt over the top in some scenes. Geoffrey Rush as the town drunk with a secret was almost unrecognizable for much of the movie. There wasn’t much scenery left after Danny Huston finished chewing on it as the Big Bad. Old school Hong Kong kung fu star Ti Lung lent some cool cred as the head of Jang’s clan.

The action scenes were all fast and bloody. The three way fight pulled out all the stops to render a high body count. For those who are squeamish there was spurting blood and a few dismemberments.

The story is what let me down. The focus of the degenerate colonel seeking out women to rape is a trope I wish would crawl into a corner to die. Aside from that the second act felt plodding, even clumsy at times. The good hearted carnival folk with life lessons to share trope felt stale as well. The storyline was disjointed, never truly unifying into a smoothly told tale.

The Warrior’s Way was limited but entertaining. This colorful movie with stylish sword fights led by the man with “a warrior’s body and the heart of a priest” was a perfectly fine afternoon watch. But like a carnival ride it could give you whiplash as it jolted you from comedy to violent cowboy wuxia to heart warming redemption story and back again.

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