ThedevilChoose When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

Ketrivie It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

Janis One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Jerrie It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Artur Machado A Tai Chi practitioner, tired of the passivity of the art, engages in clandestine fighting to help pay for the temple refurbishment.Keanu Reeves premiere as a director. A very good achievement in the fight scenes, they are very well choreographed and filmed, the viewer being able to discern all the movements and strikes used, thanks to the use of steady camera or glider, instead of shaky camera which is to be praised nowadays. Out of the fight scenes, his direction is quite decent. However, the few parts where CGI was used are really bad because it is to noticeable. As for the story, it is the typical Hong Kong fighting film, with the hero having to choose the path of good or evil and with somewhat predictable development. The dramatic part could be better developed, even if this is clearly an action movie. As for the acting, it's bad: a little more charisma in Tiger Hu Chen, the hero, would do no harm, just as Keanu Reeves in the role of the villain, a little more villainy and malice also would not hurt.Reeves is an avid fan of martial arts films and also a practitioner, and with this debut shows he has the ability to be behind a camera, at least in this genre. It's not a brilliant debut, just decent and not surprising, but I know Reeves has enough years of career to be able to show more - has he should have! And for this reason, because I think that everyone involved in this product should have tried harder in their commitment to the film, I cannot give more than 4/10.

dandbone I didn't have any expectations prior to watching this movie, especially after realizing Keanu Reeves is in it. There are hundreds of movies with this plot (martial artist fights in a dangerous underground tournament to save his dojo, or temple, or whatever). Most of them are totally forgettable affairs. Still, for a second, I was under the impression they'd make the fighting more realistic, or more spectacular. They tried both and failed miserably.However, I learned a lot from this movie. Apparently, Chinese martial arts practitioners are skilled in the ways of the Force. Since they are foreigners, they refer to the Force as "Chi". Chi is in many ways like a Higgs boson beam. It can give mass or remove mass from its target. That would explain the completely screwed up physics governing the motion of the combatants. Also, Chi is a great way to give people hickeys, if you're not overdoing it. Tiger's master gives him a belly hickey during a sparing session gone wrong -- I would not make any assumption on why the master did that, but this reminds me of some scandal in the Catholic church with a priest who gave a choir boy one of those. Us, Christians have our own way with the Chi.To conclude, the good stuff in the movie (the cops who are after Keanu Reeves) gets hidden under a pile of Bullshido: fat master, meditation, no touch attacks, nice guy straying from good, Chi and low gravity fights. To top it all, the weakest of the Merovingian vampires from Matrix Reloaded is a Tai Chi mail man who exacts his revenge on Neo.

chilichilipepper This Review might contain slight spoilers because well, in order to review it, some context has to be made with other films. So the spoilers are not going to ruin the film.TLDR / If you like action movies, especially martial arts movies, this is a must watch.Man of Tai Chi is a pretty great effort for Keanu Reeves debut. The camera work was excellent, the editing was fast paced, the fights were believable (although, there was some wire kung-fu - more on that later), and in general, the movie felt like watching a modernized classic 1980's martial arts movie.It is the same basic story as thousands of films and older martial arts. Hero is innocent, hero (or town or friend or village) loses something, hero is forced to fight, and then the hero determines ultimately which path he wants to take, good or evil. The most recent movie I can think of to compare this to is Tony Jaa's Onk Bak. It really is quite a similar movie, following the plot pretty closely, but also adding it's own style and a more futuristic setting.In the film, Tiger is becoming a master of Tai Chi, an art known more for meditation than for fighting. The movie deals with his inner turmoil of disappointing his master while also trying to establish himself. On that aspect, the movie succeeds because Tiger Hu Chen plays the part pretty well, especially for a man who mostly is a stuntman. Keanu Reeves actually does a decent job in his role and is a believable villain. Although neither are exceptional, it doesn't matter because the movie, like most "pure" martial art films that have come before it, is all about the fighting.Now, a lot of reviews and comments complain about all of the "wire fu" used in this film. There isn't as much as they would lead you to believe. Most of the "wire fu" is used to fling people back further to demonstrate the strength of the many different styles in the film, or to make a character appear to be unbeatable, or to pull off a couple of the more complex stunts. In general, besides a few scenes, it is not distracting and doesn't undermine the movie in any way. If anything, it enhances some of the fights because it emphasizes Tiger's small statue and "weak" fighting style when he fights larger, more powerful foes.And that is what this film is all about is the fights. Again, like Onk Bak, the story is just a reason to watch fight after fight after fight. In this movie, that is exactly what you get. The movie is probably 20% dialogue and 80% fighting and that is where it shines. It is very clear that Keanu did his homework and basically made an homage film to kung fu movies overall. Without question, Reeves succeeded.Quite simply, if this movie had came out in 1990 and stared Jackie Chan in the lead (although that would lead to more goofy scenes but lets just pretend Jackie plays it straight) this film would have been considered revolutionary.I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm wondering if, like Ben Affleck before him, maybe Keanu Reeves is better behind the film than in the film. Sure Keanu has had a more successful career than Ben, and Ben is probably the better actor (which isn't saying much), however if this is Keanu Reeves debut, I can't help but be anxious to see what he does next.A solid 7.5 from me, which I rounded down to a 7. For those who don't read my reviews, or check my rating history, you know I am not a instant 1 or 10 reviewer / rater. I think I've given 2 10's in my entire life, and maybe a few 9's.TLDR / If you like action movies, especially martial arts movies, this is a must watch.

heartstream Warning. Some of what I'm writing below, could be considered spoiler!Well we all know that Keanu ranges from bad to appalling as an actor, and this is no exception! He goes from overacting to wooden in every scene he is in and after a while you actually start to cringe and frown as soon as you see him appear, in anticipation of what he will "deliver this time". His fighting skills are not completely horrible, but it's not enough to deliver a decent fight scene against even a moderate fighter in a non-important scene in the movie. To fight in the final showdown? Oh, dear Lord....no no no! The final fight, even though it was sadly predictable, turns into a yawn-fest and quite frankly I found myself laughing at how ridiculous his fighting and acting was here. The movie itself is a mish-mash. Keanu tries to put: culture, old vs new china, a "new" fighting style, a touch of love story, police corruption, illegal fighting with cameras and .....well it keeps on a bit more. Lets just say he tries to put in a lot of stories and angles into this movie, which is always hard to then tell properly, and in a fighting movie it gets almost impossible. The fighting scenes are OK, some are quite good, but the story leaves very much to be desired! It scratches the surface on a lot of subjects and leaves most of it hanging like broken webs in the wind. My expectation for this movie was quite low, so it didn't have to deliver much to make me pleasantly surprised, but it failed miserably.There's so many b-movies with way better fighting than this, and better acting too I'm afraid, so no....don't watch this unless you're a Keanu-fan. You'd be better of watching an old Van Damme or Jackie Chan movie for the 15th time =)