Bulletproof Monk on DVD

What do you get if you cross "The Matrix" with "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon?"

Bulletproof Monk.

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that, but it does indicate a certain lack of creativity - or contempt for the audience.

Bulletproof Monk is an entertaining action-comedy flick, but it's too derivative.

Chow Yun-Fat (of "Crouching Tiger" fame, among other flicks) stars as a seemingly ageless monk whose task it has been to protect an ancient scroll. This scroll possesses magical powers, in that whosover reads it will gain powers and perhaps rule the world. Therefore, the scroll must have a protector at all times to prevent some dude or dudette with delusions of grandeur from finding it and exploiting it.

Alas, after sixty years on the gig, it's now time for him to hand over the task to another. Who that other may be, he has yet to discover. The only things he has on which to go are a few clues passed down to him when he originally received the scroll so long ago.

His quest for a successor leads him to Kar (Seann William Scott), an apparently stereotypical streetwise punk who turns out to be more than he appears to be at first. Against his better judgement, the monk takes it upon himself to teach the kid to carry the torch he's about to pass him.

Of course we need some sort of threat to the scroll, and in this case it's Strucker (Karel Roden), a Nazi who's been after the thing for about as long as the monk has been protecting it.

Bulletproof Monk is a pretty good action movie, but as a comedy it doesn't quite cut it. It seems apparent where we're supposed to laugh, but it isn't particularly funny. but the rest of it is entertaining enough to make it worthwhile.

Still, on the whole, it's an entertaining enough piece.

Chow Yun-Fat and Scott are both good in their roles. Though they seem like a bit of an odd couple, that acutally works in their favor and they have good chemistry between them.

In the end, Bulletproof Monk is one of those movies that, despite its all-too-obvious flaws, is still a good time in the home theater. And we suppose that's the bottom line.

MGM has given the movie an excellent special edition DVD as well. It's presented with anamorphic widescreen video (16x9 TV compatible) with a picture that's clean and sharp and colorful.

Audio is Dolby Digital 5.1 surround and it's excellent; dialogue, music, and most of the sound effects emante from the front speakers, but we noticed a decent amount of surround sound use as well, which is always nice if you've shelled out for rear speakers. We noticed some nifty pans of sound from front-to-rear, and good rumbling bass.

Extras include a pair of audio commentaries, one featuring the screenwriters and the other featuring with director Paul Hunter and producers Charles Roven and Douglas Segal. The writer's commentary is the more entertaining of the two (hey, we're writers!) and gives you plenty of poop on script development and the translation of the story from comic book to film.

Better still is an hour-long documentary "The Tao of Monk," whose five sections each focus on a different aspect of production. You also get a much shorter featurette "The Monk Unrobed," some deleted scenes and alternate ending with commentary.

Ther'es also a photo gallery.

Bulletproof Monk, from MGM Home Video
104 min. anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1, 16x9 TV compatible, Dolby Digital 5.1 surround,
Starring Chow Yun-Fat, Seann William Scott, Jaime King, Karel Roden, Victoria Smurfit
Produced by Charles Roven, Terence Chang, John Woo, Douglas Segal,
Written by Ethan Reiff & Cyrus Voris, directed by Paul Hunter

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