Mixed feelings on this one. I thought the movie had potential starting out but it seemed to have lost it's way with a questionable continuity and loss of focus. The jade pendant that gives the movie it's title has no real impact on the story, it's simply something worn by the film's female lead (Clara Lee). Presenting Ying Ying/Peony (Lee) as a kung fu master was a surprising twist some way into the picture, but again, the writers seemed to have dropped the ball with this facet of her character. Not that this should have been a martial arts flick, but the revelation held some promise for further action beyond the marketplace scene that established her talent. Set pieces seemed to occur at random, like Sam's (Brian Yang) romantic attachment to Li Li (Nina Wu), and the white thugs dispatching Tom Wong's (Godfrey Gao) father (Russell Wong) after he had been long removed from the original story seemed forced. The most surprising aspect of the film occurred right at the finale when the story turned on a dime to mention the massacre of nineteen Chinese in Los Angeles on October 21, 1871 in one of the most horrific mass lynchings in the country's history. The movie would have been served better, if that's the point it wanted to make, to key in on events that were more global in nature relative to the Chinese community, rather than the ill fated love story between Tom and Ying Ying. Nice try I guess, but it could have been a lot better.
Review of The Jade Pendant
