The Tiger Blade Blu-ray delivers great video and decent audio in this fan-pleasing Blu-ray release
When the police are challenged with a highly volatile and dangerous case, a young maverick cop with mystical powers is put on the job. Yosthana teams up with the seductive Duang Dao to hunt down and capture the deadly Five Bullets Bandit and the brutal female warrior, G.I. Jenjira. The fearsome gang is led by the lethal Mahesak, who like Yosthana is skilled in the art of sorcery and magic. Mahesak can only be defeated with The Tiger Blade, an ancient sword that holds the powers of nature and the forces of good. Yosthana must find The Tiger Blade and bring Mahesak to justice before the killers create total chaos in the city. The stage is set for a gruesome battle between the two archenemies, but fate has it that only one can survive...
For more about The Tiger Blade and the The Tiger Blade Blu-ray release, see The Tiger Blade Blu-ray Review published by Dustin Somner on May 16, 2009 where this Blu-ray release scored 3.0 out of 5.
Classic chopsocky films will always hold a special place in my heart, so it's been interesting to see production companies from Thailand attempting to create the magical combination of a good martial arts film. I still haven't found that winning combination in any of the emerging films from the Thai market, but at least they deserve kudos for continuing to try. The Tiger Blade was originally released to it's native audience back in 2005 and was picked up for home video release by BCI Home Entertainment during 2008. The film doesn't have the distinguishing element of Tony Jaa in the lead role (many believed he would be the next Jackie Chan after his stuntwork in the film Ong-Bak), which may account for the film's limited international appeal, but it still contains an abundance of over-the-top chase sequences, wire-fu ballet, and explosive gun battles.
The look of determination......
I'm pretty sure you could take 10 people that have seen this film; ask them to write down their version of the plot, and you'd likely come up with 10 different versions of the events that take place. I'll take a stab at my version, but keep in mind this convoluted mess of a plot is anything but straight-forward. Yosthana (Atsadawut Luengsuntorn) is a special agent with the government of Thailand, who generally handles any situations that are outside the capabilities of the local police force. When a rebel warlord (Pongpat Wachirabunjong) escapes from prison with the help of a sorcerer named Mahesak (Amornrit Sriphung), Yosthana is enlisted to track down Mahesak and his gang of mercenaries. After a series of encounters with the seemingly indestructible Mahesak, our hero decides to obtain an ancient sword known as the "tiger blade", which can only be wielded by a worthy warrior and must be annointed with the blood of a virgin in order to regain it's original luster. Can Yosthana obtain the sword and find the blood of a virgin in time to stop the band of criminals?
If the plot synopsis sounds a bit ridiculous, then your not alone. I can safely say this was one of the most difficult plots I've had to follow, and I don't mean that in a good way. If a story is written with the explicit intention of setting up one action sequence after another, I prefer the Steven Seagal plot structure (bad guy upsets good guy, who in turn dedicates his life to wiping out bad guy). Instead, we have a cluster of bad guys without a clearly established leader, and a complete lack of coherent motivation behind their actions. I couldn't tell why the sorcerer's gang broke the rebel warlord out of prison, or what benefit they'd gain in funding his rebellion. On the flipside, I couldn't identify some of the roles that were played by the hero's many female companions throughout the feature. It seemed the filmmakers wanted to parade as many beautiful women across the screen as possible and had to forcefully introduce them into the plot in any manner they saw fit. As a result, the women in the picture always play second fiddle to the hero, and are only included as playthings for the bad guys (of note, there's one non-graphic rape scene in the film, which tends to be slightly distasteful in the context of a comedy-action film).
The action elements in the film range from decent to awful. Don't be surprised if you see a number of scenes where kicks are clearly not landed (but result in a character flying 20 feet across the screen), or the occasional use of wires to make characters move in awkward or unnatural ways. These elements aren't overly distracting since the film never takes itself serious in the first place (I hope), but they do show a lack of polish in the choreography of the fight sequences and prevent the film from rising to the quality of most other films in the martial arts genre.
Lastly, I have to touch briefly on the incorporation of comedy in the film. Regardless of what language you choose, the comedic sidekick is downright annoying from start to finish. His over-the-top bumbling nature doesn't translate well next to the action on display, and tends to pull you out of the film. I always enjoyed the antics of Sammo Hung in his classic martial arts films, but he managed to create characters with endearing qualities, which is completely absent here. The comedy in this film falls flat every time and doesn't offer a suitable diversion from the endless action (though there's an unintentionally funny part when the sorceror shows up during the jail break wearing spandex shorts and a brightly colored shirt).
Presented in 1080p utilizing the AVC codec (at an average bitrate of 15Mbps), The Tiger Blade looks better than I expected considering the typical hazy DVD transfers on recent Thai action films (this is one of the first Thai releases on the Blu-ray format). Fine object detail is well-defined throughout the majority of the feature, and could actually be considered reference quality at times. There are still a handful of shots that seem slightly out of focus, preventing the transfer from falling into the upper echelon of Blu-ray releases, but most martial arts fans are used to below average transfers on this type of film and should be pleasantly surprised with the refreshing level of detail on display. In addition to the crisp visuals, contrast is well-rendered, adding to the three-dimensional nature of the transfer, and I rarely noticed a drop in shadow detail. Colors are vivid in the majority of scenes, but there's a clear use of filtering from time to time that gives some shots a drab look.
One minor annoyance I noticed on 3 occasions during the film, was the appearance of a blue outline around a character. It only happened when there was a white background (such as the sky) and was pretty easy to spot. It could have been related to minor imperfections in the use of CGI, but the scenes in question did not appear to incorporate the use of CGI. On that note, the worst scenes in the film where the sequences that utilized CGI. There's not an extensive use of green-screen backdrops, but when they are used, the picture becomes overly grainy and somewhat hazy. I'm guessing that was a technique used to cover up below average incorporation of CGI, but it had the end result of diminishing the overall experience.
We are given three audio options on the disc, but I chose to divide my time between the Dolby Digital 5.1 track in the native language of Thai, and the Dolby Digital 2.0 track dubbed in English. I'll get this over with right away, and recommend you avoid the English dub like the plague. If I had to summarize the dub experience in only one word, it would be "annoying". The voice actors seem to be having a competition with each other for who can be more annoying, and I never decided who deserved the gold medal. I know some of the blame should be placed on the awful script that doesn't translate well for English speaking audiences, but you'd think they could have put together something better than what's included on the disc.
As for the Thai 5.1 mix, I felt the overall experience was a little underwhelming. For starters, I had to turn up the volume when switching to the 5.1 mix, since it was noticeably softer than either of the 2.0 tracks, and the mix was far too shallow and front-heavy for my liking. There are still plenty of effects that are spread out across the sound-field, but I never noticed any level of creativity with spacial separation. To make matters worse, there seemed to be a lack of crispness in the dialogue, which could be attributed to the lossy compression. We don't have a lossless mix to conduct a side-by-side comparison, but I firmly believe a film like this could benefit from the inclusion of a lossless track.
Behind the Scenes (480p, PCM 2.0, 18:19 min): This feature is a collection of clips showing the filming of several action sequences. There's a great deal of wire use, and one segment where green-screen is utilized. Some portions are better than others, but don't expect to see a collection of outtakes that rival anything from Jackie Chan's years of martial arts stunt work.
Cast/Crew Interviews (480p, PCM 2.0, 15:01 min): Offered as a seamless collection of interviews with those involved in the film, this supplement focuses largely on the filmmaker's aspirations to make a movie that could rival a Hollywood production. The Thai film industry has certainly made strides in recent years, but they have a long way to go before gaining mass appeal overseas.
Lastly, we have a pair of trailers for The Tiger Blade and Vengeance, presented in 1080p with 2.0 channel audio.
I can't honestly recommend The Tiger Blade to anyone. I wanted to enjoy the film, and continue to hope Thailand cinema is able to catch up with the rest of the world when it comes to film production, but The Tiger Blade simply shows they aren't there yet. Watching this film, I was reminded of visits to foreign countries that appear to be a decade behind the trends of America (clothing, music, etc.). They are desperately trying to catch up with Hollywood, but haven't been able to reach beyond copy-cat camera work and sloppy plot structure. I'd wager to bet there's a few promising Thai filmmakers that are right on the verge of gaining international success, but I can promise they won't find it by making films of this caliber. From a technical standpoint, there isn't a lot to complain about. I'd have preferred a lossless audio track, but BCI did a bang-up job on the transfer and provides a proficient presentation of an otherwise lackluster film.
