The Warlords is a violent period epic with fine acting and some awesome battles, yet the story is lacking and not engaging. The Warlords is not a bad movie, it just should have been more emotionally involving than it turned out to be. Three accomplished Asian stars Jet Li, Takeshi Kaneshiro, and Andy Lau, take the lead in this epic action movie taking place during the brutal Taiping Rebellion of the 1860s. The battles scenes are epic in scope and strikingly violent, but in between action scenes, the dialogue and storytelling tend to fall flat.
The Warlords stars martial arts master Jet Li as General Pang, a solider who barely survives a brutal masscare of his fellow soldiers by playing dead, and then joins a band of bandits led bny Er Hu (the great Andy Lau, actor and director of Infernal Affairs) and Wu Yang (Takeshi Kaneshiro). The three swear an oath to be become “blood brothers” but their lives quickly derail as they become embroiled in a web of complex politics and a predictable love triangle. The movie looks terrific on blu ray, it’s sharp and clean. During the battle scenes a grainy look appears giving the blood and throat slashings a more gritty, realistic look, but that was surely intentional. There’s some decent extras including a behind the scenes featurette, deleted scenes, and a production journal that fully flesh out the grueling shoot.
For all the hard work by the cast and crew, and skilled battles on display, The Warlords is still a bit lacking. The storytelling is uninvolving and the movie doesn’t have the emotional pull of Hero or the riveting beauty of The House of Flying Daggers. The three leads give it their all, but the material is just not always first-rate. The Warlords is worth a rental for action fans, but I found it dreary and disappointing overall.
Blu Ray Grade: C+
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