The One (2001)

Strong and Moving!

So much average

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

The first must-see film of the year.

Given the interesting idea behind the story, 'The One' could have been an entertaining flick. However, the contrived script, lack of character development and poor execution are what majorly let it down. Given the many plot turns, the writers could have done loads and easily turned this into better material. In all fairness, they do provide some funny lines. Jet Li is a good actor and his amazing martial arts skills can sometimes make an entire movie worth viewing. Yet, the way the film portrays his skills is very poorly done (close cropped camera limits the magnitude of the fight sequences). There are some good visual effects and some very bad ones. Performance-wise Jet Li does well with the limited characterization. Jason Statham and Delroy Lindo are passable. Carla Gugino is very good and she has great chemistry with Li. Overall, it's a missed opportunity.

The basic premise of The One is actually pretty elaborate and could have been spun out in numerous different ways.Most of them probably would have resulted in better films than this.In short there are apparently numerous parallel universes running simultaneously, in each of these exists another version of you. Each time one of these variants dies that person's essence, vitality, strength and abilities is immediately absorbed into the remaining 'yous'.It turns out that a man named U-Law (Jet Li) has discovered this and has set about destroying all other versions of himself 'Highlander' style until there can be only (the titular) One.There are a grand total of 125 U-Law variations.He has killed 123… Only Gabe Law (also Jet Li) remains.Now apparently this mustn't be the first time someone came up with this fiendish theory of Law domination, as inter-dimensional travel is strictly policed, and a team of agents has been tailing the ever-stronger U-Law for some time, lead by the duo of Jason Statham and Delroy Lindo.Once it is evident that only one remaining Law stands in between U-Law and his domination they decide to short cut the procedure and head straight to his dimension – to cut U-Law off at the pass – so to speak.Gabe Law is actually different in all ways from U-Law, he is in fact not that naughty at all, but a cop, happily married to his loving wife TK. He also is struggling to come to come up with reasons as to why he feels about 61.5 X stronger lately… Gabe understandably takes the news that he is being hunted by himself from another reality with the proverbial pinch of salt, until U-Law shows up and starts blazing away.Now with the two remaining Law variants having approximately 50% of the strength of 123 guys each, The One has every excuse for indulging in some over the top action sequences, and it has these in spades. Unfortunately it is also lumbered with some bad angst ridden neu-metal (disclosure: some of which I liked), wire work galore in the often terrible fight sequences, and some lamentably dated 90s CGI.Delroy Lindo does his best to remain interested and Statham's performance is most notable for an awful US accent (which perhaps explains why in every subsequent film he has essentially played each character as himself), and Jet tries as hard as he can to make it easy to differentiate the two 'Laws' from each other, but it's fair to say he mostly fails because he in real life I am positive that Jet Li is simply a nice guy – he just doesn't do 'surly' well at all. It is also a huge (and repeated) failing by the US filmmakers to ignore Li's natural abilities and athleticism in favour of obvious wire-work and el-cheapo computer assisted enhancements.Final Rating – 5.5 / 10. The One should have been so much better, there is a solid film in this premise which probably exists in a parallel universe somewhere, but alas in ours this variant is teen-friendly wannabe tough mindless pap.By the way if you can bear it the best line in the film is actually the last, though it is hilarious in a way that likely differs from the intent of the filmmakers.

Impossible kung fu moves (like jumping dozens of feet in the air from a standing start etc.), black capes, science-meets-fantasy theme. You name it, the Matrix bits are here. At least nobody wore those dumb sunglasses.There's a story threaded throughout about the origins of the super hero and the super villain, and their preoccupation with destroying one another. The whole good/evil mirror images of each other thing. But the story doesn't focus so much on that as use it as an excuse for Jet Li's patented martial arts sequences. There's chases, fights, subordinate characters getting smashed, gun play, and so on. Action rarely slows down, and for a big dumb action/cop/kung fu movie, this one delivers. The bad guy and the good guy each have numerous chances to finish each other off, and never do; the quota of clichés must be met, it seems.Fast food stuff. Enjoyable as you watch, forgotten about an hour later.

The good: The effects of going between universes are kind of cool The bad: Action that fails to excite, weak acting, poor script, Quite simple: It's been done before, and done better.I like to say this to people: Just because a movie is full of action and special effects and uses the plot as glue to hold it together, doesn't mean it sucks. As long as I don't care about the plot, the film works.There are films that work with action and plot together to create a masterpiece: The Matrix, for example. There are films that center on plot and characters to create a compelling piece of entertainment. There are films that center on action, and forget about creating a great plot to create a roller-coaster ride to thrill the viewer, for example, Transformers. There are films that just flop on all counts. This is one of those films.The action is boring, the superhuman "One" is clearly taken from THE Matrix, The parallel universe idea is kind of cool, but this is just made boring by the "chase" mentality. The special effects are just lame, so the only thing to save it would be the characters. The characters could be said to be bland, but it goes beyond bland. It's flat out pathetic how dumb and lame this film is in its characters.Bottom Line: STAY AWAY!