Movie Review (DVD): Raging Phoenix

This movie probably has raging hemorrhoids from sh*tting up my DVD player and TV screen for ninety insufferable minutes.

Let’s get rid of any pretensions to objectivity at the outset.

As if I haven’t already done that.

I like to watch Yanin Jija.

A lot.

I like her so much that I would gladly let her kick me in the face and break my nose just so I could tell people she was the person who did it. I like her thatmuch. I like her for her martial arts prowess.

She’s physically amazing in the way that she can do things that seem physically impossible.

And make them look so damned easy.

I really enjoyed Chocolate. I saw it twice.

Because I wanted to look at her again.

**I (used to) teach Chocolatein my classes. So I see it at least once or twice a year. It makes me happy.

Because I usually show itwithout subtitles.**

It makes the movie better when the inane plot is conveyed only visually.

And besides, transsexuals are the universal language.

I show Chocolatebecause a competent film will tell its story visually, such that dialogue is really only window dressing. Everything you need to know about Chocolate(and everything good about it) is visual. It is a very competent film on a visual level. And Yanin Jija is visually striking (pun intended).

I like Yanin Jija  so much I almost didn’t write this review.

Because Raging Phoenix sucks.

If I write a review, even a scathing one, people might watch this movie. I don’t need that on my conscience. No oneshould watch Raging Phoenix. Not even me.

Not even transsexuals who are up to something.

It’s just… awful. Astoundinglybad. 40 minutes of bad MTV- I know that’s redundant, but we’re talking color-over-saturation, interminable slow motion, etc.-pastiche scenes go by beforethey are mercifully (and too late) exposited into making sense.

Yes, for half the film you have no f@#$ing idea what’s going on.

Except that you’re notenjoying yourself.

And your eyes hurt from all that color saturation.

It’s as if the DVD was printed in Chernobyl.

For cheap.

But I persevered, because I’m a professional.

I’m not going to tell you the plot, and not because I am Anti-Spoiler Man.

It’s because telling you the plot of this movie, which I sat all the way through, will make you think even less of me than you probably already do.

Suffice it say that I reallylike Yanin Jija.

And that I’d really, really, really have to.

Luckily for her, I do.

The action choreography in Raging Phoenix isn’t too bad.

But it’s not too good, either.

And there’s not enoughof it.

There was, however, the buffest tranny I thought I would ever see.

I don’t want to see any of them, never mind any more of them.

How buff? Imagine Andy On in a bikini.

I’m really not going to be (as) glad to tell people Andy On broke my nose.

Miss Asia Fitness 2009 Roongtawan Jindasing

Turns out she’s not a transsexual. She’s just diesel. But she ain’t cute.

I’d rather Andy break my nose than her.

Raging Phoenixhas some of the worst CGI this side of the history of blue screen.

Yes, blue screen, the analog precursor to green screen. That’s mypoint .

That‘s how bad the CGI is. People in a comawould want to stop this DVD. They’d come out of the coma, stop the DVD, then go backinto the coma. But they’d be lying on the remote. Just in case.

I watched this wholemovie. That‘s how much I like Yanin Jija. Only someone as unfortunate as me, who has seen Raging Phoenix in its entirety, can appreciate how profound my affection is, and by definition must be. If she ever gets married, her husbandwon’t like her this much.

If he ever watchesRaging Phoenix , he’lldivorce her.

But she can stay at my house when it happens. We’ll watch Raging Phoenix as often as she wants. If I’m lucky, she’ll protect me from Andy On. And if I’m reallylucky, she’ll borrow his bikini.

My nose hurts already.