SHADOW MASTER – Review

When you’re making an urban post-apocalyptic, supernatural martial arts movie a lot can go wrong, and most of it does in SHADOW MASTER. The plot is mostly drivel about The Four Horsemen (without horses) of the Apocalypse snatching children from a rundown multi-story warehouse that is shelter for a bedraggled group of survivors of whatever the unspecified disaster was that left the world all gray and smoky, inside and out. The evil quartet is doing this for a world-conquering ritual, opposed by some sort of Death God, who recruits our hero (D.Y. Sao) to take on his powers at the cost of his soul to protect the folks he’s only just met when the thing starts.

Actually, the opening scene has Sao, face obscured by long hair like the creepy gal from THE RING, killing a bunch of cops, then surrendering to the rest and explaining to their boss how he got to that point for the rest of the movie.

Writer/director Pearry Reginald Teo serves up a set of characters whose powers defy logic with their ebbs and flows. Sao is killed once, or more than once – hard to keep track – only to come back stronger… except when he’s weaker. He has to kill all four Horsemen to save the day, since killing a few of them several times has no lasting effect. Visually, almost every shot occurs in the dark labyrinthian building that also houses some radioactive waste for reasons never made clear. Or relevant. The sound track does no favors to Teo’s dialog, with much almost unintelligible for a variety of reasons, including the fact that several important characters speak in gravelly voices through full-face masks. Even worse, the ending dangles prospects for a friggin’ sequel!

So why bother? If you don’t already know who D.Y. Sao is (I didn’t), tune in for his fight scenes. The Cambodian-born, U.S.-raised dude has all the real martial skills and dazzling acrobatic gifts of Tony Jaa, without his resting angry face. Sao has almost as many stunt credits (16) as acting (21), with many of the former, including this one, as coordinator or choreographer. English being his primary language gives him a leg up for acting gigs over Jaa and the bevy of budding action stars from Korea, Malaysia, Thailand and other countries who are cranking out first-rate martial arts flicks for international markets. He’s also got the looks and presence for leading roles in better films. Sao is a solid candidate for becoming Hollywood’s next Jet Li.

For those who find the plot as confusing as I did, the film can still be worth watching by fast-forwarding through everything between the fights. Great moves abound. Without wires. Cool.

SHADOW MASTER opens in select theaters on Friday, Nov. 4 and available on-demand and on digital platforms from Saban Films starting Nov. 8.

RATING: 1.5 out of 4 stars