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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
67
$9.99
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66
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Cheri
62
Cherry Blossoms
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Dead Snow
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58
Easy Virtue
70
End of the Line, The
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Every Little Step
64
Examined Life
80
Food, Inc.
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Gigantic
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Girl from Monaco, The
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89
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Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
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Rudo y Cursi
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Seraphine
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Sin Nombre
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Song of Sparrows, The
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Valentino: The Last Emperor
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What Goes Up
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Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
91
Hurt Locker, The
89
Goodbye Solo
88
Tulpan
87
Gomorrah
86
Seraphine
84
Summer Hours
83
U2 3D
83
Revanche
83
Tyson
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
82
Sugar
82
Hunger
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
81
Il Divo
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
80
Food, Inc.
80
Tokyo Sonata
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
78
O'Horten
77
Every Little Step
77
Sin Nombre
75
24 City
74
Treeless Mountain
74
Afghan Star
74
Two Lovers
74
Song of Sparrows, The
74
Lemon Tree
71
Pressure Cooker
71
Jerichow
70
Shall We Kiss?
70
Tony Manero
70
End of the Line, The
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
69
Unmistaken Child
67
$9.99
67
Rudo y Cursi
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
66
Adoration
66
Moon
65
Sex Positive
65
Departures
64
Outrage
64
Examined Life
64
Throw Down Your Heart
64
Lymelife
63
Tokyo!
63
Cheri
63
Dead Snow
63
Tetro
63
Great Buck Howard, The
62
Cherry Blossoms
62
Big Man Japan
62
Not Forgotten
61
Sunshine Cleaning
60
Under Our Skin
59
Sleep Dealer
58
Julia
58
Easy Virtue
57
Away We Go
57
Merry Gentleman, The
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
56
Girl from Monaco, The
56
American Violet
55
Brothers Bloom, The
54
Is Anybody There?
54
Pontypool
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
52
Quiet Chaos
50
Management
48
Alien Trespass
45
Whatever Works
42
Little Ashes
42
Tennessee
40
Limits of Control, The
40
Paris 36
38
Gigantic
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
35
New York
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
28
Surveillance
22
What Goes Up
18
Downloading Nancy
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
xx
Call of the Wild
xx
Home
xx
Offshore
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Kung Fu Hustle
Sony Pictures Classics
FILM:
MPAA RATING: R for sequences of strong stylized action and violence
Starring
Stephen Chow,
Wah Yuen,
Qiu Yuen,
Siu Lung Leung,
Dong Zhi Hua,
Kwok Kuen Chan,
Chiu Chi Ling,
and
Leung Siu Lung
Set amid the chaos of pre-revolutionary China, small time thief, Sing (Chow), aspires to be one of the sophisticated and ruthless Axe Gang whose underworld activities overshadow the city. (Sony)
| GENRE(S): |
Action
|
Comedy
|
Foreign
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Tsang Kan Cheong
Stephen Chow
Xin Huo
Chan Man Keung
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Stephen Chow
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: August 9, 2005
Theatrical: April 8, 2005
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
95 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
China / Hong Kong |
| LANGUAGE(S): |
Cantonese / Mandarin (with English subtitles) |
Original title "Gong Fu"; Best Action Choreography, Best Editing, Best Picture, Best Sound Effects, Best Supporting Actor (Wah Yuen) and Best Visual Effects, 2005 Hong Kong Film Awards
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Film Threat
Phil Hall
Kung Fu Hustle is something you rarely encounter in theaters: a genuinely original comedy.
100
The Hollywood Reporter
Andrew Sun
With a delirious mix of the sublime and the silly, Hong Kong comedy king Stephen Chow Sing-chi has taken the kung fu comedy genre to new heights of chop-socky hilarity.
100
LA Weekly
David Chute
The movie refers glancingly to dozens of Hollywood classics, from "West Side Story" to "City Lights," but at heart it is a debt of honor richly paid by Stephen Chow to his martial-arts forebears and to the traditions that shaped his sensibility. His gong fu is the best.
100
Chicago Tribune
Robert K. Elder
Chow's savagely funny cinematic love letter places Hong Kong legends Yuen Wah, Leung Siu Lung and former Bond girl Yuen Qiu in well-cast pivotal parts, establishing Kung Fu Hustle not only as an endearing homage to a genre's history, but an astonishing piece of cinema in its own right.
100
Time
Richard Corliss
Moviemaking doesn't get much smarter, funnier, handsomer, better than this.
100
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
It's a short, sharp, shock to the cinematic system that's virtually impossible to dislike, and if you don't leave the theatre grinning your face off, then buddy, movies just aren't for you.
91
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
All of Kung Fu Hustle is like that: You don't just watch it, you ride with it, laughing all the way.
91
Portland Oregonian
Shawn Levy
It's a visual feast that only a crack director could provide, and it's mounted within a story and setting that, played utterly straight, might still have made a good movie.
90
Los Angeles Times
Carina Chocano
Brilliantly choreographed and shot, Kung Fu Hustle is often grisly, visually spectacular and unabashedly silly, sometimes all at once.
88
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
Gut-Bustingly funny moves are pretty rare, so hustle over to Kung Fu Hustle, actor-director Ste phen Chow's exhilaratingly hilarious and affectionate send-up of Hong Kong action flicks.
88
Premiere
Aaron Hillis
Guaranteed to deliver more innovative eye candy and smarter fun-per-second than most of this summer's fare, and that one-two punch ought to knock you off your seat.
88
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
Raymond Wong, who has become Chow's favorite composer, iced this cake with music that sounds like Beethoven, Henry Mancini's jazz and all the James Bond themes run together in a blender.
83
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Sean Axmaker
In a farce like this, where the story is merely a string of martial-arts movie cliches lined up to be parodied, that has its own rewards.
80
Dallas Observer
Luke Y. Thompson
The inspiration appears to be equal parts "Looney Tunes" and Capcom video games like "Street Fighter II." All the energy that was missing from the recent "Mask" sequel is here, and then some.
80
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
It won't be long before you feel the compulsion to watch again. There is too much to appreciate in one sitting.
80
Newsweek
David Ansen
Defies all laws of gravity in its pursuit of thrills and laughs—and it's so disarmingly eager to please that only a stone-faced kung fu purist could object.
80
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Tasha Robinson
Its crowd-pleasing, action-packed brand of frenetic parody promises to spread Chow's mythos even further.
80
Village Voice
J. Hoberman
Chow manages to have his cake and eat it too: Kung Fu Hustle is a kung fu parody that's also a terrific kung fu movie.
80
New York Magazine
Ken Tucker
Half-amazing, half-ridiculous, thoroughly exhilarating.
80
Empire
Simon Crook
Kung Fu Hustle pummels "The Matrix" trilogy into a puddle.
75
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
Viewers will discover that the film has something to offer nearly everyone, whether they are a novice or a black belt in kung fu cinema.
75
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Does the plot spin out of control? You bet. But dumb fun this smart is a gift.
75
Baltimore Sun
Michael Sragow
Kung Fu Hustle is to "House of Flying Daggers" what "Blazing Saddles" is to "Unforgiven."
75
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
Like a meal prepared by an extreme chef, ''Hustle" is more than a bit of a mess. It still tastes like nothing you've ever had before.
75
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
This is the kind of movie where you laugh occasionally and have a silly grin most of the rest of the time.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Ruthe Stein
Vivid and madcap but fails to connect on any emotional level.
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Liam Lacey
A celebration of Hong Kong action cinema that mocks gravity, both emotional and physical.
75
USA Today
Claudia Puig
Hustle's approach to a simple good-vs.-evil plot is eccentrically exuberant.
75
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
For all its excitement Kung Fu Hustle is mostly a marvel of comedic ingenuity and mile-a-minute creativity run wild. You've never seen anything like it.
70
Chicago Reader
Kevin B. Lee
Chow's newfound patience and attentiveness to stasis, tinged with nostalgia, are promising indications of where he's taking his art as he attempts to influence the commercial cinema that's long influenced him.
70
Slate
David Edelstein
At times, the picture evokes such stylized musicals as "The Band Wagon"; at others, it seems to whirr every kung-fu movie ever made into the most luscious action smoothie you'll ever imbibe.
70
Salon.com
Andrew O'Hehir
Chow depends way too much on jokey computer graphics that make the whole thing feel like a superhero comic, instead of athleticism or charisma or good storytelling, and that Kung Fu Hustle wears itself out long before it's over.
70
The New York Times
Dana Stevens
For all its punches, kicks, whacks and thumps, the movie does not have much impact, and for all its affectionate nostalgia, it produces a strange kind of amnesia. It knocks the sense right out of your head, and its own as well.
63
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
The upside: Chow has energy and invention to burn. The downside: He doesn't know when he blisters his audience.
60
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
A giant leap forward in Stephen Chow's ongoing assault on Jackie Chan's status as reigning balletic clown-master of martial-arts mayhem, this extravagantly nutty crime comedy is a work of some kind of genius. Not everybody's kind of genius, to be sure.
50
New York Daily News
Jami Bernard
The overly broad martial-arts comedy Kung Fu Hustle was obviously made with skill and affection for its many cinematic sources, yet I found the tone, timing and emotional involvement off by just enough to irritate rather than enchant.
50
Variety
Derek Elley
Devoid of genuine inspiration or involving character development.
30
Washington Post
Ann Hornaday
For all its stylishness, verve and moments of visual poetry, the relentlessly punishing slapstick and overall cruel tone left me cold.
 The average user rating for this movie is 8.9 (out of 10) based on 107 User Votes
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