The Storm Riders (1998)

Mix a Big Bad out to rule the martial world with two handsome warriors raised as his disciples and an overly accommodating daughter caught up in a love triangle with the two men, throw in a lot of CGI fight scenes and you have The Storm Riders. I actually enjoyed it.

Sonny Chiba plays the perfect Big Bad. He has the evil laugh down to an art form. Ekin Cheng as the kindhearted Wind and Aaron Kwok as the unpredictable Cloud make for an interesting pair of men raised as brothers by the man who killed their fathers. Kristy Yeung and Shu Qi are there more for adornments and a little lusty conflict and humor respectively, but not particularly integral to the story. Of course, the movie hits its stride when Cloud and Wind must combine forces into a storm to try and take down Lord Conqueror and avenge their families while also freeing themselves and the world from his tyranny.

There's a fiery monster, a fighting monk, destiny, magical glowing red fruit and an arm seeking it's master. The movie rarely slows down to let the viewer catch their breath. The special effects were very good, but at times over-powered the fight scenes. I would liked to have seen a few more actual martial arts moves during the fights.

I tend to struggle with movies based on comics as often the movie makers assume the viewer is completely familiar with the story and they tend to skip about or not flesh out the main characters, but this story was told in a comprehensible straight forward manner and granted the main characters enough story development for me to care about them. The Storm Riders was a fun, entertaining movie.

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