Review: Chocolate (2009)

[Scott Mendelson]

Chocolate
2009
95 minutes
rated R (violence throughout, and brief sexuality/nudity)

by Scott Mendelson

I've never been a fan of watching circus performers do their thing
without nets. Sure, we're told, it's more exciting without a net, it
somehow makes the trapeze act or balance routine more impressive, but
it also makes it scary as hell. It's a lot more fun watching a trapeze
act knowing that if they screw up, they won't plunge to their death.
I'll take peace of mind over increased suspense when the stakes are
for real.

I bring this up because the action in Chocolate is incredibly painful
looking and, as we see in the closing credits, it was in fact quite
brutal on the actors and stunt people. We see a number of seemingly
very serious injuries as a result of the onscreen carnage. I'm not
sure at what point it stops being a movie and becomes something
resembling a snuff film. There is a scene about halfway through the
film in which a number of foes get stabbed or impaled with meat hooks
in various body parts. I'm scared to ask how they did that.

Anyway, Chocolate is the latest Thai martial arts import from Prachya
Pinkaew, the guy behind the Tony Jaa spectacles Ong-Bak and The
Protector (the latter affectionately referred to among friends as the
'give me back my elephants!' movie). As usual, the plot is pretty
simple. Basically it involves a forbidden romance between two people
from warring mob families. Dad is Yakuuza and mom is from the Thai
mob. After giving birth to an autistic child, Dad is forced to flee to
Japan while mom is shunned, forced to raise her special needs child
alone. After young Zen's mother is stricken with cancer, the young go-
getter applies her potent martial arts skills (learned from watching
previous Pinkaew films on television) to track down various criminal
elements that owe her mother money and extract it one way or another.

Aside from the somewhat overly melodramatic storytelling, the film
really doesn't get going until the second act. But even when the
fights finally start up, there is an odd discomfort in watching them.
Although family friend Moom assures Zen that the targets are in debt
to their mother, we really don't know for sure how many of these local
businesses aren't just local businesses that aren't really involved in
skullduggery. For all we know, Zen spends a good forty-five minutes
basically extorting innocent businesses for money and beating the
living hell out of anyone who tries to stop her. Then again, they may
actually make the movie unintentionally hilarious, depending on your
mood.

But it must be stated that the fight scenes, two in particular, are
quite impressive. The aforementioned mid-film battle in an abattoir is
both lyrical and gruesome, with both spectacular fighting and
horrifying injuries. The final battle, set outside a large, multi-
story shophouse, waged up and down the various ledges, is one of the
greatest fight scenes I have ever seen on film. Seriously, this one is
worth the price of admission all by itself. The stunt work is
astounding (and frighteningly real, as it turns out), as men fly out
of windows, crash into ledges, smash into billboards, and otherwise
send their (theoretical) health insurance premiums skyrocketing. I sat
there hoping, wishing that someone would make a video game out of this
movie, as the shophouse finale would make a stunningly fun final
level.

Chocolate is pretty much what you expect from the genre. The plot is
paper thin and yet occasionally convoluted, the acting is serviceable,
and the techical aspects are more than adequate. But, at the very
least, the film is worth seeing for the splendid fight scenes and
Panna Rittikrai's refreshingly comprehensible choreography. And again,
that last smackdown must be seen to be believed. I'm personally
finding it difficult to believe that no one got killed in the
process.  Oh well, that's something Pinkaew can aim for on his next
feature.

Grade: B