Fighter, Denmark (2007)
Despite positive reviews and screenings at the international festivals, this movie is not for everyone.
The story is very similar to other movies, in which a teenage girl from the family of immigrants needs to overcome many common personal problems of her age, and also to struggle against the pressure of ethnic traditions in her family.
She does that by choosing some kind of sport, and with the help of a local boy, that for some reason falls in love with her, she confronts her problems and wins.
In Girlfight it's boxing, in Bend it like Beckham it's soccer, and now it's Kung Fu.
But Fighter is much inferior product than these two, it was simply embarrassing to watch it. Semra Turan, the "actress" that playing the role of a teenage girl, maybe can do a lot of things, but one thing she can't do is to act. Her presence on the screen is anemic and clumsy, the dramatic situations, in which she tries to show some emotions, are dreadful, her body and facial language are of amateur actress, badly instructed by the director.
The rest of the cast is a little better, but they just cannot save this cliche movie with stereotypical characters and shallow plot. Besides a few good moments this movie has nothing new or interesting to offer.
Even the kung fu fighting is not a reason to watch this, it's just so boring. The slow motion was really unnecessary, the choreography was basic and lacks the inspiration, and most of the kung fu scenes are just training, not fighting. Not to mention how ridiculous it looks when a small and skinny girl fights big and muscular boys, and knocks them off their feet.
The only reason this movie has been noticed at all is because it's European. It's very easy to publicize this movie - A first martial arts film from Denmark, but don't be fooled, it's not. It's just a drama about stupid teenage girl and her problems, which are, by the way, not really convincing.
Bad movie with embarrassing lines, acting and story.
My rating: 3/10
