Kung Fu Hustle

Being the first kung fu film I've ever seen, Kung Fu Hustle is just outrageous with some of the references, the action, and the plot...not to mention the soundtrack was pretty cool. I really enjoyed how the kung fu genre provided the general structure of the film, but references were built right in. In the asylum, seeing the door to the cell opening and blood pouring out (The Shining) was fantastic, and while it was a parody, it also sent the message of how powerful and deadly the prisoner in the cell was...but even then, there is lots of humor, such as when the cell door is opened and we see the kung fu master sitting on a toilet reading a newspaper. I found the matrix-style fighting to be a good reference too, considering it was choreographed by the same person that worked on The Matrix.

Kung Fu Hustle was full of postmodernism. The copious amounts of references, and some of the extreme action that they had all referred to other movie references, which was fantastic. The film itself isn't very original...which just as postmodernism points out, is almost the point! Having a film like this shows that we are pretty much at the end of originality, in terms of film innovation. Orson Welles was original, and mastered his techniques. Today, the most original you can find would be a Tarantino film, which are all very very unique in there style...you can pick a Tarantino film out of a pile of films from a mile away. Even then though, a lot of his films are full of postmodernism. Death Proof is a great example...it points directly at Vanishing Point, and plays with a few other genres.