Rating: 3.0

‘Kamikaze Girls’ is a fun, gentle(r) slice of kooky Japanese celluloid with a refreshing female slant and enough gentle kookiness to put a smile on your face.

There are some genuinely witty moments in there and they prove the perfect covering for the many more that end with a whimper.

A cheeky and often funny, if overlong, look at how the need to act tough and prove you can fight never really leaves you, even many years after high school.

Equal parts goofy, exciting and tedious, the flick works best when Li and his band of pint sized pugilists are kicking butt and performing amazing feats of acrobatics.

Sparse of budget and meaningful dialogue, the film instead sticks to its high-kicking guns and delivers a surfeit of high impact fight scenes.

On its release ‘Kill Bill: Volume 1’ was Tarantino’s weakest film. Now that honour goes to ‘Kill Bill: Volume 2’.

‘Killer Constable’ could have been a genre film with a heart as well as a brain; as it is, this is a good, but not great kung fu film in both action and content.

The real problem of ‘King Of Beggars’ is that there is a lack of focus on what should be the main strength of the production.

A formulaic plot that doesn’t exactly inspire viewing is lifted from tedium by some inventive and exciting action sequences.

‘Kitchen’ is watchable, of course for Jordan Chan’s first-rate display, though it tends to languish in pretentiousness when a firmer hand would have been far more effective.

‘Kung Fu League’ displays the good and bad of Lau, a fact that means it’s never a smooth journey through the hundred minutes, but you don’t necessarily feel too aggravated by the end.

In its own way it is quite a diverting drama that has its moments of chemistry between the two leads. It’s just unfortunate that the b-movie direction undermines the hard work of the cast.