Tsaiberspace

The second import from Tony Jaa (Ong Bak) features the stuntman doing all his own spectacular stunts sans wires, computer graphics, camera tricks, acting, drama, and plot.

There is less parkour to enjoy than in the first movie, mostly because it seems like the movie producers decided to drop all pretense of a plot, and thus of any motivation for any chase scenes, and just skip straight to the video-game fight scenes.

There are more nods to other movies:

• We get to follow Jaa fight his way up a building in an extended, single-cut, 10-or-so-minute scene, Hard Boiled-style.
• He fights opponents of varying fighting styles: capoeira, swordsman, big dudes, and whip-wielding dominatrix (Bloodsport, Quest, Game of Death, just about any martial-arts film).
• He takes down a whole room of suit-wearing Agent Smith wannabes, Neo-style.

One never watches these movies for plot, but other inconsistencies still made the movie almost laughable to watch. In particular, the movie felt very much like watching someone play a video game, propelling Tony Jaa from one contrived fight scene to the next. Even more video-game like are the inconsistencies where after defeating one foe and turning to address the next opponent in turn (of course), the body of the first foe somehow disappears, Double Dragon style, to make room for the next fight.

As a side note, the Thai title Tom Yum Goong is the name of a spicy soup dish, which actually does have relevance to the movie (no spoiler; you’ll understand after you watch).