Candy and a Movie: Movie #37 The Protector

The Protector (2005)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427954/

A.K.A Tom Yum Goong if you speak Thai, which I do not. If you don't know who Tony Jaa is, it's time you learn. I first saw him in Ong Bak, which was great. I heard that The Protector was even better and let's just saying after watching this, once I bought it. The Protector is a kung fu movie and maybe has 3 of my favorite fight scenes of all time in the same movie. Have you read the piranha post? If you haven't you should. I kept a nudity count in it. Did something similar in this movie. I don't want this to sound bad but my brother and I aren't exactly sure how much money Thailand has. Some of these stunts looked amazing. So amazing that it probably took high quality, expensive stunts to make. Stunts that we aren't sure that they could afford. That is why we think 49 bones were actually broken and 20 people may have possibly been killed. Two men's genitals may have also been permanently rendered useless. That's how good this movie is! Scratch that. For how good the fight scenes are, the rest of the movie is bad. The plot is Jaa's elephants were stolen and he wants to get them back before they are killed. It's not about that though. It's about Jaa just wrecking bad guys.

Like I said, there are elephants. Jaa's family has taken care of them for forever and they are like family. They are all at some kind of fair and Jaa's grandfather gets shot trying to stop a bunch of guys from stealing the elephants. Jaa's goes after some people but they get the elephants anyway. About 10-15 minutes goes by without anyone getting a beat down but the wait is over. It starts with Jaa's go to move, a flying knee. He then throws a kick that doesn't get that close but it is probably the only flaw in the scene. In fact, here is the scene I have no problem with you watching all of the fights that I post before watching the movie as long as you get it and watch with all of your friends after. It's a whole experience. If you know me away from the internet and want to borrow it, just ask. Immediately following that fight is a pretty solid boat chase. Not exactly the Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade chase, but still solid enough. Jaa learns that his elephants are taken to Sydney, Australia and off he goes.

Right after getting off the air plane, he of course gets picked up by a car jacker in a stolen taxi. He gets away but now the cops(led by a dirty commissioner) want him because he could've been in on the crime all along. Some people are opening an underground exotic animal restaurant and that is why they want rare animals like elephants. Don't know what elephant would taste like, can't imagine liking it. An Asian lady is taking over and she seems pretty evil. Jaa finds this guy named Johnny who is the one who took his elephants. His girlfriend is pretty hot. Too hot to be just an extra, I bet she'll be back. They have a mini fight that Johnny kind of wins. Jaa chases after him and kicks like a 12 foot high street light just to do it. It's awesome. He catches up, ruins whatever criminal deal they were having and starts the next fight. Not sure if you've ever seen Brink! but there is a team of bmx/roller bladers/motorcycle/atv fighters that enter and all try to take Jaa down. Look like team x blades, that's the blink reference. Here's the fight completely random, completely awesome. Probably stupid awesome.

We find out Johnny works for the evil lady. Jaa got pretty messed up during that last fight and winds up on the street. Johnny's girlfriend finds him and brings him to her apartment for rest. He dreams about the old kings fighting on elephants. Again, possibly a large chunk of the budget was spent on this and not actual stuntmen. He wakes up and I think that she must have a heart of gold to be taking care of him like that. Next scene we see that she is basically a prostitute and Johnny is her pimp. Makes more sense now that she would be helping out the guy after Johnny. Now there is this weird meeting of important businessmen at a mud bath. A couple of call girls, including the girlfriend (don't know what else to call her). Things get dirty, not sexy, just dirty. One guy starts having a heart attack. Maybe it was sexy for him. The dirty cop from the taxi scene walks in and kills everyone but the girlfriend who is hiding and another cop who takes the frame for the murders. At this point of the movie you realize that any line said in english has been learned only for the movies. No one speaks english or knows what they are saying.

Ok, my favorite scene happens now. Might be my favorite from any movie. Jaa is trying to get to the top of this circular building where the restaurant is. He has to fight his way up. The entire fight scene is in one shot. That means no one yelled cut, it's just one take. Pretty unheard of. The fight with Johnny at the end wasn't bad but the best part is the whole circle. Enjoy As you can tell, Johnny is all kicks and that will only get you so far. Jaa doesn't find his elephant but does find the cop who was framed and a ton of “love slaves”. Then the baby elephant shows up thank goodness.

Back to the evil lady who it turns out just wants control of her crime family. Her animal restaurant just got shut down and she has no respect. To get respect, she poisons the two young heirs. Looks like she is in control now. Meanwhile, Jaa has been hiding out at a monastery. He comes back one day to find that this Capote dude killed all the monks. They get into this awesome looking fight. They do a little dance fighting and there is sweet slow mo. Then he fights a sword guy and then a Stone Cold Steve Austin look alike. Fight

TIME FOR THE ENDING

The girlfriend drops off a tape of the dirty cop killing people. Jaa goes after evil lady and finds that she has his dead elephants skeleton hanging around. He loses it and the bone breaking scene commences. You'll know why I call it that He just crippled so many people in real life. Stone cold comes in to fight him again and is giving Jaa all that he can handle. For no reason three more show up and now there are four Mr. Universe's vs little Jaa. He uses broken bones from his elephant to probably dice up those guys for real. Evil lady tries to get away but Jaa literally jumps off a skyscraper to give her a knee while she hangs off a rope of a flying helicopter. The end.

OH YA!!!

Favorite Scene : I'll just rank fights. 1. Circle single cut fight. 2. Temple Fight 3. First fight/boat chase. 4. Broken Bones 5. X Blades 6. Final Fight

Memorable Lines: Movie would've been better with 0 dialogue.

Rating: I give this movie 8.5 Baloon candies (big in Thailand according to Google). On quality this movie is probably a 4.5 or a 5 but this movie is still great after like the 10^th time I've seen it.

Alternate Ending : Jaa kills everyone but goes crazy and thinks that he is an elephant. His new friends try to bring him back but he has completely snapped. Turned into a Tarzan for elephants instead of gorilla's. No need for a Jane because he winds up in a mental hospital. The end.

What I would've done if I was the main character : Not wear that scarf because it didn't look cold and doesn't fit with all my snapping necks. Then use the baby elephant as a chick magnet.

What happens in the sequel : I want to see a sequel so bad. But then again maybe not. Another movie similar to this is Ong Bak. Stupid good. Ong Bak 2 and 3 are stupid bad. Let's say the protector 2 is the same movie but involves Jaa taking down the mafia. Not as good just like the Ong Baks.