Legend of the Wolf (1997)
Director - Donnie Yen
DVD Released by : Jumbo Plain
Player reviewed with : Malata DVD-N996
Receiver reviewed with : Sony 925
 
Features:
Cantonese and Mandarin Soundtracks
English and Chinese Subtitles
Not enhanced for 16 x 9 TVs

Donnie Yen stars in LEGEND OF THE WOLF. A man seeks a meeting with Wolf (Donnie Yen) in an effort to kill somebody. Wolf's friend escorts him to this meeting but asks him to re-think what he is doing. To explain himself better, the escort tells the legend of Wolf. Years ago, after leaving the military, Wolf is left with amnesia after being shot. The one thought that he remembers, is that he must meet a woman at a temple. While searching for this temple, he encounters the man who is to become is friend. This man leads him to the temple. Wolf finds the woman but not before he must battle several bandits with machetes. The woman explains a little to Wolf about his past but he doesn't remember. Soon, a group of bandits, led by somebody from Wolf's past appears and a showdown begins.

THE LEGEND OF THE WOLF has it's moments but it's for diehard Donnie Yen fans only. The movie is directed, produced and written by Yen and it is a decent effort. The fights scenes are very good but some could be even more so if there is reason given to care about the characters.

The video quality is below average. The image is not the original aspect ratio. I think it's closer to a zoomed in full frame than pan & scan. The compositions look OK but the burnt in subtitles are sometimes off the screen. The image itself has artifacts and looks more like a video tape than DVD. There isn't a lot of detail in the picture and you can barely tell what is happening in dark scenes. A smaller screen may not make these defects as noticeable.

The audio is also less than average. The levels are too high sometimes and the volume has to be adjusted. There are also audio dropouts. There is a choice of mandarin or Cantonese but you need to do it "on the fly" with the remote because there is no menu.

There are no extras on this DVD and as mentioned before, no menu.

Unless you really need to see this movie, I would say pass on this one. The DVD looks more like a VCD. The film itself has some good fight scenes but it doesn't elevate the movie above fair. If you are a fan of this movie, you may want to wait to see if somebody else attempts to release it. I would like to see a better version of this movie because the faults of this DVD are really distracting and it might make the movie more enjoyable.