Power Kids, with its innocent-sounding superhero-ish title, is a delicious piece of oddity that combines kid adventures with the violence of 80's action flicks. If you've ever watched 3 Ninjas and wished that the fighting was better choreographed and way more violent, or watched Hard Boiled and wished that Chow Yun-Fat and Tony Leung were little kids, this is the movie for you.
If you've never done either... Well, screw it, don't you want to see the 3 Ninjas kids dropped right into the middle of Hard Boiled's hospital climax? Because this is that. Almost exactly that.
It's understandable to think of such a thing as a difficult mix, but that's the film's primary draw. Whereas the typical kids-versus-adults adventure films usually adjust the conflicting age gap by forcing supposedly hardened criminals to play by kid movie rules, Power Kids does the exact opposite by forcing the kids to fit into an adult world. This means that whenever the film focuses on the kids, it adopts a goofy tone that looks familiar; but as soon as a bad man show up, suddenly we get swear words, political strifes, bloody deaths and a number of John McClane-type shenanigans. It's hilarious to acknowledge that this silly pseudo-family movie called Power Kids was actually rated R by the MPAA. It's like something Robert Rodriguez would do as a prank.
The preposterous premise is that five junior Muay Thai students have to deal with their youngest nearing death because of a failing heart. Hope arrives in the form of a heart donor from a different hospital, but it just so happens that right after the heart is cut out, a group of terrorists takes the hospital under siege as a form of political protest. With the window for a possible transplant narrowing and no official resolution in place, it's up to the other four kids to sneak into the hospital and smuggle the heart out. Naturally, they run afoul of the terrorists and are forced to save the day. I'm not sure why the terrorists even care about what these kids are trying to do, since they still have about a couple of hundred more hostages, but rest assured that the bad guys play their part accordingly, showing no hesitation in fervently trying to gun down these kids.
The film's demented sense of proportional violence is apparent in a scene that introduces the kids' martial arts ability. When a scrawny Japanese tourist accidentally invites the ire of a big, drunk, muscular Westerner, the kids step in to defend the tourist. It's a sight seen plenty of times in family movies: kids banding together to defeat a big bully that looks disproportionately mightier. Except instead of employing wits and wacky stunts, these kids just straight up beat the shit out of the guy. What transpires then is a scene depicting several children brutally hammering one intoxicated man. The film shows this while maintaining a lighthearted Home Alone type tone; never mind that every blow is shot like it's part of a brawl in Ong Bak. To be fair, they try to somewhat condemn this act by having the kids grounded afterwards. That'll show 'em.
It's here that a morbid grin spread across my face. It's not just a kids movie that has violent elements to it; the kids are actually the violent offenders. This, I suppose, makes it easier to take in the latter parts of the movie when these tykes dodge assault rifle fires and incapacitate dangerous terrorists. Forgetting the nonsensical premise and the gag-inducing saccharine "dying kid" moments, the film does exactly what it presents itself as, which is a badass version of a kid flick. While the use of wires is pretty apparent in some stunts, there are still some very well-timed hand-to-hand fights at work that makes this a solid action movie—kids or no kids.
Blu-ray Bonus Features
Included in the extras are two behind-the-scenes clips that are now standard inclusion. One is a "Making Of" featurette while the other is footage from the production. The two are not exactly distinguishable and they are pretty dull to watch, even though it's nice to see kids being put through rigorous stunts, if only for a brief moment.
"Power Kids" is on sale June 8, 2010 and is rated R. Action. Directed by Krissanapong Rachata. Written by Nonont Kontaweesook, Napalee, Piyaros Thongdee. Starring Johnny Nguyen.
