Adventures of Johnny Tao, A Kung Fu Fable is the story of Johnny Dow. Johnny is a down on his luck guy who it trying to squeak out a living by running his gas station in a nearly abandoned rural town. The gas station is not just a place to fill up however. Inside is Johnny’s museum of memorabilia of his father’s musical career. The centerpiece of his collection is his father’s guitar, which, according to legend, was carved from an ancient spear that his father found in the crater of a shooting star.

In actuality, there are 2 pieces to the spear. When Johnny’s bumbling best friend, Eddie, uncovers the other piece, He becomes possessed by the spirit of a demon with the intentions of taking over the world. The Eddie Demon has the power to turn the locals into sugar craving zombies and quickly builds a small army to carry out his plan to find the second half of the spear and harness it’s power. The beautiful Kung Fu warrior Mika comes to Eddie’s aid in defeating the demon and restoring his friend Eddie. Mika is descended from a long line of warriors, trained to defend earth against this very scenario.

The acting in this movie is pretty average. Everyone holds their own but there is not glaring performances as far as strong or weak. There was no one actor or actress that stood out as either remarkably bad or good. The actors and actress all did quite well in the fighting sequences, which added to the overall quality of the film.

Adventures of Johnny Tao reminded me quite a bit of the Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies. I do not mean this as a put down as those franchises epitomise family friendly action films in my view. They have a lot of kid friendly action scenes and explosions. The fight scenes themselves were excellent. The film itself looked quite good and the quality of the production was above average for this type of film. Carrying on the Turtles theme, Johnny Tao is directed quite competently by Kenn Scott, who actually played Raphael in the 2 live action Turtle movies.

I did not have the opportunity to view the bonus features, however they seem pretty straightforward. To me this isn’t really a film that I would care to watch with a commentary track but I wouldn’t have minded checking out the Making Of featurette.

I watched Adventures of Johnny Tao with my son and found that of the stacks of family friendly dvds that we have, he asked to rewatch it the next day. To me this is a good litmus test of its rewatchability with kids. Unlike many movies today, I was able to sit through multiple watchings with my son without being miserable. I also appreciated having a movie to watch with him that while there was multiple fighting scenes. they were done in a PG way and I did not have to worry about his possibly picking up any new phrases that children ought not repeat. If you are looking for a family friendly action flick for the next movie night, go ahead and pick up Adventures of Johnny Tao. Your kids will love it.

Bonus Features:
An Adventure in the Making: The Making of Adventures of Johnny Tao
Filmmakers’ commentary track
Deleted scenes
Music Video

Adventures of Johnny Tao, A Kung Fu Fable is available courtesy of MTI Home Video beginning on July 29th, 2008.

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