Top Ten Movies # 7 - The One

I could choose from a multitude of his chinese martial arts actioners (like Hero) but for me my favorite Jet Li movie is THE ONE. Maybe because it contains not only kick ass cgi, awesome fight choreography (like the battle when he handcuffs four of his buddies together to keep them from capturing him) and soaring music but because of the ideas it tries to present. We all know what a sucker I am for time travel science fiction and the idea that we all exist on mutliple planets in a multiverse at the same time is intriquing. Its all just energy and if we could somehow kill all our other multiverse counterparts we would gain enough energy to become faster and stronger - to become - THE ONE. That is a philosophy I can get behind. Sure you gotta be a cold blooded bastard and shoot 124 versions of yourself to gain your superpowers but I could see the ends justifying the means. I mean is it really murder if you kill 124 versions of yourself? Sounds more like suicide to me. In this movie the law has caught up with the particulars of time travel. The movie also stars the great Jason Statham, Delroy Lindo (Yulaw's old friend) and Carlo Gugino (Gabe Law's love). It is also very funny like when they show all the various identities he had like SVEN LAW (Jet as a Swedish guy complete with blonde hair) and LAWLESS (his badass criminal identity) The effects that show him fighting himself (Gabe Law vs Garbriel Yulaw) are nearly flawless and actually pre-date the Matrix. And the end we get that classic scene when the villian Yulaw is transported to the Stygian prison world in the Hades Universe and when faced with a fight for his life to the top of the pyramid defiantly exclaims "I am Yulaw, I am NOBDODY'S BITCH!. YOU are MINE!" CLASSIC.