Kung Fu Panda 2

Here's a bit of trivia: who is the most successful, in terms of box office, female director? It's Jennifer Yuh Nelson, director of Kung Fu Panda 2, which has earned 665 million dollars worldwide. She is also the first female to direct a Hollywood animated film by herself. That's all great for women, but the movie itself isn't so great.

Picking up where the original Kung Fu Panda left off, Po (Jack Black) is now the Dragon Warrior, and along with the Furious Five, protect the citizens from evil-doers. A peacock (voiced by Gary Oldman), uses gunpowder to invent a cannon, which makes kung fu obsolete. Can he be stopped before he takes over all of China?

As with the first film, there is a lot of fighting action alleviated by humor, as Po, even though he is now a trained fighter, is still something of a klutz and a glutton. In this film he is told by his master (Dustin Hoffman), that he must learn how to reach inner peace. But no one could gain inner peace while watching this film, which is full of sound and fury. Although ninety minutes long, there is perhaps only a third of that in actual story.

I'm amazed that they got all of the big-name cast back from the first film, including Angelina Jolie, Jackie Chan, David Cross, Seth Rogen, and Lucy Liu, and added Oldman, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Dennis Haysbert. Granted, I'm sure Van Damme probably answered the phone before the first ring ended, but I would imagine the talent budget was pretty steep. This is odd, considering some of the characters hardly speak at all.

The film did get nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, which is an indication that there are too many nominees in this category. There were 18 animated features, and five of them get nominated, so if my math is correct, about 28 percent of all films get nominated. If this worked in the Best Picture Oscar, there would be over 100 nominees.