Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		2.5

Enter the Warriors Gate Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 6, 2017

There have been a number of films through the years where the intersection between videogames and “real life” leads to characters from both realms interacting in some way, or which alternatively at least feature human characters putting their videogame skills to good use in some alternate realm. TRON of course springs instantly to mind, but a number of other properties like The Last Starfighter and eXistenZ also ply much the same territory, albeit within different contexts and with a decidedly various set of approaches and treatments. The world of anime is virtually stuffed full of projects where characters are more or less sucked into videogame environments, including such popular titles and/or franchises as Sword Art Online: Box Set I, Log Horizon: Collection 1 and .hack//Quantum OVA. With such an oft traveled path in front of them, it’s probably not all that surprising that screenwriters Luc Besson and Robert Kamen don’t ever really push the concept into any significantly new directions. A lot of contemporary action adventure films are often compared to videogames, and Enter the Warriors Gate (evidently originally released as simply The Warriors Gate) certainly has that ambience down pat, including an opening battle scene that seems to be taking place within an historical context but which of course turns out to be a videogame being played by teenager Jack (Uriah Shelton), who is perhaps seeking a bit of escape (in time honored teenager fashion) from both his put upon mother Annie (Sienna Guillory) as well as some local bullies who delight in tormenting the “97 pound weakling”. Annie, a single mother whose realty job has pretty much dried up, has her own pressing economic issues, including the impending foreclosure of the family home, that keeps her in absentia a lot of the time, something that at least offers Jack more of an opportunity to keep playing his favorite game.

What is it about Asian themed antique stores that always seems to lead to some kind of unexpected adventure? Remember Grandfather, also known as Mr. Wing (Keye Luke), from Gremlins? That mysterious if concerned character at least had the good sense to try to shoo potential customers away from those nefarious little furry creatures, but in the case of Enter the Warriors Gate, Jack’s sometimes employer (Francis Ng) at a local (you guessed it) Asian themed antique shop gifts him with a magical basket that turns out to act as a portal between Jack’s increasingly perilous suburban environment and an ancient Chinese locale that bears a rather striking resemblance to Jack’s favorite videogame.

In just one of several fairly hoary plot developments, an ancient Chinese warrior named Zhao (Mark Chao) delivers a damsel in distress named Su Lin (Ni Ni) to contemporary America in an effort to keep her safe from an impending arranged marriage to nefarious bad guy Arun (Dave Bautista). The first part of this “culture clash” deals in fairly broad comedy as Su Lin attempts to navigate a modern world and Jack attempts to explain the sudden appearance of this rather exotic young woman in his life. When Arun’s henchmen track down Su Lin and capture her, Jack is forced to used the basket as his entryway into his own culture clash, albeit obviously reversed from that just experienced by Su Lin.

That of course sets up the second round of cliché ridden material, as seemingly woefully underprepared Jack has to battle various forces of evil, joined by Zhao and being trained by a Wizard (Francis Ng) who bears a rather amazing resemblance to Jack’s boss back in 21st century suburbia. It’s all almost depressingly predictable, and unfortunately Besson himself isn’t on hand to direct in his typically high energy way, meaning that for all the cartwheeling camera work and admittedly nicely staged fight scenes, a lot of Enter the Warriors Gate comes off as ersatz adventure material, never really generating much in the way of either excitement or emotional attachment to any of the characters.

As my colleague Brian Orndorf mentioned in his review of Enter the Warriors Gate’s evidently very brief theatrical exhibition on this side of the pond, the film seems willfully designed to appeal to younger kids, and for them, the basic storyline and set pieces may well be enough to captivate them. Others who have experienced any of the other similarly themed films listed above may feel like they’re having one of those “déjà vu all over again” moments, since Enter the Warriors Gate seems largely content to simply rehash by now rote plot conceits in its effort to get to an expected happy ending.

Enter the Warriors Gate Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Enter the Warriors Gate is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.38:1. This is just the latest domestic Blu-ray release of a foreign film released overseas theatrically in 3D which is granted only a 2D disc on this side of the pond. While the IMDb doesn't have technical data available on the shoot, cinematographer Maxime Alexandre's personal site credits a generic "HD" digital capture, and the results are often quite beautifully sharp and precise looking, especially when the palette hasn't been shorn of color or otherwise graded heavily. Fine detail is frequently exceptional, especially in close-ups, though detail levels do tend to fluctuate somewhat as a result of the many grading options that have been utilized, some of which strip nearly all color out of selected scenes, while others are bathed in deep tones like blues that tend to mask fine detail levels. Some of the location work in China features some staggeringly beautiful landscapes which look great in this transfer, albeit sometimes with attendant softness when CGI elements are added.

Enter the Warriors Gate Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Enter the Warriors Gate features a suitably robust DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 which derives a lot of surround activity from the expected gaming aspects as well as later "real" battles between combatants. The film is frequently a bit over noisy in that typical martial arts way, but smart prioritization generally places dialogue forward in the mix, so that all elements are rendered cleanly and clearly. Fidelity is fine and dynamic range very wide on this problem free track.

Enter the Warriors Gate Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary with Director Mathias Hoene


• Beyond the Gate: Making Enter the Warriors Gate (1080p; 9:48) is pretty standard EPK fare with okay interviews and behind the scenes footage.


• The Journey East: Bridging the Cultural Divide (1080p; 4:40) focuses on the cross cultural currents within the story as well as the actual production.


• Deleted Scene (1080p; 3:31)

Enter the Warriors Gate Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I evidently liked Enter the Warriors Gate at least a little bit more than Brian did, but that's not to say I felt this was anything other than a pretty tired rehash of ideas done more innovatively in other films. While it's once again disappointing that a 3D theatrical release is granted only a 2D disc, the good news is that technical merits on this release are top flight, for those considering a purchase.