The Zoe Saldaña performance inspired by Jet Li and bullfighters: “It’s a very sensual dance”
Zoe Saldaña could retire tomorrow with an almost complete Hollywood bingo card, her cultural cache impeccable, having starred in several of the highest-grossing movies of all time, originating and embodying some truly legendary characters.
If all that wasn’t enough, she added an Oscar to her haul in 2025, and sure, it was for the utterly dismal Emilia Pérez, but a win is a win.
However, the role for which the history-maker is best known is a green alien whose dad is hellbent on destroying half the universe, you know, that classic archetype. She first played the role of Gamora in Guardians of the Galaxy, before reprising her role four more times across the wider Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) as a badass warrior who has gone toe-to-toe with some of the most brutal forces in the universe, one of the few truly great female characters in a franchise severely lacking in girl power.
Unlike most of her Marvel cohorts, Saldaña didn’t have much to draw on as Gamora and the rest of the Guardians weren’t big stars before their first movie outing. They’d appeared in comic books, but not to the same extent as many of the other heroes who would later join the Avengers. As she explained to Slash Film, the star had to look elsewhere for inspiration, including to a real-life, often underrated action hero.
“Jet Li is much more graceful than karate, which is what Jackie Chan has trained in,” she claimed, “And I find that with women, you have to maintain some kind of grace, at least that’s my personal opinion. I was very adamant with Chloe and Steve and Thomas, the choreographers, to study the bullfighters. Because I kind of find it very seductive, the way a bullfighter can seduce a bull into surrendering to its own death without touching him at all. Just with the red, it’s a dance, it’s a very sensual dance that eventually the bull caves in, and basically runs towards this red thing and then there’s a sword meeting him behind it. He’s basically running to his own death.”
Li, who Western viewers might know from The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor or The Expendables, initially trained in a style of martial art called wushu, which, alongside being a more combat-based style, also has a more choreographed form, which would explain why Li’s fighting style can be so beautiful to watch. He’s also a great appreciator of the Shaolin style of kung fu, which is also extremely artistic.
Interestingly, Saldaña’s next movie directly after Guardians was The Book of Life, in which bullfighting plays a major part, but since this was an animated film, she sadly wasn’t able to put her newfound skills to use.
While true cinephiles might know Li’s name, he is often overshadowed by Jackie Chan when it comes to discussions of great martial arts stars, so Saldaña mentioning his name in conjunction with one of the biggest films of the year is a true sign of just how great he is. As for bullfighting, not even an association with Marvel can make me praise that.
