You really have to watch the movie with the mindset of a kid (a little too violent though for an elementary schooler, but oh well): the comedy is broad and blunt, the story is melodramatic, a lot of one-dimensional characters, dumb camera work, super undercranked fights, very exaggereated wirefu...etc.
BUT
Somehow it all came together, somehow I was able to withstand the flaws (typical in any Wong Jing productions) and came to like the movie. The kid characters in this movie were not used cheaply to enhance Jet Li's charisma or whatnot--they were actually the main characters, we more or less see the world through their little boys perspective where everything was black and white and evil guys were awful-looking and showing off kungfu was the way to go (they had a scene where the lil' kid stood on Jet Li's head as they plowed through the market place--totally obnoxious, but that's something I would've done as a kid if me and my dad were martial arts masters living in ancient China).
I guess you have to watch this in an innocently goofy mood.

Oh yeah, I just realized that this movie is a ripoff of the popular (and great) Japanese series "Shogun Warriors." Where a man is wanted by the government and he hides/ fights with his lil' boy. The opening scene where he asks the infant boy to choose between a wooden horse and a sword is a BLATANT ripoff. But it's still fun.