This is actually one of the better martial arts films that I've seen in a while. I was very impressed with Jet Li the first time I saw him, which was in "Lethal Weapon 4". I loved the way he moved and fought, and I am glad he has started to get some leads in English speaking roles. I did not like very much his next film "Black Mask", which was a Hong Kong import. And last year's "Romeo Must Die" was only okay, and the action sub-par. "Kiss of the Dragon", I'm glad to say, is just one long action scene after another, and most of it was very entertaining.

Li is a cop from China (Beijing, not Hong Kong for once) sent by the Chinese embassy to help the French authorities with an international drug ring involving Chinese suppliers. Unfortunately it turns out that a crooked Parisian cop is the ringleader on the French soil. When we first are introduced to the Parisian Cop (Tcheky Karyo), he is beating an Asian man into the floor, and upon seeing Li approaching, has one of his henchman break his neck while hanging from the ceiling. I was more than a little surprised after seeing this to learn that he was a French police inspector. None of the men, including the inspector, look even remotely like a cop, and more like mobster thugs. The same goes with the way they act.

As you can predict, next we get the setup where Li is framed for murder, although logic tells me that this won't solve the Chinese connection problem, since they will probably just send over another Beijing cop. The inspector has a good scene where he tries to convince the Chinese officials that Li has killed the contact, and several of his cops. It seemed clear to both the inspector and the Chinese that they weren't buying it, so he has all of his men put out an alert to be looking for him. The Chinese know that he is not staying at a hotel, but instead with a mole probably somewhere in the Paris Chinatown.

The opening scene where Li is setup is very violent and lasts for a while. I suspect that he fought over twenty people. The opening scenes were actually exciting and pretty well done, so I found myself settling in to enjoy the rest of this action film. Even with some unusual questions of logic regarding what little we had seen of the plot, I knew that this film's heart was going to be with the fighting and shooting.

A couple of questions about the violence did keep me wondering though. The bad guys kept pulling out more guns, and they seemed to keep getting bigger and bigger. Doesn't France have gun control? I thought like most European nations, it was pretty hard getting that kind of firepower, even if they are cops. Actually, that brings up another point. I couldn't believe how many crooked cops this guy must have had on his payroll. I think at least fifty die over the course of the film. Could they all be bad cops, or were there some hired henchmen as well? Then again, how would a cop manage to meet with a number of henchman in his office in police headquarters the way he does.

My friend said after the movie, "Luc Besson must hate cops." This is probably true. I haven't seen a good portrayal in any film that he has directed or produced. There is even a fight scene towards the end where Jet Li beats up about twenty-five cops. Richard, the crooked inspector, is actually very similar to the over-the-top New York cop that Gary Oldman played in "The Professional" (Leon). He constantly seemed enraged and willing to sacrifice anyone to keep his power. I imagine he became a cop so that he could take advantage of the system and run his criminal drug empire with impunity.

There are very few scenes not involving violence where we get to learn anything about the characters. One quiet scene has Li meeting a hooker (with a heart of gold, of course) played by Bridget Fonda. Seeing her in this reminded me of the fact that she played the lead role in the American version of the producer's "La Femme Nikita" called "Point of No Return". I found it to be a very unusual coincidence with her and Li meeting up, multiple times. However, I think the movie worked very hard at being as simplistic as possible story-wise, so maybe I should give it some credit for not wanting to drag out the non-action scenes by trying to give them a plausible reason for meeting multiple times.

There are few laughs, but one scene I have to mention. We have seen many movies where a spy in a foreign land goes to the bus station to get gear out of his locker in case the kind of situation he is always preparing for happens. I have never seen this scene done like it was here. It could easily have been cut out of the film, and nothing would have been lost, but it was worth the laugh. Li goes to the locker, but there are two cops leaning against it having a conversation. He asks them politely to move over which they do. Li looks inside the locker to find a cell phone (I think) that when he dials opens up the locker underneath where the two officers are now talking. We get a shot from inside the locker of a cache of weapons (why aren't they in bags?) and see the cops and Li looking inside with their jaws wide open. I laughed as he made his escape without getting to any of his equipment.

As someone who knows a little something about acupuncture, I found myself chuckling at how often it was used inexplicably in the film. If you only know that it involves sticking needles into people's bodies, you will still probably find its use in the film laughable. The first time we see the needles come out, I was wondering what was the point of putting a dying man to sleep. And then, although I'm not sure, he paralyzes a hooker by placing needles in her arms. Li is such a skilled practitioner of acupuncture that he seems to be able to put anyone to sleep with it at will, and you don't even want to know what the Kiss of the Dragon technique involves.

For the most part, the laws of physics are followed, and I can't say that about most of the action films these days. I can only think of one move (repeated twice) that looked like it would have had the need of wires to help out the fighter. Not that we didn't appreciate some of the cooler effects from "The Matrix", but that is the only movie where there was a reason why the actors could defy gravity. I was also impressed that guns were used quite a bit, and Li actually had to maneuver to get close enough where he had an advantage with his fists.

Another sign of a good action film is when we can see some of the strategy involved. When fighting an Aryan looking bad guy who has been established as a great kicker, Li positions himself so that table legs get in the way of his opponents kicking so that he can fight him with his fists, where he had the advantage.

The movie doesn't try to have any message, or be more than just an enjoyable action romp. For that I give it some credit, because it does succeed at being very entertaining. This is probably the best action film I've seen so far this summer.




Recommended:
Yes

Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older