Screenplay by Besson, action by Ping, starring Jet Li, Freeman and Hoskins, music by Massive Attack. It sounds like quite an interesting cocktail of talents, and at the same time, quite an odd one too. It’s unfortunate that a few good ideas turn into quite a mess, and to top it off, makes a sentimental film about identity turn into quite a comic endeavour.

The story revolves around a small time thug played by Bob Hoskins who owns a human animal in the form of Danny (Li). Danny is treated not only as a dog, but as a tool and a weapon. Trained to be a killer and an animal, when his collar is removed, Danny is unleashed as an unstoppable killing machine with the only focus being to elimnate his enemies unless told otherwise.

A few unconvincing scenes take place (much like the rest of the movie, but let’s suspend disbelief), and Danny meets a piano tuner in the form of Sam (Freeman), who, after an accident, takes Danny in as his own. As you can imagine, Danny’s life improves slowly he grows fond of said new family, and then finds out his owners is still alive. Well the rest, and even before that, is pretty formualic.

You won’t find a great story, nor a deeply intriuging plot. The film offers nothing that could be seen as value for money. In fact, it’s a chore to watch through at times. I can see the theory in the film: a human being treated as an animal coached back to reality through love and affection, bettering himself in an action film. It sort of works, but more often than not, I found myself laughing out loud, rather than feeling empathy for the sentimental moments in the film.

The fact that you have two Americans, a Chinese guy, Brits and all tangled in a web of implausible tragedy all hanging out in Scotland (at least it seems) then you have to make it link together cohesively and intelligently. Of course this isn’t the case, and why would it be – after all for all it’s attempts to provide something different, it inevitably fails to carry through and falls back on the lowest common denominator – in this case fight scenes.

Ping’s direction in the action and his work with Li ensures that the fights at least provide some respite. There are two key problems, predictaly. Firstly the fact that neither Ping or Li has worked with any of the cannon fodder previously means that the fight scenes would have to be worked as best they can. These guys are not natural at kung fu, and therefore the fights do sometimes seem pretty awkward. Even Li either seems to have slowed down to accomodate for his colleagues, or he really is slowing down. He seems to move achingly slow at times.

The key grand fights also fail to engage fully, and only shine on ocassion. There’s a fight in an arena where the equivalant of a Straight to Video fighter resides waiting for Danny to fight. The scenes are reminiscent of American ideas of what a martial arts fight is. For an example check out Best of the Best, and No Retreat, No Surrender as two examples of far too many. It’s the same sort of trash fight that makes you feel pity for Li as he fights people far below his ability to keep up with him. It looks really, really bad at times.

Only towards the end do we get a flavour of a fight scene you can watch without laughing all the way through at the unconvincing acting of these first timers in fighting. The opponent, unfortunately, seems inclined to dress like a member of the hare krishna but act out violence – I’m sure followers would feel a certain disdain towards this contradiction. The comes out of no where; you see him in one scene, and suddenly he’s the new bitch after Danny. And just as quickly as he entered, he makes a swift exit to meet his maker.

So with the fighting being the key to the film, there’s very little else in there. Hoskins plays a decent enough vaillain, treating Danny like the dog he considers him. Still, I just can’t get the image of Hoskins as Mario Mario in that dreadful movie out of my head.

Freeman looks like a resurrected Ray Charles with a tash. He’s character (like almost all of the cahracters in this film) is stereotyped as the frail old man who will teach the young, unruly child the way of the heart and goodness, and will guide him to the right path. It’s so cheesy, so predictable, and Freeman never derails from that cliche.

It’s a poor film, it could have been a hell of a lot worse, but not by a lot. Even to this day, the biggest mistake Li did was to try to break America, because like his colleague Jackie Chan, America just does not undestand these actors to give them roles to get their teeth into. Instead Li could have been making the same films he’s always been making, with directors and producers as well as other actors who understand his metholdogy and his character.

All of this is lost in the transition, and what you’re left with is an empty character, played by a Chinese film star. It’s tragic, and ultimately disappointing. Still at least he should be given credit for trying, but the West has not been kind in the scripts it’s offered Li, and Li has been unlucky accept so many turkeys.

Verdict: Courage for trying something different, but a whipping for being derivative and dull