Kiss of the Dragon
Reviewer: Nicklon
Director: Chris Nahon
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Year of Release: 2001
Genre: Action, Fighting, Martial Arts
Starring: Jet Li, Bridget Fonda, Tcheky Karyo, and Burt Kwouk as Unlce Tai
Running Time: 1 hour, 38 minutes MPAA Rating: R (violence, language, sexuality)

Kiss of the Dragon: the only French and Chinese culture based movie where everybody speaks English.

Sure, 99% of the events in the movie are almost certain never to happen in real life, but if you made an entire movie about everyday situations and extreme martial art action, it would most likely suck. Anyway.

Jet Li plays a Chinese intelligence officer named Liu Jian, but might as well as kept the name Jet Li because his movie name was mentioned once. It is amazing how useless names are in movies... they're just tools used for people who don't know the actor/actress' real name. So on special assignment, Jet Li travels to Paris to get some much desired information to a Frenchman named Richard (Tcheky Karyo). From what I understood, this Richard guy was the head of an international mafia, who used Jet Li to get valuable information and to get away with a murder. Oh, who gets murdered? Not like it is that important to the plot or anything, but just the Chinese Ambassador to France. After that little shindig, Jet Li pulls a little switch on Richard by stealing the evidence that Richard really killed him, as opposed to Jet. Richard gets ticked, and Jet Li becomes a fugitive trying to get back to China. Bingo, there's the plot.

But who needs plot when you got spiffy choreographed action scenes? If I remember one point of the movie years from now, it will be the scene where Jet Li does and jump kick twist that knocks out the British guy with a billard ball. So yes, action scenes dominate the movie. Most of the times in movies made right there in Hong Kong or China, the plot speeds up to get to the five minute karate scenes. It is just the opposite for this Hollywood flick. Most of the movie moves a bit slow, and the action scenes are over before you even know they started. Towards the end of the movie, they get a little more graphic, but there is a bloody nose in just about every fight.

Oh! I forgot to mention the whole falling in love subplot (which actually takes over as the main plot towards the end of the movie, as Jet's actions are all for her. Bridget Fonda plays the shy prostitute named Jessica. Just when you start thinking you wouldn't want to be in Jessica's shoes, you find out her daughter has been kidnapped by ninjas the French mafia. I can see why Jet doesn't want to get in a realtionship with this gal, I mean... I wouldn't either. His excuse is he lives for his work, but we all really know he doesn't want to pay the child support and wake up with a low self-esteemed ex-prostitute.

Get down to it, the movie was made to see people getting beat up... and an actual something for people to see just for plain entertainment. There are bits and pieces of humor put in that I smiled at, so that's a plus I suppose. I guess the plot was so-so, better than some action movies go in Hollywood that is. If I had to see it again, I wouldn't go kicking in screaming... I wouldn't mind. Overall, wasn't the best movie if you haven't gotten that vibe yet, but not horrible either. It was fair. They say Jet Li is the next Jackie Chan, and I wouldn't doubt that at all. Chan looks a bit older in every movie, so look out. I wouldn't say this was his best film he ever made, but it was a nice try. Cause hey, ya never know when a stereotypical bad movie will become a gem. But I see no reason whatsoever to make a sequel to this movie unless they wanted to use the same characters. Jet Li is now finishing up another movie called "The One," so look out for that in 2002.

This is Nicklon at the movies saying good bye, nice try.