Cert 15
99 mins
BBFC advice: Strong violence, gore
The question of what to watch on the plane bound for the Canaries could only have one answer.
So little of the year has elapsed that the only film which I needed to tick off and was available to download on itunes was Daniel Lee's Dragon Blade.
With a $65 million budget, it has aspirations to be an historical Chinese epic but the lack of concentration on cast and dialogue result in it being a bit of a mess.
At 61, dear old Jackie Chan is just too old to star as action heroes such as Huo An, the defender of the famous Silk Road.
He finds himself an unlikely ally of a defected legion of Roman soldiers led by General Lucius, played by John Cusack.
I like Cusack. He is particularly good when taking the part of the intellectual down-trodden. But a Roman general he ain't.
But he fits like hand in glove compared to Adrien Brody as Lucius's ruthless pursuer, Tiberius,
Brody is at his best in quirky comedies. He just doesn't have the physical attributes nor power of voice to be believable in this role.
In addition, there are elements to Dragon Blade which jolt so badly they are almost funny.
For example, the characters of Chan and Cusack begin a fight to the death on their first meeting. Suddenly, a sandstorm dusts up and within a minute they are best friends.
This is not untypical. At one point Chan and his crew are taken prisoner and the next he seems to be in charge of the very city where he was incarcerated.
To be fair the individual fight scenes have some exciting sword-play but they just dont make up for the film's obvious deficiencies.
Perhaps western audiences are missing something, Dragon Blade made less than $500,000 at the box office in America and in the UK it is difficult to find a cinema which is screening it.
Yet, in China it has earned a whopping $120 million. It appears that at the movies, beauty really is in the eye of the beholder.
Reasons to watch: a true story which few in the west will know
Reasons to avoid: Its appalling casting and jerky storyline
Laughs: none
Jumps: none
Vomit: none
Nudity: none
Overall rating: 3/10
Star tweet
Been doing martial arts for almost 30 years - had to work with Jackie !