Movie Review: Kiss of the Dragon

By Robert K. Elder, Chicago Tribune Staff Writer

"French kung fu."

Doesn't really roll off the tongue, does it?

It doesn't roll off the screen much easier. Nevertheless, "Kiss of the Dragon" teams respected French director Luc Besson ("La Femme Nikita," "The Professional") with Hong Kong sensation Jet Li ("Lethal Weapon 4," "Romeo Must Die") for a tale of murder and international conspiracy.

Li plays Liu Jiuan, a top Chinese agent flown to Paris to back up French police guarding a Chinese mystery man on a top-secret mission. When a corrupt cop, Richard (Besson mainstay Tchéky Karyo), kills his charge, Liu gets framed for the murder. A daring escape ensues, and the hunt begins for Liu, a wanted stranger in a strange land. In the middle of it all is Jessica (Bridget Fonda), a prostitute and not-so-willing participant in Richard's assassination plan.

Working off a story by Li, Besson wrote the screenplay with Robert Mark Kamen (Besson's co-writer on "The Fifth Element") and produced the film with Li. Commercial director Chris Nahon makes his feature-film debut.

While Nahon does an adequate job of capturing action sequences, especially Liu's explosive laundry-room escape, and rushing through bad dialogue it's a shame the stylish Besson didn't take the directing helm himself.

Despite Li's starring roles in two of the best martial arts films ("The Legend of Fong Sai-Yuk" and "Once Upon a Time in China"), he is still establishing himself with Western audiences. A man of few words, his appeal stems from his quietly simmering charm and explosive fists; he's Jackie Chan's sexier, more dangerous cinematic brother.

Li does deliver the action, but here he prefers settling things peacefully, paralyzing his opponents with strategically placed acupuncture needles, which he keeps strapped to his wrist.

The characters in "Kiss of the Dragon" are more cardboard than usual for an action movie. And the dialogue half of it written by a Frenchman never sounds quite right.

It's one thing for a script to set the framework for an action film, to give its characters goals and motivations that lead to car chases and elaborate battles. It's quite another when the script gets in the way.

Example: When Richard looms over Jessica, intimidating the woman he's forced into prostitution, he starts filling in her back story, unnaturally, with: "Coming from such a quiet place as North Dakota "

Shoehorning character history into dialogue will cause audiences to laugh at such a sophomoric narrative device when they're not questioning why a Parisian cop needs to recruit prostitutes from North Dakota.

Later, Liu and Jessica bond while she stitches up one of his wounds. She tells him about learning this particular skill sewing injured pigs on the ol' homestead. (Groan.) In the same conversation, it also comes out that Jessica has a daughter whom Richard has kidnapped and placed in an orphanage. This, apparently, is part of the North Dakota-Paris prostitute exchange program.

There are one or two original, unforced and rather tasteless spots in the script, like having Liu repeat "I'm not gay" to a persistent Jessica. Later Richard, perhaps the sloppiest, most gun-happy cop in the City of Lights, kills a Chinese agent and, filling his evil quotient, says coldly, "With a billion of them, you think they'll miss one more?"

Besson and Kamen burn their credibility with lines like "Any interest in an ex-junkie hooker who can cook, clean and sew?"

Several heart-pounding action sequences stand out, including Li's escape from a SWAT team on a glass-top boat and his fight with excessively blond twin Neanderthals. Talented action director Cory Yuen ("The Legend of Fong Sai-Yuk," "X-Men") fuses flare with imagination in choreographing his set pieces. Unfortunately, in this realm the producers choose quantity over quality.

In the final sequence Liu stumbles upon a group of cops practicing martial arts in "Karate Kid" costumes. Of course, he takes on the whole room but by this time you'll have encountered so many layers of absurdity that another won't matter.

"Kiss of the Dragon"

Directed by Chris Nahon; written by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen; photographed by Thierry Arbogast; edited by Marco Cave; production designed by Jacques Bufnoir; produced by Besson, Jet Li, Happy Walters and Steven Chasman; original music by Craig Armstrong. A 20th Century Fox release; opens Friday, July 6. Running time: 1:40. MPAA rating: R (strong violence, language, some sexuality and drug content).

Liu Jiuan Jet Li

Jessica Bridget Fonda

Richard Tchéky Karyo

Lupo Max Ryan