WAR - what is it good for? Absolutely nothing.

The title of this review is pretty lame and obvious, but not as lame and obvious as Philip G Atwell's directorial debut. Jason Statham plays an American cop out to avenge his partner's death at the hands of a Triad assassin played by Jet Li. Statham's accent is caught somewhere between West Hollywood and Billericay. Li moves through the movie barely uttering a word. Neither is particularly charismatic. The fight scenes are decently choreographed but that doesn't make up for the unimaginative dialogue and formulaic structure. Admittely, there is a neat plot twist near the end of the film, but by that point I was so alienated by proceedings, I couldn't have cared less.

WAR was released in most countries in Autumn 2007. It opens in South Korea on February 28th and is also available on DVD.

DOA: DEAD OR ALIVE - Smut! (Part One)

DOA: DEAD OR ALIVE is a deliberately so-bad-it's-funny movie that is all about hot chicks in bikinis using wire-fu badly to kick the shit out of big buff guys. They do this is an international fight-off staged by an ageing hippie who turns out to be an wacko megalomaniac (who knew?!). It's all improbable script, wooden acting, unimaginative lame fight scenes and Bond-like desert island. However, I am told by those who know that a lot of the characters from the video game are there and the "bouncing boob" quotient is also sufficent. There are scenes with wet t-shirts and volleyball. Clearly, I am not the target demographic for this flick and I went to see it coz I lost a bet, but even *I* found it amusing enough for the eighty-five minute duration. As smut goes, this is actually rather mild, and one suspects that your average thirteen-year-old would get better value for money from a copy of Hustler. But what do I know?

DOA: DEAD OR ALIVE is on release in Australia, Italy, the UK and opens in Hong Kong and Turkey on Friday. It opens in Poland on Sep 29th, Germany on Oct 5th, Sweden on Oct 13th, the USA on Oct 20th, in Brazil and Spain in November and in the Netherlands and Estonia in December. DOA finally opens in Belgium on Jan 3rd 2007.