"Oh, Jackie Chan's not in the movie enough.. All these in-jokes no one could POSSIBLY appreciate.. And it doesn't make any sense! Yikes, I'd better come to the conclusion that it's a bad film, and real quick like, lest my hipster friends think me a FUN-ster." Go away. You, who knows nothing of the beautiful Brigette Lin, or Jimmy Wang Yu, star of countless "one-arm" kung fu films, or Jackie Chan for that matter. Go listen to your Radiohead, and read your Spin. Ignorance is truly bliss. To the true fu fans out there, and to the ones that can appreciate original, unusual films like this, I offer props. Mad ones, even. It's World War II.. sort of. From a heavy drug-user's perspective, I suppose. The Japanese (always the Japanese), in a desperate attempt for world conquest, kidnap 4 generals, and one of them is Abraham Lincoln. Various miscreants and misfits from all walks of life are assimilated into an elite military unit, by one super-tough and, this time villainous Mr. "Jimmy" Wang Yu. It's their job to rescue the generals, in four days. This plot may seem contrived, aside from the Abraham Lincoln part maybe.. but it's the way it's carried out, the way this film takes so many different, weird directions at once. Plot twists, you might call 'em. But these are REAL plot TWISTS! None of that, "Ohh.. so HE was on the bad side. Okay." Who's expecting these guys to be fighting flying, color-rope wielding amazons one minute, then playing Mah Johng with ghosts in a haunted mansion the next?? I didn't. I don't suspect anyone else saw it coming either. And this film is so FILLED with such inexplicable and genuinely funny goings-on.. with KUNG FU to boot! And good KUNG FU at that! "But what about the ending, oh it sucked.." Again, WRONG. The way this film ends, and I daren't give it away, NEVER: suffice it to say, it is one of the most nihilistic and insane conclusions to any film ever made. It's as though the film makers, not content to have merely warped your mind with a whole 90-or-so minutes of brilliant, unheard-of plot developments and VERY competent action (especially from Brigette Lin, Jackie Chan too, natch.), they go the WHOLE nine yards by slapping on an ending that could not have taken more than 2 minutes to conceive, but it stands now and forever as the cinematic pinnacle of "WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT??" You won't be disappointed in this film, not one bit. Well.. no, there are SOME people that don't like it. There's a good chance that these same folks find the musings of Alanis Morisette to be "thoughtful," "energetic," "liberating," and maybe even "scathing." Egad..
