Cousins Thomas and David run a mobile restaurant in Barcelona, where David's father is currently recovering in a mental institution. With an uncanny ability to get into trouble, they manage to fall in with the mysterious Sylvia who looks like a princess, steals anything she can get and may be a prostitute. Despite this, David is besotted and tries to help it when it is clear someone is out to get her. In fact more than one group is looking for her and another party has employed local bumbling detective Moby to track her down. With none of them sure why she is being targeted, but each with their own agenda, David, Moby and Thomas all try to keep her safe and uncover the truth.
A key thing to know going into this film is that the plotting was not anywhere near the top of the priority list and that it does show in the final product. The story is a really convoluted mess that has characters and scenarios that seem to exist only to allow the overall flow to continue (specifically the entire mental institute thing) and that, even with this, it has plenty of logic jumps to keep things going. This isn't a massive problem though because generally the film is a comic genre film and it is possible to accept this as coming with the territory. So it goes forward with this constantly played-up comedy air that is always silly but mostly quite amusing - I never really roared with laughter but I had frequent chuckles to myself.
A big part of this is down to the acting rather than the material and, although very much of the genre, it does work. All three of the leads do well with the comedy, all overacting and exaggerating facial expressions to emphasis things - hence it being a bit silly a lot as well. Sammo does this the most but at the same time does get the most laughs. Chan is good but doesn't have as much pure comedy in his character, while Biao has more of the romantic sap to carry but works. Where they naturally excel is in their physical action work. Sammo has the lesser part of this and his main efforts are in his (admittedly impressive) reactions to the many kicks and punches he takes. Chan gets a great scene with Benny Urquidez to show his skills and Biao is amazingly agile. The one problem with the martial arts action is that there is not quite enough of it. The end of the film is the "big" scene but up till then it is not quite what you would be used to from the genre - where amazing fight scenes are scattered throughout as well as a big finish. So at times I was coasting on the odd chuckle but the final scenes are tough and impressive - particularly Chan, doing his usual stuff but instead of making it a bit comical he makes it a lot more brutal than I have seen him do.
The support cast all overact accordingly and mostly fulfil their roles without their average acting skills mattering (eg a goon is a goon and the main fighters are very good fighters etc). Forner is not too bad as Sylvia, although her role as "woman of intense beauty" isn't helped by the impact of dating on her looks and outfits. The one supporting performance of real note is from Ng (I think - he was the mental patient who was "mentally ill - not stupid", he has two main scenes both of which are funny due to his material and his performance.
The end result of all this is not a brilliant film but still a silly and enjoyable one that never quite has enough of any one thing but still works overall with consistent chuckles and, when it comes, engaging and impressive fight sequences.
