Average for This Type of Thing, an Expensive, Slick Looking, Overproduced Kung Fu Action. Director Tong (a former stunt man) has Made a Career Helming Hong Kong Films and Seems to be Trying Forever to Become "International".Problem Is, the Appeal and Charm of Hong Kong Action is Hong Kong Action Unfettered by a Hollywood Looking Production that is so Pretentiously Pandering to a "Wider" Audience that the Core and Soul of its Raw and Reliable Homeland Sizzle is Wanting.The Only Thing Recommended Here is Some Daring Set Piece Stunt Work. But Even that is Derivative and Lacks a Certain Spontaneity. The Wire Work is Clunky and Rapper Coolio is the Clunkiest of the Clunk Going On Here. It's Not Awful but Some of it Is. A Very Weak Story and Even Weaker Acting, Makes the Whole Movie Sink Under its Contrived Conceit of Cool, and Again, Not Helped by Hiring Coolio. The Movie Looks Good and the Few Disjointed Action Scenes Make for Some Fun, but Overall it is a Mediocre Mess. An Appeal for a Hollywood Sleekness when None is Required.

Darren Tong (Aaron Kwok) is a Chinese security officer, who together with his partner Alex Cheung (Leehom Wang), fights the good fight when it comes to the war on drugs. Scum such as the young Tony Lau (Mark Dacascos) are now intent on smuggling narcotics into the country. Fortunately, there is also an agent with Japanese Interpol on the case.Kwok and Wang are a very likable and animated pair in this effort from co-writer / director Stanley Tong, who injects a lot of comedy into the proceedings. The plot is real comic book type stuff, and, truth be told, there's more talk in this than action. There's quite a bit of silly dialogue, and some of the performances are rather awkward. Rapper Coolio, filling out the role of an American "draw", is mildly amusing as a smooth criminal - named Coolio - but Dacascos is more charismatic and more effective as a bad guy. Norika Fujiwara provides a wonderful amount of eye candy; like Coolio, she's playing a character with the same name. This would seem to suggest a certain in-joke tone to the whole production.While there may not be enough action here to suit some tastes, it *is* quite breathless when it occurs, and is deliciously far-fetched. The chase scene with the motorcycle early on is a hoot, but the *real* highlight is the incredible final fight sequence taking place on a pane of glass suspended high up in the air. If nothing else in "China Strike Force" grabs your attention, this certainly should.It's all attractively shot in Panavision by Jeffrey C. Mygatt, and Tong does get down to business immediately with his opening set piece. Overall, the movie is fun.Six out of 10.

To put things in perspective, first understand that Norika Fujiwara is a huge star in Japan (although the nickname I made up for her, "Fujinori," has yet to catch on). As such, this movie's Japanese title is SPY N. Yeah, N for Norika. N for Ntrigue. N for "No, you shouldn't ever speak English in a movie ever again." Norika's acting isn't exactly prime stuff when she speaks Japanese either, but in this movie she is reduced to a device for almost-nudity and boner jokes.I vaguely remember some kind of high-flying climactic fight for which the rest of the movie appeared to be one big vehicle. I mean, if you don't count the boner jokes.

I saw this movie at an asian cafe and I can honestly say, this is one of those few movies that can elicit an entire room full of people to tearful laughter just for being so bad. While I have to admit that I didn't pay very close attention to the first half of the movie, the near-nekked back shot of one of the antagonist got my attention (*cough cough* =P) and thanks to the tepid company I had at the time, I decided to watch the rest of the movie. It's essentially a very typical "Hong Kong Action Flick" (TM) with the helpless girl, the foreign baddies who speak English, and the protagonist with a good heart. A million bullets, ten cringe-worthy lines (at the very least), and a hundred thousand explosions later, everything is solved of course and everyone goes home nice and happy. Brainless, easy-to-follow entertainment, not bad after a couple of beers I would imagine, but being as I was ENTIRELY too sober at the time, I would say that the only reason I didn't run out of the cafe was because I was having too much fun laughing at their understanding (or lack thereof) of physics. Motorcycles slamming into walls with heroes flying into the air are just a tad too much for me to take and the entire cafe reverberated with laughter for five minutes after, and given this cafe was populated by geeks, explaining just WHY it was impossible. No duh. Nevertheless, it's an action flick, so check your brains at the door and enjoy this movie for all it's testosterone-y goodness. It doesn't get much worse than this (speaking as a female of course), but then, why would anyone expect it to be better? Besides, watching Coolio try to act is just as hilarious as anything else. 2/10 (1 pt just for the sauna scene)