Cinema Disaster: Bridge of Dragons
A friend of mine once said “I like my movies the way I like my tuna…without Dolph in.”
Having found out just how smart Dolph Lundgren is, I have a different attitude. He does this stuff because it’s ridiculous and because it’s fun.
Dolph is, of course, our white protagonist in the “wuxia” movie. Air quotes for a variety of reasons including, of course, the amount of truly terrible gun fu.
Because despite this being all about who gets to marry the princess this is neither sword & sorcery nor traditional wuxia. They wanted more explosions than that.
At the same time, they also wanted a cavalry charge. In other words, the tech level in this movie makes no sense.
It’s also a pretty terrible romance. Princess Halo, played by Rachel Shane (or Valerie Chow, she appears to have changed her name, but she’s credited as Shane), is pretty much a bargaining pawn and the only agency she has is that she’s spunky.
Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa chews plenty of scenery as the evil General Ruechang, bent on marrying the princess so he can share her throne. We know right away that he’s the bad guy. When he gets out of the helicopter with 666 on the side.
The best part of the movie is Jo Kendall as Lily, Princess Halo’s nurse…I mean maid. I mean, she is…
