| Jet Li stars as a discharged soldier who returns home after the war and gets drawn into a feud between the local Chinese and US soldiers stationed in the village. A bar frequented by the soldiers becomes the focus for the dispute as it stages boxing matches. To defend his countrymen's honour Jet steps into the ring after being challenged by a particularly troublesome American and beats his opponent convincingly. However this only increases the bad feeling between the two sides and leads to more trouble.
This was Jet's first movie after the Shoaling Temple series and his first and only attempt at directing. Despite not being all that successful at the box office it is quite accomplished in terms of style and content. The story line is fairly involved for a martial arts movie with a subplot that focuses around Jet's old army friend and his relationship with his prostitute daughter. The only problem (and quite a big one for a Jet Li movie) is that the fight scenes are somewhat unsatisfying. As a piece of film making it is quite an impressive directorial debut and one has to wonder why Jet didn't try again.
As I said the problem with the movie is the fight scenes. For the most part of the film Jet seems to get the crap kicked out of him when what you really want to see is him kicking ass. Also the choreography is far less graceful, with a couple of exceptions, that any of his other films. It is only in the final showdown that you feel that the film is starting to deliver. The fights also differ from Jet's later films in that there is no wirework or undercranking... | 
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