Protege de la Rose Noire's slim plot -- which, for some mind-boggling reason, took three people to come up with -- is as simple as a pregnacy test on a hooker. Gillian and Charlene, as usual, play a couple of mis-matched partners (Charlene, of course, plays the "kooky" one, while Gillian plays it straight) who come under the tutelage of the slightly nutty and love-sick Black Rose (Teresa Mo), a former kung fu-fighting super-hero who grooms them for a life of fighting crime.

Ekin Cheng, who seems to be in the early running for the Anthony Wong/Chapman To "any role for a buck" award for 2004, plays a dim-witted cab driver who wears a Robin costume and becomes Charlene's love interest. There is a bit of "comedy" as Rose confuses Ekin with her former lover and Gillian become jealous. A lot of time is wasted with this Three's Company-style shtick until eventually, some shred of a conflict comes forward, as the girls must battle a former protege (or sister, or daughter -- it's never made very clear) of Rose who has taken to kidnapping to pay the bills.

So, yeah, the plot isn't Shakespearean, and it takes forever to get going. Things aren't helped any by the copious amounts of dopey comedy that would make even Wong Jing blush. What makes matters even worse is that the Twins seem to be buying into their own hype, as witnessed by some of the jokes, such as one with a concoction Rose makes called "Twins sugar", which is supposedly the sweetest thing on earth. A bit of self-referential humor in and of itself is not such a bad thing, but Protege de la Rose Noire takes it almost up to the level of a film like Scream, where Wes Craven cannibalized his previous filmic entries just for the sake of a few bucks.

And ultitmately, that is Protege de la Rose Noire's main problem. It -- like many Hollywood summer "blockbusters" -- just feels like it was a movie made just to make a profit. I'm not naive; the Hong Kong film industry needs all the money it can get at this point, but surely they can come up with something better than this Lunar New Year stinker. I'm a fan of Donnie Yen's work -- and it's his expertise in making action scenes which saves this from being a Charlie's Angels-esque bomb, especially those featuring his sister, Chris, who seems ripe for stardom in her own right.

But I would think that with as much talent and money this production had thrown at it, the results could have been better than this. I guess we'll just have to wait a month or two, since as long as the Twins make money, studios will keep pumping out films featuring them. I just hope the results next time out are better than this. I don't want to hate the girls -- their cutie-pie antics do grow on you after a while -- but surely, they (and, more importantly, the fans and viewers) deserve better than this mish-mash.

REVIEW:
Up for the least-entertaining comedy actioner of 2004 is Protégé de la Rose Noire, a pop culture quagmire of horribly-unfunny gags, an incoherent plot, and slick, yet pointless martial arts action. Although co-directed and choreographed by Donnie Yen, there is little reason for action fans to even consider watching this turkey.

The character of Black Rose is based on a popular super-heroine along the lines of the Green Hornet who was featured in a TV series and several films. Teresa Mo, who played the role in The Legendary La Rose Noire (1992) is back again along with Twins Effect stars Gillian Chung, Charlene Choi, and Ekin Cheng. Ekin and the Twins wind up trapped in Rose's home and despite her eccentric behavior and a predisposition against men, they all become her apprentices to do battle with Rose's foxy sister and her deadly accomplices.

The direction of this film is a mess with emphasis put on incidental gags rather than any kind of a story worth following. Basically, we're looking at a superhero parody, but it's a failure on that level. References to superhero clichés are weak with Ekin Cheng running around in a Robin costume as prime example. The Twins are charming and crank up the type of humor they display in other films like Twins Effect. But whether a cultural, generational, or quality issue, I don't get it, any of it. Call me crazy but having a robot that runs around for the sole purpose of chopping off male organs, or the stars breaking into a mock-operatic song about becoming superhero apprentices, or a mobster with a cleaning fetish just isn't that funny. Making matters worse, the pacing on the film is awful with scenes that try vainly to draw laughs dragging on far too long. And the soundtrack with it's '80s synthesizers and Star Trek klaxon sound effects is bad beyond belief.

Poor Venoms star Lo Meng, who made a fool of himself in Anna in Kung Fu Land is back doing it again as a gangster who has a hot soup-eating contest with a rival gang leader. Whah? He then gets the crap beat out of him by Donnie Yen's sister, Chris Yen, who plays a Go Go Yubari look-a-like with nunchacku. She's the only highlight of the film and she hardly even speaks. She takes on the Twins in an extended fight that features some sloppy sparing, but Chris delivers several good wushu moves and does a remarkable job of handling twin nunchacku considering it's her first time doing so. Teresa Mo's fight with gangsters in a restaurant features a long take where her character (most certainly a double) puts the smackdown on several thugs in quick succession. But unfortunately, it takes nearly an hour of lame comedy to get to any action and by then the story and characters have been established as completely ridiculous, thus making the action seem nearly as trite as everything else. Viewers may be left wondering why exactly anyone is fighting. Nobody seems to care much, least of all the filmmakers.

There is an homage to Drunken Master that accurately reconstructs the training sequences from the 1978 kung fu classic with the Twins performing as Jackie Chan clones. Taken on its own, the scene is interesting simply to see it being done, but in context to the rest of the film, it's just another hollow scene.

Protégé de la Rose Noire is tacky, brainless, and dull. Donnie Yen is wasting his talent away and I'm sorry to see his sis, who has plenty of potential, introduced in this way. I used to be able to blame this kind of tripe on Wong Jing, but with equally banal comedy actioners like Anna in Kung Fu Land and Star Runner clogging Hong Kong's dwindling film output, the future does not look bright for fans of Hong Kong martial arts action.