Kong (Jing) is a national martial arts champion who is taking a break from competitions to tour with a Chinese Opera troupe in Hong Kong. Whilst there, he is approached by a small-time crook who is looking for new and talented fighters to enter his underground all-contact boxing arena. Although it goes against all of Kong's principals, he is eventually persuaded to join so that he can raise some much-needed cash for both himself and the girl he is interested in. With Kong on board, this small operation starts to grow as he wins fight after fight in spectacular style, making the cash come rolling in for all concerned. However, it isn't long before a rival gang boss appears on the scene wanting a slice of the action and this means new and meaner opponents for Kong to fight. With this supposed sideline spiralling out of control, Kong begins to wonder if he is doing the right thing and if it's time to get out before he winds up dead.

When the trailer for 'Fatal Contact' first materialised, the film just seemed to ooze promise as it showcased a number of enticing looking action sequences set against the intriguing backdrop of an underground fighting arena. Sadly though, rather than being the holy grail of Wu Jing movies, 'Fatal Contact' boils down to nothing more than a handful of average fight scenes strung together by a poor excuse for a love story. Clocking in at a bloated hour and 40 minutes, the film makes no valid attempts at establishing a solid reason behind Jing's need to fight before proceeding to fill in the gaps with an awkward romantic sub-plot. This lightweight approach is further hampered by the fact that Jing and co-star Miki Yeung show no real signs of chemistry and Yeung's character is such an annoying busybody that one wonders how any man could possibly fall for her. In fact, the movie's only real saving grace comes from the pairing of Jing and Ronald Cheng who share some of the film's brighter moments but even this is spoilt as Cheng goes strangely AWOL for the film's closing act. As a final nail in the coffin, 'Fatal Contact' then makes the calamitous mistakes of choosing not to end the film with a final bout of combat, instead opting for an attempted tug at the heart strings accompanied by an extremely predictable plot twist. By this stage though, we all know and care so little about the leads that no one really gives a squat when Law finally attempts to inject some emotion into the piece and provide a moral to this utterly pointless story.

For the film's crucial action sequences, 'Fatal Contact' serves up another huge slice of mediocrity as Nicky Li puts together some very lazy and lacklustre choreography. The majority of the duels consist of nothing more than a few specific punches and kicks, demonstrated over and over again before Jing finally despatches of his opponent with one last supposedly flashy wire-assisted kick. Now don't get me wrong, you could do a lot worse as the camera angles are decent and the editing isn't all quick cuts but when you have a talent like Wu Jing on board, it just seems inexcusable that the fights are so utterly uninspiring. As if this wasn't bad enough, the lack of any kind of final duel means the audience's last taste of action is a clear 20 minutes before the finale, making the fights feel like more of a footnote to the movie which seems ludicrous considering they are the film's main drive.

Going into this movie I really wanted to enjoy it, if only because I think Wu Jing is a sadly underrated actor, but unfortunately it is just so frustratingly average that it is unlikely to satisfy the majority of viewers. Like most martial arts movies to emerge out of Hong Kong in the last few years, there are flashes of the talent involved but it's not nearly as entertaining as it could have been.

Judging from Wu's latest film, Fatal Contact, the answer is a resounding "maybe". Wu certainly looks good during the fighting sequences and is amicable enough during the exposition stuff. However, the film falls prey to many of the traps which surround movies of this type (especially at the lower end of the budget spectrum), and one never really gets the sense that Wu is being used to his full potential.

In the film, Wu plays a member of the Chinese national wushu team who is tapped by a local promoter (Lam Suet) to particiapte in underground fighting matches. At first, Wu refuses, but after some prodding from his girlfriend (Miki Yeung) and training from a strange kung-fu master (Ronald Cheng), Wu enters the dark world of unlicensed bouts. He quickly rises to the top of the ranks, which attracts the attention of an unscrupulous promoter (Ken Lo), who wants to fix the fights in order to insure a big payday.

For someone weaned on the action movies of the 1980's, this plot fits right in with those types of films. And, like those films, the plot is only really a device to get to the next fight. There are quite a few brawls -- most of them are far too short to really see what Wu Jing can do onscreen -- but overall, they're done well enough that the viewer can forgive some of the fluff surrounding them (a weak love story, obvious double-crosses, etc.). If you're an action junkie and are willing to sacrifice things like actual character development for ass-kicking, then you'll have a good time with this movie.