RZA directs himself, Russell Crowe and Lucy Liu in this wired yet reverent pastiche of retro kung-fu flicks.  

Visually opulent and well cast, this is an amped up, playground run through of all that is great about mad old martial arts flicks. It is a little too jam packed with characters and incidents to ever truly coalesce into a flowing journey. RZA’s vanity casting of himself in the lead role leaves a gargantuan charisma deficit and the jarring use of hip hop language and misogyny tarnish a fair few sequences. Still Russell Crowe and Byron Mann are particularly good value.

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