Stylish. Or Stylised.

Either way, this film is a triumph of style over substance.

A joint American-Japanese co-production, it also features a multi-ethnic cast, both amongst the goodies and the baddies. The plot revolves around a Chinese hit man who refuses to carry out an assignment for the gangleader who has some sort of hold over his family in China.

This upsets the gangster greatly, and he decides to punish the hitman in the usual way, by having him killed.

But in true skiet, skop en donder style (without the skop en donder in this case), these 'replacement killers' are just not up to the task. Everybody expends a great many bullets, and in the end, well, you know who wins and who gets killed... - no surprises there.

The hitman has to get back to China to look after his family, so he goes in search of someone to make him a passport, which is where we meet our female romantic interest, who is American, and no innocent cookie. As the plot would have it, they team up and make a great partnership.

I am still not sure where the film is set - I initially thought it was Hong Kong, helped by the ethnic mix, references to 'the mainland' and the fact that the passport needed was British. What confused me was the large number of Whities, as well as a reference to 'Chinatown' - which implies somewhere like San Francisco. So I remain confused.

Be that as it may, most of the film is taken up with nicely choreographed shootouts between the goodies and assorted baddies. Their pistols seem to go through about 30 rounds before needing reloading. Amazingly enough, the hero has more lives than a cat, and no matter how many bullets are fired at him by the replacements - who are supposed to be 'as good as' him - he only sustains one minor skin wound near the end.

My main problem with the story - apart from the unkillable hero - was how he managed to become such an expert assassin. He had only killed two men before, both of them criminals, but somehow he had acquired the skills of a master. Maybe he went to Assassin School somewhere.

I have heard this film described as a 'music video' and in a way it is true. The editing is sharp and snappy, and the actors seem to move in time to the music, and also do things in a sharp and snappy way - as if they were aware that they were taking part in a dance.

This is beautifully demonstrated near the end when the hero and his former boss are face to face, and both out of bullets. There is a delicious pause before they simultaneously start reloading. You know who reloads first...

The action fans will love this, as will people looking for mindless entertainment (or those wanting to perv Mira).