Jet Li’s No Good, Very Bad Matrix

Sometimes you see a movie so bafflingly bad you have to wonder how it made it through production. I thought this back in 2001 when my friends dragged me to see The One, a Jet Li movie I hadn’t heard anything about that they thought looked cool. It was not cool. It was a very bad movie. So bad that I hadn’t even really thought about the film in the 25 years that came and went since. But a recent watch on Amazon PrimeWhile Netflix might be the largest streaming seervice right now, other major contenders have come into the game. One of the biggest, and best funded, is Amazon Prime, the streaming-service add-on packing with free delivery and all kinds of other perks Amazon gives its members. And, with the backing of its corporate parent, this streaming service very well could become the market leader. to refresh my mind gave me the same thought: how on Earth did this movie get made?

In theory this could have been a very interesting film in the vein of The Matrix (which is clearly what they were going for, both in style as well as in title). A guy gaining super powers with limitless potential who has to battle a great evil with his newfound powers for the fate of the universe. Add in a bunch of slo-mo special effects, and then put one of the great martial artists of the time in the lead role, plus a Rock-heavy soundtrack, and you clearly have a winning movie, right?

Wrong. The idea is there, but every choice made on this mid-budget film makes it feel like the entire production staff had two notes they brought to every meeting: “edgy” and “cool”. The film reeks of desperation as it flails around, trying desperately to make everything going on seem cool, while it also acts tough and thinks it’s being dark as shit all the time. But the film is goofy as hell and bumbles everything so bad that you can’t help but laugh at it. This is a bad movie that doesn’t even understand that it’s bad, and if it didn’t have actual famous people starring in lead roles, I would have expected to see The One on Mystery Science Theater 3000First aired on the independent TV network KTMA, Mystery Science Theater 3000 grew in popularity when it moved to Comedy Central. Spoofing bad movies, the gang on the show watch the flicks and make jokes about them, entertaining its audience with the same kind of shtick many movies watchers provided on their own (just usually not as funny as the MST3K guys could provide). It became an indelible part of the entertainment landscape from there, and lives on today on Netflix. and not in multiplexes.

Jet Li stars are the titular One. Or, really, Two. The film opens with a version of his character in prison, Lawless, who is then killed by the main antagonist (and another multiversal variant of the same character), Yulaw. He discovered that if versions of himself died across the various worlds of the multiverse (125 in total), the multiversal energy that connected them all would grow stronger, empowering the rest of them. Yulaw realized that if he killed the other 124 versions of himself, he’d be like a god. Lawless was the 123rd version. That leaves one more.

That’s when we cut to Gabe Law (also Li, of course), a deputy sheriff who has a run-in with Yulaw. The two fight, and the rest of the department is confused, thinking both versions of Law are the same man. This leads to the police thinking Gabe is crazy and, as bodies around him start dropping, they accuse him of being a murderer. But there are two men on Gabe’s side, Evan Funsch (Jason Statham) and Harry Roedecker (Delroy Lindo), ready to help him stop Yulaw. They’re MultiVerse Authority (MVA) agents and their job is to capture, not kill, Yulaw so that all the energy isn’t collected in a single man since that might make a god, or it might end the universe. Law and Law have to battle to see who comes out supreme and if, just maybe, we actually get the One that the movie promises (spoiler: we don’t).

There are a number of very bad decisions made on this film, but if I’m being honest top among them were the casting choices made for this film. Li is an excellent martial artist, but it’s pretty clear that his acting chops, especially his English language ones, didn’t extend to functionally playing both a superhero and a supervillain. Neither character is very convincing and it feels like Li is simply going through the motions, never really investing in his characters at all. The fighting he displays is excellent (although we’ll get to that), and it’s clear he tried to invest in the characters by giving each of them their own, distinct fighting styles, but his performance overall is lacking, and since he’s both sides of the film’s biggest performances, that leaves a massive hole in the middle of the movie.

Unfortunately the co-stars aren’t really able to help out there. I like Jason Statham. He is a reliable, solid actor whenever he does his simple, Jason Statham thing. Watching The One I have to think he realized he has his limits and this film was well outside of them. This is one of the few times he acted in a sci-fi movie, and it’s clear he was uncomfortable the whole time while doing it. His acting here, in short, is bad. But then so is Delroy Lindo’s, and he’s usually a solid performer as well. Both of them overact all their key lines and they are never convincing in their roles, start to finish. It’s so hard to watch.

But then, from a technical stand point, this film also fails. The movie was made on a budget of $49 Mil but it’s hard to see any of that actually on screen. The sets are all cheap and flimsy and the props look rinky-dink, like they were bought from a dollar store right before shooting. The film tries to work in a lot of CGI, but despite its budget it has some of the worst CGI I’ve seen from this era of filmmaking, plasticy and terrible. You have to wonder where the money was spent because it didn’t go into making the film look good.

It’s possible all that money was spent trying to replicate the slo-mo filmmaking from The Matrix, but the movie both does these effects poorly and also never knows when to use them properly. There are a few short sequences where Li’s characters speed through time, and the world slows to a crawl around them. They run, they dodge bullets, they fight, and it would all look really cool if The Matrix hadn’t done these same kinds of stunts, to greater and better looking effect, two years earlier. The creative team on The One knew they wanted those effects, but they didn’t actually understand how to do them right because every time they cut to slo-mo it makes no sense and comes out of nowhere. And, like a Zack SnyderOften reviled for the bombastic and idiotic content of his films, there is no question that what Snyder's movies lack in substance they (at least try to) balance out with flash and style, making him one of Hollywood's top directors... sadly. film, when the slo-mo kicks in it's usually at the worst, most awkward time.

This is especially true during the fight sequences when Law gets to fight Yulaw. I understand they obviously had to use a stunt double since Li couldn’t actually physically fight himself, but because they had to work around hiding that both Laws weren’t always played by Li, the fight sequences (especially with the slo-mo worked in) are choppy, hard to watch messes. Li is an excellent fighter, and that’s clear any time the film stops cutting and the camera stops moving and we can just watch him work. Those moments are few and far between in this film, draining all the fun from the action.

And that’s to say nothing about the fact that Law’s powers are ill-defined and clearly made up in the moment. Sometimes he’s super fast and can dodge bullets. Sometimes he’s super strong and can lift and bend things like none other. The film even says that he’s super intelligent, although it never actually finds a way to showcase this. More often than not, though, these powers only come up when it’s convenient and then, when it isn’t, suddenly both Laws are weak and easy to hit. Nothing is consistent so it’s hard to invest in the character as a superhero (or super villain) because there’s no way to ground ourselves in what he can and can’t do.

This all amounts to an entirely frustrating, not fun to watch experience. I laughed at the film once or twice when a sequence was particularly stupid, but I wasn’t really laughing with any kind of pleasure. This film hurt to watch. It was a joyless, idiotic slog from start to finish. By the time the credits rolled (over its obnoxious, Nu Metal soundtrack) I was done with the film. I realize I wasn't wrong 25 years ago. The One was bad then and it feels even worse now. Sometimes a terrible movie is just always going to be a terrible movie, and it boggles my mind that a studio thought The One would somehow be a success. It was not.