El Poder Del Talismán

Now Jackie Chan's "The Medallion" wasn't going to be a masterpiece no matter what they did to it--it's just plain goofy and there's no way around that fact. But I just watched the deleted scenes on the DVD and it is obvious that the unbelievably dumb, painfully incomprehensible, sub-Tuxedo flick we all saw last summer could have been much better.

It is such an odd situation. After years of American companies complaining that Jackie's Hong Kong films dealt too much with action and not enough with plot, the tables seem to have turned. Jackie's US partners in this project, Columbia-Tri Star, had the final cut on this one and for some reason they decided to cut out virtually all the scenes of plot exposition or character development. I mean, you watch the stuff they took out and you say "so THAT'S what was supposed to be going on!" Like I said before, even restored this would be a wacky kid's movie, but it at least would have made sense according to its own rules and the world it created, the way Spy Kids or the Wizard of Oz did. The version we got in the theatres was practically a "worst of" collection of clips!

We need a "director's cut," and if they put one out in Asia, I'll be the first on Ebay ready to buy it.