The Replacement Killers

Director: Antoine Fuqua
Cast:
Chow Yun-Fat
Mira Sorvino
Michael Rooker
Jurgen Prochnow

I dunno, maybe it's just all the Thai food I've been eating lately, but I'm having trouble caring about any characters I see on the big screen. A better reason is probably that the movies themselves are bad, but there has to be an explanation why I can't seem to care whether or not anyone lives or dies. Such is the case with "The Replacement Killers," a moderately boring ride through the underworld of the Chinese mafia in America, a movie so careless and inconsequential that one is left wondering who gave it the green light. Chow Yun-Fat stars as an assassin who owes his mob boss a few favors, and must kill the seven-year-old son of a police detective (played with the usual intensity by Michael Rooker). He balks, of course, and is then hunted down, for some reason, by some uber-assassins who like killing people just for pleasure.

Enter Mira Sorvino, wearing little more than lingerie for the entire film, an expert forger who happens to fall in like with the poor Chinese hero and rides with him into peril. People die, stuff is blown up, revenge is had and romance is hinted at—but can you keep awake for it all? It reminded me of this movie called "Cobra" put out by Sylvester Stallone in 1986. Remember that one? I didn't think so.

—Ian Williams

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