Max Havoc: Curse Of The Dragon (2004)

Absolutely Fantastic

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

I saw it with friends here on Guam yesterday. I liked it. It's goofy like those films from HK back in the 1970's. Had a old fashioned quality to it. If anything I thought the film was trying to be to PC and that would be because of its ties to the government. So it was limited perhaps in being more graphically violent as movies like these are. I liked the star, Max. He reminded me of Richard Chamberlin. Very much a straight up hero. LOVED TAWNEY SABLAN. She was great and much prettier than the model playing her sister. I liked how Guam was portrayed and thought Carmen Elctra was gorgeous and fun. The story was dumb but so were the HK films back in the 1970. Although I saw Transformer today and you talk about DUMB. That movie was stupid and boring. This one is just harmless time passer. My only real complaint except for the story was it would have been nice for Max to fall in love with a local girl. That would have it made it much better for me.

When you name hack-ass Albert Pyun as your director you have to expect a train wreck on screen. And when David Carradine and Carmen Elektra are your star powers you have little hope at finding an audience. All of this synergy comes to pass on this long stewing mess of an action film that makes little sense and makes the least out of a tropical setting.As an opener we watch a tepid heist take place where a Jade dragon statue is stolen. Next we meet Max, a former kick-boxing champ turned sports photographer, as he submits shots of a motocross race to his manager. Max has fallen into this profession after accidentally killing a man in the ring. In case you do not pick up on this detail Pyun will replay this scene of tragedy close to two dozen times. Max's agent tells him he next has a cushy assignment to shoot promo spots for a beach resort. Next we see the statue getting pawned with an antiques buyer named Tahsi, (Richard Roundtree) and soon Jane, a gorgeous art dealer, nabs the expensive dragon for pennies on the dollar. Tashi turns out to be Max's former trainer who naturally turned antiquities broker. A Japanese syndicate arrives to reclaim their prized artifact, and Max has to protect the pretty gal and her sister.Max, Tahsi, Jane, the thief, and the Japanese syndicate all converge together on, of all places, the island of Guam. Why does Max's assignment, Tahsi's shop, and the sister's vacation, as well as the thieves attempt at fencing stolen goods, all take place on this remote spit of land way out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean? Certainly it would have nothing to do with the government of Guam bankrolling this ludicrous production in the hopes of luring future Hollywood projects on their island. For close to a million dollars they got German soap opera performer Mickey Hardt in the lead, while Carmen Elektra was reportedly paid $100 thousand to appear in four scenes, two of which requires she only look into the camera and smile. All told she utters maybe four lines of dialogue, justifying getting featured on the cover. Carradine is simply there to collect a paycheck and for his part spent a day at a Hollywood studio, but he is seen throughout the film, courtesy of the endless flashbacks we endure.Pyun the auteur gives us repeated scenes shot in hotel rooms and hallways, slapdash action sequences that are edited with a butcher cleaver, and moronic dialogue that is distracted away with cleavage. And every single scene has to begin with exterior shots of a building, a-la 1970's TV detective dramas. It turns out the dragon is an urn, holding some remains of the Yakuza founder, but Jane needs to sell it for her sister to go to college. Max steps in to avenge the death of Tahsi and save the gal, and we are left with only one thought: the director and producers should be punished for this dung heap. I would suggest banishment to a remote island out in the middle of the ocean.

The Movie is p*ss-poor and stupid. I fell asleep about 45 minutes into it cause it was so dull.The story is about some kick boxer turned photographer (badly acted by some dumb German chump)who goes to Guam and takes some photos of the beach. He meets up with two girls in swimsuits (they don't take em off, sad to say, cause the chicks weren't hired for their acting ability) who are being chased by the Japanese Mafia. It's suppose to be an action movie, but the action is dull and is amateurishly done. I fell asleep during some supposed action sequence where everybody's fighting in slow motion, or something like that. When I woke up the film was over and I took it back to the video store and said it didn't work in my DVD player and they gave me credit for a free movie. The guy working behind the counter said that a couple of people have rented the title and they all have come back and said how sh***y the movie is. I told the guy he should just throw the thing in the trash and he did.

I spoke to someone that worked on the crew that shot all the non-Guam footage which includes everything with David Carradine, Richard Roundtree and the bad guys footage. The original director, Pyun, had been gone from the film for awhile because the film was shutdown because it had run out of money. When money came in the film was taken over by a Israeli producer. This producer and a new director, also Israeli, re-shoot quite a bit of the film and did all the editing. The version that got out is their work as well as the people at Rigel Entertainment who he said were involved in shaping the final film. Word on the set was that Pyun's version was too soft and played like a Magnum PI episode instead of the hard action Jet Li film Rigel wanted. He saw some of Pyun's version and it was like a G rated tropical TV movie and had no stock footage. Nicely pretty and light. He was a little shocked at the final result from the re-shoots and final editing. He thought it looked like the producer couldn't figure out what he wanted to do. Just thought you viewers might want to know. I usually like seeing director's cuts on DVD. Maybe they will come out with Pyun's. Sounds like there are truly different films.