Dream of a Warrior
2001; directed by Park Hee-Joon

Hong Kong singer/actor Leon Lai stars in Dream of a Warrior, a 2001 South Korean picture that seems to be trying to give all those cheapie Filipino/Hong Kong 1980's co-productions from alleged auteurs like Godfrey Ho and Phillip Ko a run for the money, or the lack thereof. From beginning to end, this is low-budget film-making at its' absolute worst, cripplingly boring and mind-numbingly inane all at the same time.

As bad as Ho and Ko's films often were, they could usually at least deliver a few good action scenes, or give the audience some unintentional laughs Mystery Science Theatre style. Dream of a Warrior cannot accomplish even these small tasks. It wastes far too much of its' running time trying to establish a story which ends up making no sense in the end. As far as I can piece together, Leon Lai plays a cop who is sent to an alternate dimension to save the daughter of a prominent scientist. I think Leon and the daughter were supposed to have known each other in a previous life, but everything here is hidden behind psychobabble and pseudo-scientific dialogue that is then presented tot he English-speaking audience via poorly-translated subtitles.

Even running at only eighty-four minutes, Dream of a Warrior still struggles to fill the screen. Besides the poor exposition, we are "treated" to multiple flashbacks of footage that was shown only minutes earlier, and nausea-inducing dramatic scenes accompanied by the cheesiest music this side of One Life to Live that only serves to highlight just how poor the acting in this so-called movie is. Leon Lai has never been known as one of Hong Kong's strongest actors, with much of his popularity coming from the Cantopop world. He is positively dreadful here, even after taking into account the fact that his Korean dialogue was obviously dubbed over by a different actor.

Like the rest of the picture, the action scenes -- which are oftentimes the saving grace of low-budget productions such as this -- are poorly shot and edited, to the point of becoming incomprehensible. Director Park Hee-Joon seems bewildered even by the simplest elements of film-making such as basic camera placement. Did he just plant the camera in the middle of a room and expect a good action scene to magically appear? The world will probably never know the answer to that question, but here is one we can offer closure to: should someone take the time and effort to sit down and watch Dream of a Warrior? The answer is simple. No, no, no. A thousand times over, no. Even fans of trashy/cheeseball movies should be able to find something better to do than subjecting themselves to this piece of rotten cinematic flotsam.

RATING: 2.5