Released: July 2008
Director: Kuen-Hou Chen
Rated R
Run Time: 90 Minutes
Distributor: LionsGate Studios
Genre: Action, Martial Arts
Cast:
Veronica Bero: Body
Joey Covington: Flex
Vasilios E.: Ghost
Rhett Giles: Scholar
Coco Su: Kay/Sue
As a huge fan of the martial arts, it’s been an extraordinary privilege to see some incredible films in the genre. From Enter The Dragon to Ip Man and Ong-Bak, the genre has recently seen a huge surge in quality martial arts films. However, the ratio of good martial arts films to bad is about 50:50. For every Police Story, you get a Remo Williams. It’s a bizarre trade-off. Thankfully, I’m familiar enough with the genre to recommend the best ones and the worst ones to avoid. Most of Steven Seagal’s films you can generally ignore, although some of his earlier ones are truly exceptional. But there are very few that come close to the level of awfulness that is Twin Daggers. I would personally consider this post to be a Public Service Announcement. Why? because Twin Daggers is, as my British friends would say, absolute bollocks.
Set in 1935’s Los Angeles, the film follows a group of assassins as they are hired by a lovely young woman to kill her twin sister, because she apparently killed their parents. That’s the story. Period. Full stop. You know, setting a martial arts film in the 1930’s in the US is NOT a bad idea. It could very well work. It just doesn’t work with Twin Daggers. I honestly believe that Twin Daggers should be used as an example for false advertising, or at the very least, incompetent advertising. Don’t let that cover art fool you, there is no Shaolin Temple in the movie and the two characters on that cover don’t show up in the movie at all. But that’s the least of the film’s problems.
The action in the film MIGHT have been alright if the editing wasn’t so piss-poor. The cuts are so completely random, you can’t tell what’s going on. Not to mention the horrendous close-ups. It’s very obvious that the actors in the film are not martial artists, so they have to use stunt doubles. Fair enough, if it wasn’t for the fact that you could tell that they were stunt doubles. I kid you not, the moment we are seeing Rhett Gile’s character in a fight and when the camera pulls back, the character has a completely DIFFERENT head of hair! Did the film-makers think the audience was that stupid? Even if you had barely dabbled in film-making, you would know that if you have stunt doubles, they need to look like the actor. That’s why they’re called DOUBLES. It’s basic fucking film-making 101. Let’s also not forget the fact that they tried to cover up the horrendous choreography by speeding up the camera. I honestly wish I was lying, but I’m not. They sped up the camera during some of the fight scenes to try and make it look exciting. The wire-work is unbelievably ridiculous. I’ve seen short films on YouTube that had better fight choreography.
While we’re kicking the film while it’s down, let’s rip on the acting, shall we? Rhett Giles? Really? He’s a B-Grade, low-level direct-to-video actor that has absolutely NO talent whatsoever. He’s no martial artist. He’s not even trying. Everything else is so over-the-top and yet so under-cooked. Honestly, I though Mortal Kombat Annihilation was a pretty bad martial arts movie, but it least it actually employs SOME actors that are martial artists. Remo Williams had the benefit of just being so bad it’s good. Twin Daggers is absolute garbage in every sense of the word. Also: Fuck that Kung Fu mime. Just…no. Don’t see this one, if you see it on a store shelf, do them a favor and throw it in the trash. You may just end up being a hero. My final verdict is: 1 Kung Fu Mime/10.