UNCLE DON’S VIEWS OF NIL REPUTE

The nice thing about being paranoid is knowing you’re never alone. In

his new movie, Jet Li is paranoid. And as it turns out, he’s not alone.

There’s 124 more of him scattered around in the various parallel

universes that exist in “The One.” Most of them are bad guys, but then,

this is a bad movie.

You know you’re in trouble when a movie has to explain its premise

before any action occurs on the screen. “The One” does. Evidently there

is not one universe. There are multi-verses. Therefore, there is not one

you. There are multi-yous. However all the universes are in balance as

yin and yang, quid and quo, itchy and scratchy, mop and glo.

Up pops a version of Jet Li. He’s going to upset the balance of the

multi-verses. This bright boy has figured out that by using a contrivance

called “quantum tunneling” he can tool around the other 125 universes

wiping out his parallel counterparts and therefore become physically

invincible as well as boring and uninteresting. Why are there only 125

parallel universes? Must have been what the movie script called for.

It’s easy to spot the bad Li from the good Li. The good Li badly acts.

The bad Li acts badly, furrows his brow, grimaces a lot and kills tons of

people.

So far he’s offed 123 other versions of himself, with one more Li to

go before he becomes the master of the universes. He has grown stronger

than day-old coffee and tougher than month-old tortillas, dodging bullets

like Clinton did impeachment convictions. He’s faster than a speeding

Pinto and can leap graffiti-covered freeway overpasses.

But then so has, and can, his counterpart (the good Li). As one kills

other versions of oneself in other universes, the remaining power is

allocated to the remaining versions of oneself, so by the time it’s down

to the final battle, these two should be absolutely equal. So how could

one better the other? Only the script doctor knows for sure, and attempts

to think this deep really make my brain hurt.

Bad Li is being chased by a couple of men-sort-of-in-black whose duty

is to bring bad Li to justice and send his sorry butt off to the prison

planet of Stygian, where the charming inhabitants play a version of

king-of-the-hill that involves your garden variety maiming and violence.

Armed with all sorts of cool weapons that buzz and glow, our two cops

stumble around, chasing one Li or the other, catching him about as often

as the Mighty Ducks or the Angels draw a sellout crowd. One of these guys

kinda looks like Fred Williamson, the other looks like Woody Harrelson.

One ends up dead, the other damaged, but the movie drags on to its

obvious finish.

“The One” has two obvious sources of inspiration. One of these is

good, one is bad. Both are borrowed from with equal incompetence. It has

the confusing script and wall-walking of “The Matrix” and the laughably

awful flying of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.”

Speaking of which, while “The Matrix” was great even to my especially

discomfited brain, “Crouching Tiger” has got to be one of the all-time

worst movies ever made. Nominated for Academy Awards? Well, even John

Wayne won one. (Don’t tell me that Wayne actually acted in “True Grit”).

The martial arts choreographer for “The One” really ought to glue his

butt in front of a TV, have toothpicks stuck in his eyelids and be forced

to watch Jackie Chan movies. There was very little martial and no art in

the fight scenes he staged.

The sets aren’t too bad in a “Blade Runner” wannabe sort of way. The

special effects, if one wishes to use that term (and one must use it

loosely) look stolen from any old “Battlestar Galactica” show. And

there’s this transporter that sends people hither and thither. Instead of

that nice smooth beam that the Starship Enterprise had, this thing sends

people off in bits, pieces and chunks. Looks and sounds painful to me.

But not nearly as painful as viewing “The One.” While Jet Li can twirl

motorcycles better than a majorette, he can’t spin past the fact that

“The One” is really a stupid movie.

“The One” is rated PG-13 for intense action and some violence.

* UNCLE DON reviews b-movies and cheesy musical acts for the Daily

Pilot. He may be reached by e-mail at [email protected]