Shanghai Noon

There's not a lot of focus to the plot or much motivation for characters to turn up where and when they do--just what was achieved by the much-discussed trek to Carson City, anyway? But Chan's inventively staged battle sequences (particularly an early one in which he uses flexible, resilient trees to best some Crow Indians) are predictable highlights. You'll wish there were more to some of them, but as with his many of other films, you'll want them on video to watch in slow-motion to see how he pulls them off. And in a potentially star- making role, Wilson's loquacious, hyper-self-conscious meanderings--he's funny even when his lines aren't--make him seem less like a character than a very amusing deconstruction of one. Chan and Wilson are entertaining together, even though they're both off in their own little worlds. Think of it as Butch Cassidy and the Shanghai Kid, and you won't be too far off. --David Kronke