Jade the animated sequence starts off with a story about Jade and her brother Brandon who moved to Albuquerque New Mexico after their parents were killed in London. Motive or culprit for their killing isn’t stated. The whole aspect of how they became part of a street gang and how that caused Jade to accidently kill her brother, isn’t fully explained. But whatever the case, she has made certain not to touch a gun again.
We see Shaina West (Black Widow, The Woman King) who play the role of jade having gone to see Layla (Katherine McNamara, The Arrow, Assimilate) who is not pleased with her presence the moment the filming begins. This is probably because Jade’s wayward bullet has ensured that the child she is carrying will never have a father.
In a charming twist for the audience, she also has to protect a hidden digital drive from some violent individuals working for Turk, something of a goon businessman created for Rourke. How rough these guys get? At some point, they are literally beating the flesh out of someone’s body to get to the location of the drive. Some man is being held in the basement; he is first punched in the stomach and then has his knees bashed by a hammer because the location lies deep in his throat. They are even cruel enough to pour lemon juice over his eyes. After that, when the same level of violence is offered to him and he doesn’t budge, they finally kill him because they realize he wont yield.
Originally announced in 2021 for a 2022 premiere, Jade, the former stuntman of Deep Rising and Apollo 18, James Bamford’s debuted feature in the theaters shot way before the recently premiered Air Force One Down. Then what prompted the early release of the film? The script which is co authored by Bamford, Lynn Colella and Glenn Ennis, apart from being bossy is Gnome Alone. To begin with, the dialogue is either rigidly awkward or even completely agonizing for an audience. If you want to insult someone six times, spend a full dozen in a sentence, makes the characters sound much tougher; isn’t it?
In addition, the story also has its confusion, does it lean more towards an action film or an action-comedy film. For instance the movie Jade’s character slits the throat of her opponent and the fight is over. As a voice over gun sounds and sprays blood on the wall spelling the words, “FATALITY.” Finally, the audience can even view what the character shoots with a killer translation appearing over the wall. For those interested in the statistics of killing, the kill count is even displayed on the screen.
This statement is equally true for the treatment of action sequences in the movie. Some kind of them are quite simple as they allow the actors to perform. Other kinds are so jam packed with fast slow fast motion and cut scene editing, mixed with tons of music that makes them feel like you are watching a video or music clip. Or it’s just cringeworthy, at one point, Jade throws her Afro comb at someone who dies as if killed by a shuriken.
It’s a pity because if Bamford just records the fights without any strange things, most of them are quite good. West surely has certain moves, that can make him convincing in the duel, and Mark Dacascos (Brotherhood of the Wolf, Blade of the 47 Ronin), unless father time has weight on him, doesn’t require any assistance for a brawl. He has quite a small part as Reese, Jade’s parents’ ex friend, “INTERPOL? Dad claimed you were running a gym.” and again his fight sequence is absolutely destroyed by the use of all those cheap tricks.
What is located in the hard disk? For the last time, he never states it, nor the insinuated link pertaining to Mushka’s brutal murder, which invites the audience to a deeper understanding. Instead we get an ending which is meant to be sarcastic but is conventional in fact.
On the whole, Jade is a huge back fire, it features more action sequences than certain self respecting bigger budgeted flicks and then spoils them with bad and worn out gimmicks.
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