WAR

WAR, a police thriller about FBI agents fighting Japanese and Chinese gangsters in San Francisco, was not screened in advance for critics, and it is easy to understand why. The story doesn’t always make sense and the two major twists in the end reveal that this is a dark story of revenge and betrayal as much as it is a story about the FBI stopping Asian gangsters in the U.S.

The movie stars Jason Statham as FBI Agent John Crawford, who works with his partner, Tom Lone, fighting organized crime in San Francisco’s Japanese and Chinese communities. John is wounded in a gun battle where he thinks he spies a man called Rogue, a hitman working for Shiro, the Japanese head of a group of Yakuza gangsters in Frisco. When Rogue murders Tom and his wife and daughter, John becomes obsessed with bringing Rogue to justice.

Three years later, John’s obsession with Rogue has broken up his own marriage. When it appears that Rogue (played by Jet Li) is back in town, but now working for the Chinese gangster rival to his old boss, John and his team are again on Rogue’s trail. Unknown to John, however, Rogue seems to be trying to start a gang war between his new boss and his old boss.

The two big twists in the plot to WAR are a bit much. They darken the moral atmosphere of this police thriller about FBI agents fighting organized Asian crime. They also confuse the premise of the story that’s supposed to drive the plot. WAR contains plenty of strong foul language and brief sex and nudity in scenes set in a racy nightclub and house of ill repute operated by the Japanese gangsters.