“Hidden Strike” Theatrical Poster
Director: Scott Waugh
Cast: Jackie Chan, John Cena, Amadeus Serafini, Pilou Asbæk, Jiang Wenli, Rachael Holoway, Amadeus Serafini, Rima Zeidan, Max Huang, Tim Man, Tazito Garcia
Running Time: 102 min.
By Paul Bramhall
It may be difficult to believe that a movie which started filming in 2018 featuring Jackie Chan as its star, was funded almost entirely by Chinese backers, and paired the action movie legend with WWE wrestler turned actor John Cena, could proceed to sit on a shelf unreleased for the best part of 5 years. But that’s exactly what happened with Hidden Strike. A production that started life under the title Ex-Baghdad, in subsequent years it was re-titled Project X-traction, then later became SNAFU (apparently a U.S. military term meaning Situation Normal: All Fucked Up), before finally landing with an unceremonious thud on Netflix in 2023 under the title Hidden Strike.
Needless to say the production has had a rocky road to the screens, a case of timing and worldly affairs constantly transpiring to delay its release. While the COVID-19 pandemic affected several productions, Hidden Strike simply couldn’t catch a break. From the U.S. pulling out of Afghanistan making the prospect of a story involving a marine saving a Middle Eastern country a not particularly appealing proposition, to John Cena’s referring to Taiwan as a country during the promotion of F9 drawing the ire of China, to the U.S. and China’s deteriorating relationship. The last one in particular has seen these kinds of U.S. and China co-productions become a thing of the past (it’s worth remembering when Hidden Strike started filming, the Jackie Chan and Johnny Knoxville caper Skiptrace had only been released a couple of years prior), so while the 2 JC’s may have been a draw at the start of filming, the tides changed remarkably fast.
The fifth movie from director Scott Waugh (although amusingly, even before Hidden Strike was released, it was being used as a reference on the poster for the also yet to be released Expend4bles), who sat in the director’s chair for the likes of middle-of-the-road actioners Act of Valor (2012) and Need for Speed (2014), the pairing of Chan and Cena are easily the highest profile stars he’s worked with. Following the success of Wolf Warrior 2 in 2017, the concept of a Chinese hero rescuing a bunch of Chinese workers and locals in a dusty Middle Eastern location was clearly seen as a recipe for box office success. Interestingly while some plot descriptions describe the oil refinery that the workers need to be rescued from as being in Mosul, Iraq, in the movie itself the location is only ever referred to as “the Middle East”.
The plot essentially sees Chan leading a special military unit, very much a precursor to the role he’d play in Vanguard, who are sent to rescue and extract the employees of an oil refinery that’s regularly being attacked. The person responsible for the attacks is played by Pilou Asbæk (Lucy, The Great Wall), a spiteful ex-employee who believes he’s owed for his woes, and plans what’s best described as an oil heist as a get-rich quick scheme. He hires a slightly naïve mercenary played by Amadeus Serafini (Summer Days, Summer Nights, Smiley Face Killers) to kidnap one of the extracted Chinese employees due to them knowing the codes to access the oil, and Serafini attempts to rope in his older brother, played by Cena, to take part in the plan. Cena’s resigned himself to a quiet life in a small village entertaining the local kids, however when their water runs dry due to a recently build dam and it turns out to be a costly fix, he agrees to do it so that the village won’t suffer.
As expected events transpire that Chan and Cena end up teamed up together, although you’ll have to wait 40 minutes for them to actually meet each other. Before that, we have to endure Chan in what’s (for me at least) become one of his dreaded attempts to act seriously, but only serves to come across as either irritatingly miserable or completely listless. It’s a style of acting that he started with 2011’s 1911, and similar examples can be seen in the likes of Dragon Blade and Bleeding Steel. Chan can be a solid actor, but I’ve realised now that he’s older, he really needs a good director for him to pull off these roles that see him cast in more authoritative positions. Many of his lines in his pre-meeting Cena scenes involve him yelling the likes of “what have you done with my people!?”, “who killed my people!?”, “where are my people!?”, and such dialogue only serves to suck the life out of Chan’s usual charismatic screen presence.
When the pair eventually do cross paths, the tone changes completely, and we get the Hollywood style comedic bantering that defined so much of Chan’s western efforts in the 2000’s. It’s a little jarring, but it works in the way that it allows Chan to at least show some signs of life. Unfortunately, unlike The Foreigner that was also filmed in 2018, and showed Chan could still display his action chops in the context of his age, here we’re forced to watch him choreographed as if he’s at least 30 years younger. The result is blatant doubling, props on wires, inappropriate wire assisted falls, and limply thrown kicks that rely on the reaction and sound design to sell their impact. It’s painful to watch, especially his fight against Tim Man (Boyka: Undisputed, Accident Man) which acts as a kind of finale, taking place in the equivalent of a foam party created by fire extinguishers, and executed in such a way that even the comedic beats miss the mark.
Cena fares better, however there’s nothing particularly noteworthy in the action design, delivered courtesy of Jackie Chan Stunt Team members Han Guanhua (Who Am I 2015, Europe Raiders) and He Jun (Saving Mr. Wu, Railroad Tigers). That leaves the car stunts by vehicular mayhem veteran Bruce Law (Special ID, The Raid 2) to pick up the slack, and there’s undeniably some well executed 4 wheeled stunt work in there, however Hidden Strike’s aesthetic is tainted by a kind of artificial gloss that permeates through every scene. It’s clear that many of the landscapes are CGI, mainly due to the rendering being not quite there (shots of the sand dunes look far too smooth, like they don’t have any texture), and it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a more obvious example of actors performing in front of a green screen due to the unnatural lighting. It’s harsh, but Hidden Strike feels like an ugly movie to watch, and the 5 years sitting on a shelf has unfortunately already aged it when it comes to its usage of CGI effects for backdrops.
The chemistry between Chan and Cena is somewhat of a saving grace, even rescuing a horrendous sub-plot involving one of the evacuees being Chan’s estranged daughter, played by TV actress Chunrui Ma. A contender for Hidden Strike’s most unwatchable scene, an exposition dump while driving down the “highway of death” reveals he left her and his wife when the later was hospitalised, due to needing to go on a “top secret mission”. His daughter has never forgiven him, however the ice eventually begins to melt when they visit the local village, and we watch Cena singing “Old McDonald” to a group of kids for what feels like an eternity. As if that’s not bad enough, the cutaways to Chan and Ma sharing reciprocal glances across the room almost sent me over the edge. It’s this scene that walks away with the most unwatchable award, and if I ever have to watch Cena and Chan doing animal impressions again, it’ll be too soon.
Interestingly it seems like the script was either originally a lot edgier when it comes to its humor, or Cena is just quite gifted at adlibbing, as during the end credits we see various alternate takes of scenes in which he lays on the sexual innuendo hilariously thick. Watching Cena tell Chan he wants to bend his daughter over and go at it like a freak was so extreme I wished they’d kept that version in the actual movie itself. Perhaps the funniest thing about the scene though is that I’m not sure Chan was entirely certain of what was going on. Of course for those who know Cena speaks Mandarin, he naturally gets a few scenes to flex his 2nd language skills that did make it into the final cut.
I was thinking if I’d feel any differently towards Hidden Strike if I’d seen it when it was originally meant to be released in late 2018, versus viewing it in mid-2023, and it’s fair to say I’m pretty sure I’d feel the same. In 2018 it would have been released between Bleeding Steel and The Knight of Shadows: Between Yin and Yang, in 2023 its release comes between Ride On and The Legend, productions which show the continued conflict between Chan playing age-appropriate roles, and those which think he’s still 40. Hidden Strike falls squarely into the latter, and does itself no favors with such an approach, feeling forced almost from the start, and ending on an unremarkable whimper. Perhaps it wouldn’t have been such a bad thing if it stayed on the shelf a little longer.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 5/10
This is unfortunate. Even if the movie does suck, it’s still good that it got released so that audiences can make up their own minds about it, unlike what Warner Brothers did to the Batgirl film.
It was said that Scott Waugh sat back and let the JC Stunt Team have free reign on the action scenes much like he would for Expendables 4. It’s too bad that didn’t translate into anything good for Hidden Strike. If Jackie Chan had used his fighting style from The Foreigner instead of bad doubling and wire work, it certainly wouldn’t be out of place.
Jackie Chan was once up for a good role in Sidney Lumet’s The Interpreter, but turned it down because he listened to his manager’s bad advice. It’s not good when he wants to be taken seriously as an actor, but then turns down roles like this. Something’s gotta give.
Hmmm.
I may still suffer through this at some point since it’s on Netflix (and will wish I hadn’t, I’m sure).
It looks like a fun watch, but Chan is very hit and miss in the drama category. We’ll see. It will depend on my mood.
This is somewhat of a setback since Ride On was a return to form and you wouldn’t be embarassed to play it after one of Chan’s 80s/90s masterpeices. Theres’ a reason why this sat on a shelf for 5 years evem taking current world affairs into account.
Disagree completely, movie was awesome!
Jackie in f*****g 70s and still deliver quite an old school fun! And there is still people who think that in this age Jackie wont be using stunt double and jump like 20 year old guy LOL
It is not a 10/10 film but definitely a solid 7.5 – 8/10 !
I guess the reviewer just cant take a non woke cool action fun!
John Wick and Mission: Impossible are woke? And honestly, “woke” means whatever some butthurt conservative such as yourself wants it to mean at this point. If it’s got women or people of color, you whine, and you call it woke.
Did the Little Mermaid make you cry?
I don’t watch Di$ney movies for years, woke or not. And that’s fine by me.
Just finished Hidden strike, and the duo Chan-Cena works fine with me, thanks. Cena is I think not bad at all in the comedy scenes. It’s much better than those … Expandables movies (oh yeah, great flicks, sorry, great chemistry, great dialogues, great action scenes, LLLLOOOOLLLL!!!!), on the comedy level and on the action level. Too many ideas taken from Mad Max – Fury Road of course (I would say even from the average third one), too many useless camera/FX shots and movements, yes, of course, bla bla bla… But it’s clear that Jackie Chan supervised the best parts (cf. the end credits). They sure should have hired a more experienced guy, a less MTV-COOL-YEAH one…but I’ve seen so many worse movies on every level.
I had fun for the most part of this “LESS THAN 2H30”, and I laughed more than expected. Like Gene Fininsays in the excellent Pompo the cinephile: “It’s a 90 minutes movie”…well, just a little more.
If you want to destroy action movies, chose honestly … ones: Cobra with Sly, 99% of the Van Dammages, Running man, Raw deal, Commando (yep, that’s awful), 99,5% of Chuck Norris ones, Rambo II, all the Die hard after the third one, Leathal weapon III and IV, and the list is so much longer.
But hey, it was already on the black list of the vast majority of the people who trashed it because they had to they wanted to. Fine if they have lots of fun doing that, I find them pitiful (why have they watched it in the first place?…oh yeah, that was free ;)…and have they really all watched it?).
Go all watch The first slam dunk and have a nice weekend!
Proba-f***ing-bly.
“Interestingly while some plot descriptions describe the oil refinery that the workers need to be rescued from as being in Mosul, Iraq, in the movie itself the location is only ever referred to as “the Middle East”.”
And I’ve heard, in a hilarious video from…a US comic guy, whatever, that in Top gun maverick (I’ll never watch that giant piece of publicity for U$$A marine/arms sellers), they refer to the enemy as…the enemy. And that’s much dumber than in Hidden strike, because in that one, the Chinese woman clearly says that China pays for the oil there…you know…oil…U$$A/United Kingdom/ France/all their dogs in Irak, you know, the 4th biggest army in the world, the excuse for killing thousands of civilians with chirurgical bombs and to sell sell their … Patriots (just the name makes me laugh)…China wasn’t at least part of that mascarade. Do yyoubwanna talk about the U$$A atrocities in Vietnam (chemical war, more than 600 times the Hiroshima bomb on Vietnam at the beginning of the conflict, mercenaries cutting ears to get paid, no, it’s not just in that Van Damme horrible franchise). Please, don’t talk here about politics, or watch first what happens in YOUR country, what YOUR country does to the world. But if you think West = good, East = bad, well, life must be simpler for you. I think it’s bad everywhere, that’s why death could be the greatest thing ever.
By the way, cables and CGI and action scenes were worse in Ride on. But I’ve ordered the UK (my god, those guys bombed Irak…but I don’t care) Blu-Ray ’cause it’s a nice movie anyway (hey, there’s even a father-daughter conflict in it, for your entertainment pleasure).
P.S.: I’m quite angry today…but I’m happy with my two posts. Or am I kidding, and if so, how much? 😉
Still, have a nice weekend everybody…except that guy.
Oh, thanks for the censorship. You are fast.
Dude, calm down. See, your messages are there!
Just to clarify, we don’t censor any comments on COF. Either a comment is advertising viagra, an “exciting business opportuntiy”, or mentioning how they viewed our profile and would love to get to know us better – in which case they get sent straight to the spam folder – or a comment is approved, there’s no in-between.
this comments section is better than the actual movie
Wow, better than the Gestapo and the Stasy! You are a fucking pussy, dude.
Duuuude!!!!
Is he serious?
Ignore him. He’s a snarky SOB at the best of times, but must be smoking something particularly strong today because his posts are borderline incomprehensible.
Do you know him? Or his mother?
Why do you take the time to read his comments?
He’s not a diplomat, that’s for sure, but I get what he means. And I even agree with him most of the time.
It’s decent. It’s waaaay unfinished. The first 40 minutes are ass.
I thoroughly enjoyed their lack of chemistry and Cena’s acting.
It still was never supposed to be released, and I am eerily responsible for calling the movie a SNAFU so props to me. I’m a boss!
What happened to the French guys? They just left?
I gave this a watch yesterday. I’d give it a solid 6/10, latter-day VOD-esque Jackie movie that it is. It’s definitely spotty and takes a while to really grab your interest, but I had a good enough time. Chan and Cena have decent chemistry, and I definitely enjoyed the finale more than Mr. Bramhall did. It’s a better buddy action flick than the third Rush Hour was, that’s for sure.
I can understand why some people lean one way or another with this one. After being in a lot of letdowns, it’s easy to not be excited for a new Jackie Chan film.
On the other end, even if he’s in a lot of garbage, some of it might be more tolerable than the rest depending on what the viewer interprets. Skiptrace for example is obviously not good, but I tolerated that more than his recent Stanley Tong outings, and even Rush Hour 3 for that matter!
This movie was good to me! It’s watchable. Jackie Chan and John Cena put on some good action because this is what an action movie is supposed to be. People need to accept that you can’t expect Oscar nomination acting in action movies and enjoy it for what it is. This movie was good for me. Give it good reviews People.
For me this is a 2 movie out of 10!
I no that this is for no Oscar race, but all the sets are bad and honestly movies with Jackie Chan are not for me, I’m sick and tired of these silly comedy scenes arranged on the spot.
This is the director of Expendables 4 ? Ohhhhh boy ;(
Then you’ve watched it for John Cena. Do you like big muscled guys?
What made me so sad is that Jackie and John actually do have chemistry. I didn’t enjoy the movie, let’s be clear, but I laughed out loud several times. And not ironically either, I laughed at the jokes. I hope they can partner again under a more competent team of filmmakers.
By the way, big big success on Netflix. Some here must enrage, it’s kinda cool.
Hasta que el destino nos venza, debemos llevarla de la mano, como a un niño, y azotarla; pero si ella nos conquistó, entonces debemos amarla.
I watched it 6 times already,, I absolutely LOVED the movie..A fun ACTION PACKED film with great chemistry between Chan and Cena . I am not surprised that the film is such a huge success on Netflix..22 million views in 3 days,,IGNORE ALL NEGATIVE REVIEWS 🙂
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