The Foreigner Jackie Chan Moment With The Terrorism Thriller

Jackie Chan, left, and Pierce Brosnan in the movie "The Foreigner." (Christopher Raphael / STX Entertainment)

Legendary action star and lawyer of martial arts, Jackie Chan, received a "acceptable" moment by David Marcini, directed by Martin Campbell, director of the terrorist thriller "The Foreigner" and "James Bond", director of "James Bond".

Chan, a former 2002 actor, has been associated with Pearce Brunsnan, as a man to take revenge for killing his daughter in a bloody bomb attack in London, she growling her way into a fleshly and morally untouchable roles

Brosnan is a former IRA member and Irish Deputy Minister Liam Hennessy, who makes efforts to politicking his way after the bomb attack, which is not claimed by a rogue IRA cell.

Stephen Leather is adapted from the novel "The Chinaman", because the name of the movie is "foreign" because the option will create a panic. And yet the character of Chan, Kaun Ngoc Minh, is still known as "Chinaman", even though he is ethnically Vietnamese.

Despite its literary origins, the film feels as if a writer tossed a few darts at a board labeled with aging action stars and various terrorist groups to construct a script. Jackie Chan vs. the Irish Republican Army? That could work.

Chan's role is brooding, serious and simple. He wants names. Names of those responsible for his daughter's death.

Rebuffed by the police and government, he relies on his old bag of tricks, developed in the jungles of Vietnam, honed by U.S. Special Forces. He detonates homemade bombs with notes just reading “NAMES” all around the environs of deputy minister Hennessy's stamping grounds of Belfast. He plants nasty jungle traps, ensnaring Hennessy's thugs. All just to get some face time with the minister.

These bombers certainly messed with the wrong dad.

Chan, now in his 60s, isn't the energetic tornado of whirling kicks and punches he once was, but he's still got it. His fighting style in the film is brutish, resourceful and extremely effective. Brosnan is the talker, deploying his suaveness, talking out of both sides of his mouth to British politicians and his cabal of former (or are they?) IRA militants.

It's a refreshing change of pace to see Chan in this more serious role, but he isn't given all that much to do. When he isn't in motion, he stares vacantly, communicating his shock and trauma, his character merely a violent automaton.

There's a lot happening in “The Foreigner.” One sequence intercuts Chan being stalked through the forest by Hennessy's special-ops-soldier nephew, while Hennessy chats with the British police who are surveilling him with drones, and while also torturing the truth out of one of his own pals. Meanwhile, a likely terrorist seduces a reporter. With all this going on at once, why does it feel so dull?

The IRA revival storyline hampers the father's revenge plot and vice versa. We never dig deep enough to care about any of the characters or even the plot twists. “The Foreigner” feels like halves of two different (and probably good) movies pasted together, but now doesn't make much sense.

This vigilante justice story — standard fare for the aging action star — could have signaled a new turn in Chan's career, but he has to share this movie with Brosnan's far more fascinating plot about dynasties of terrorism. Unfortunately, neither star receives a fair shake in “The Foreigner.”