Dragon Forever, also commonly referred to as
Dragons Forever, stars Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, and Yuen Biao in their final pairing together. Jackie Chan plays Johnny, a lawyer that is arguing a case for a shady businessman. The businessman is polluting the environment and, consequently, ruining a nearby fish pond owned by a young woman. Johnny enlists the help of his two friends, Luke (Hung) and Timothy (Biao), to help him with his case. Luke pretends to be romantically involved with her, while Timothy spies on her. Johnny even involves himself with the fish farm owner's cousin, which creates several humorous scenes. Eventually, Johnny realizes that he is on the wrong side of the issue when he discovers that the factory is refining narcotics.
The three actors in
Dragon Forever also teamed up in
Project A (1983),
Wheels on Meals (1984), and
My Lucky Stars (1985). Fortunately, the result is a lot stronger for
Dragon Forever than for
My Lucky Stars.
Dragon Forever is entertaining on many levels, not just because of its fight sequences, but also because of its plot and humor. The humor is not stupid and insulting like
My Lucky Stars, it is entertaining and very well done. For instance, when Johnny's friends break into his house while he is having dinner with his new girlfriend (the cousin of the prosecutor in his court case), the situations that occur as a result are hilarious.
The fight sequences are usually too short, although they are enjoyable and well executed. Most of the fights are good, but never great like many of the fights in Once Upon A Time in China II (1992) or even another Chan movie such as Jackie Chan's First Strike (1996). Nevertheless, all of the fight scenes in the factory towards the end of the movie are very good, especially between Jackie Chan and Benny "The Jet" Urquidez. Most of the fighting is unarmed, so those moviegoers looking for sword fights or other forms of armed combat will be disappointed.
The movie dwelled too much on some of the plot aspects and attempts at drama, but featured too few fight sequences. That is not say a great movie has to contain constant fighting, but if the plot is a bit choppy and the fights are lacking, then the movie suffers. Several movies, such as Spiritual Kung Fu (1978) and Dragon Fist (1979), have very basic plot structures, but still succeed because the fight sequences are unusually impressive.
