I have for many years avoided Jackie Chan's movies past approximately the year 2005: some of his stuff through the 1980s and 1990s was quite amazing (and I've seen most of it). Between 2000 and 2010, his movies were as often about how much pain he could absorb doing stunts as about the balletic action he used to specialize in. But fairly recently I saw "The Foreigner," which is very good. And I guess it softened me up enough that I was willing to try another recent Jackie Chan movie available on Netflix - this one.

The movie starts with Hong Kong cop Lin Dong (Jackie Chan) rushing to the hospital where his nine year old daughter Xixi is dying of leukemia. But a phone call is enough to divert him to protect a witness instead. He ends up in a firefight with a group of superhuman people who want to kill the witness: most of his team are killed and his daughter dies. Then we jump forward nine years: he's now in Australia, and both he and a skilled hacker are interested in both an author who wrote a successful book and a young Asian girl - as are a group of nasty people who wear the same uniforms as the nasties from Hong Kong.

Is this making sense?

Eventually you find out that it's all connected, but it's complex without being interesting. It's silly, obnoxious and ridiculous while trying to be funny, harkening back to the worst of Jackie Chan's humour in his HK movies of the 1980s. And it's unbelievable pretty much every step of the way. There are trademark Jackie Chan stunts, but they're not his best.

And after you've waded through this mess, the ending is even more improbable ... and deliberately sets up a sequel.