All this and subtitles, too.

flashed an applet on the Brotherhood tie-in website I visited, echoing the title of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon with an offer of unsubtle charms. Lack of subtlety is a guiding principle in Brotherhood - all the things you think will be in this movie (sex, a monster, long choreographed fight scenes) are in it. There are none of the refreshing surprises Dragon brought to the martial arts genre, like world-class acting and direction, rich and expansive roles for females, and a thrilling climactic battle between two female combatants. But one doesn't always need or want surprises. If you want naked breasts and a fanged, peasant-eating monster, Ang Lee can't deliver but Christophe Gans can. Dragon thrilled us with great acting, superlative fight choreography, and sensitive, mature direction. Brotherhood is Dragon's discount cousin - with more flesh and less passion, more gore and less ballet, more characters and less chacterization.

Gregoire de Fronsac and his sidekick Mani have come to hunt and dispatch a beast that's killing and terrorizing the people of a village. But Brotherhood of the Wolf isn't a horror film: there's too much emphasis on politics and history. It's not a period romance either, as the minor romantic subplot is artless, underdeveloped and uninvolving. It's a martial arts romp with a French taxidermist and an Iroquois mystic as its heroes, with some horror, sex, and romance thrown in. And, amazingly, it somehow coheres.

Samuel Le Bihan as the blonde, sexy man of science/taxidermist Fronsac is likeable, handsome yet not movie-star perfect, and has a sweet and winning grin. Hawaiian actor Mark Dacascos is the dark, sexy Iroquois sidekick Mani, saddled with all the worst Native American mystic/warrior tripe the cinema has to offer: like the Native American version of a badass blues song, he can hear the dead, heal the sick, tell you your totem animal, and whoop ass with a staff and/or axe. (One almost expects him to play the French horn and make a mean Baba au Rhum.) When he visits a bordello, we are pleased to see him fallible and human, not a semi-saintly earth-priest. He's a faithful, stereotypical Tonto to Fronsac - silent, loyal, and wise. He's a triple prototype - Indian buddy, Indian warrior, and Indian sage. Dacascos is a real-life martial arts champion, and his lithe moves are fun to watch, even to those spoiled by (martial arts choreography master) Yuen Wo Ping's work in Dragon and The Matrix. Even under a ton of racial baggage, Dacascos brings a quiet dignity to the role; it may be stereotypical and predictable to make the character a mystic and warrior, but it's no small feat to carry off onscreen. (Disconcertingly, perhaps because Dacascos is of mixed Chinese/Irish/Filipino/Spanish/Japanese ancestry and is playing a Native American, he seems to be wearing orange full-body Man Tan in some scenes.)

The remaining characters hold our interest as the shaggy plot cannot. The courtesan Sylvia (Monica Bellucci, a stunning, compelling actress - look for her in the new Matrix movie) is voluptuous and feline - the perfect vessel for dark inner secrets. Emilie Dequenne (who bears a marked resemblance to Christina Applegate) as Marianne, the love interest (to Fronsac - you didn't think the Iroquois mystic was going to get romanced, did you?) tries, but she and Le Bihan have little spark and are clearly just dancing the steps the director laid for them, rather than the impromptu of real chemistry. One moment they're making playful banter; the next, they're utterly in love and arranging trysts. It's never clear why the world-traveller Fronsac settles so swiftly on the charming but provincial Marianne, aside from serving the needs of the screenplay. They seem to exist as romantic foils to one another just to beef out the scanty plot, and we never feel with them the heat or interest Fronsac sparks with the mysterious Sylvia.

Jeremie Renier as the young nobleman Thomas is effectively sympathetic and kind and shows more growth and depth than anyone else on the screen; Edith Scob is perfect in a small role as the hidebound Mme. de Morangias.

So, the two leads are able to carry the weight of the film and the secondary characters are pretty good too. But no matter the genre, no matter and the skill of the cast and director, any movie is only as good as its villain. And this is where Brotherhood finds its unforgivable fault. The monster is scary enough when we actually see it, and the fight scenes are consistently involving and exciting, but when the plot suddenly opens up beyond the single villain of the beast it loses its momentum. The heroes are great, the sexy courtesan and her secrets pretty good, but the villains just drag the movie down.

The plot wanders, and like many a movie monster, seems to die and dwindle but then rises up snarling. The movie seems to end a few times, prematurely, but then rises from its grave to march on, growing slower and slower (and less and less logical and linear) with each resurgence, until it is put to rest at last. Brotherhood of the Wolf is not going to take the place of Lola Rennt (Run Lola Run) as my first choice for the foreign movie to recommend to a friend with wrong ideas about foreign films. Nonetheless it may help defuse and set to rights, among American viewers and review-readers and those exposed to its U.S. ad campaign, many wrong ideas about what foreign movies can be. Just like homegrown films, they can be good-naturedly gratuitous, unpretentious, gory, and cheap, forgettable fun.

Jennifer Saylor, January 25, 2002