DRAGONBALL EVOLUTION

DIRECTOR: James Wong

CAST: Justin Chatwin, Chow Yun-Fat, Emmy Rossum, Jamie Chung

NOW here is a film that makes no pretence of being anything more than a big-screen adaptation of a television children’s show. It doesn’t tax your brain, it doesn’t require a genius to follow the storyline, and it doesn’t leave those of us who have never seen the TV show wondering where they landed up.

It’s just about a boy, two girls, a master, a greenish villain, and seven magical orbs called Dragonballs which give tremendous power if they are rounded up together. Partly the reason the greenish villain has risen up from the dead 2,000 years later to capture them.

Director Wong does mix his geography a bit, having a presumably a Chinese prophecy resurrected in presumably America, where a Black guy dressed in Chinese robes chants Hindu mantras and greets everyone with a Namaste!

However, barring that, Wang clearly knows what he is getting into, keeping it simple and straight with some likable characters and a pleasing Chow Yun-Fat, and when to get out — in less than 90 minutes. That’s more than you can say for some films.