recommended

There's a good chance the film will make you laugh out loud, but if it doesn't, there's an even better chance it will make you openly sob.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Jack Moore (Richard Gere) is an American visiting Beijing to sell American TV to the communist. He spends the night with a local woman and finds her murdered the next morning. He's arrested for killing a general's daughter. Everybody wants him to confess including his defense lawyer Shen Yuelin (Bai Ling). His contract is lost. There is a high level conspiracy at work.This is a slow moving thriller. Jack Moore has little rooting interest and he acts as an entitled Westerner right from the start. It would be more compelling to have him overwhelmed as the initial reaction. As for the realism, I doubt a kangaroo court is somehow unknown in China. If anything, the objectivity shown by some of the characters is nice for the Chinese people. There is still an out-of-date style to the setting. The China being portrayed doesn't feel correct. The plot moves way too slowly. At 2 hrs, it's way too long. In the end, the plodding pace takes a toll.

This film revealed the Chinese justice system accurately. I am from China. I have experienced the Chinese justice, it favors the rich and man with connections with the officials, they can forge evidence to frame you, and you can do nothing about it disregard your strong evidence indicate otherwise. People here are nothing but slaves to the powerful red machine. Those corrupt officials always get away with it. Maybe that is why the Hong Kong counterparts want universal suffrage to guarantee their rights not being violated. This film tells the accurate story of how the Chinese Justice System works. The party officials control the lawyers and judges from behind and decide the outcome of the lawsuits.

Jack Moore, a high-profile international lawyer, is in China for business. Moore sleeps with a young woman, and wakes up to find her dead in his bed.Falsely accused of murder, Moore's only chance is his Chinese advocate Yuelin.The rules and laws are different, and Moore must convince Yuelin of his innocence and unravel the chain of events that entrapped him...One cannot deny that Gere is very good in this movie, it's one of his best roles without Julia Roberts being involved, but the whole thing is a little overlong, and very boring.It's not Geres fault, it's the script and the narrative just plods on and focuses too much on him alone and complaining that his earphone/telephone isn't working.But it wouldn't hurt to just have a couple of exciting scenes? The one scenes with him running toward the embassy is a little too late, another case of a deceptive trailer.so all in all, Gere is good, film isn't, and it all has a 'Rising Sun' feel to it

This film held my interest because of the great acting by Ling Bai,(Shen Yuelin),"Edmond",'05, who is a very educated Chinese lawyer and is placed in a very difficult situation in having to defend Richard Gere,(Jack Moore), "Unfaithful",'02, who is also another lawyer from the United States. Jack Moore gets himself in a very bad situation with a young Chinese woman, he some what falls in love with this gal on first sight and winds up in bed with her and all kinds of problems seem to happen. Jack wakes up and can't remember very much of anything that seemed to have occurred with this young gal and winds up being thrown into jail and having to live like a pig in horrible conditions. Richard Gere and Ling Bai are a great combination, however, the film is rather long and drawn out and intends to become a bit boring.