If Shakespeare’s most enduring tragi-romance Romeo & Juliet were ever realised as martial arts slug-a-thon, and shot with the brio of an MTV commercial, the result surely would be more entertaining than Andrzej Bartkowiak’s directorial debut Romeo Must Die. A ludicrous East-meets-West love story set to an ear-splitting mish mash of rap and R&B, the film marks an inauspicious Hollywood topline bow for action star Jet Li, who was far more effective when he kept his mouth shut and played the villain in Lethal Weapon 4. Former police officer Han Sing (Li) languishes in a squalid Hong Kong jail, having taken the rap for his father Ch’u (HenryO) and brother Po (Jonkit Lee). Whilst he has been behind bars, his family have moved to Oakland, California, where they are installed as the Asian mob, vying with the local African-American mafiosi run by Isaak O’Day (Delroy Lindo) and his sadistic right-hand man Mac (Isaiah Washington).