Jackie stars in this whimsical adventure tale of Bob Ho – a newly retired CIA agent who had previously been on loan from China. Let’s stop right there, shall we?

This rings bells of Steven Segal’s ex CIA agent-like antics in probably all of his recent films – and all of his recent films have gone straight to TV. Come on Jackie! Is the CIA agent route one you really want to be going down…

Anyway Back to the film: In fairness: what could be more fun than a spy living next door? Other than your personal safety being at risk and possibilities of perversion – nothing at all! Bob Ho lives in a lovely surburban street and pretends to be a pen importer, (that’s right pens) but really he is out fighting Russians, or at least a very evil Russian with a very bad Russian accent, Poldark.

It’s not very clear what exactly Poldark is after but needless to say Bob’s retirement from the CIA is short lived particularly after Bob agrees to mind his next-door neighbour who is also his girlfriend’s kids who are nothing but a group of bratty bollixes!

The children don’t like Bob at all at first and he finds it very hard playing the fatherly figure to them, cue some “hilarious” scenes involving burnt breakfasts and Bob swinging from the rafters of the downtown mall.

However Bob perseveres and with the help of his partner, played by ever-cheesy Billy Ray Cyrus, he goes about handling the situation as best he knows how – using all sorts of highly technical, made-up CIA gadgets and gizmos and he seems to be getting somewhere with the kids.

But remember: Poldark is on the loose and he wants to hurt Bob and now the kids too – prepare for pandemonium! Or not, the film is actually not that good.

Perhaps the first mistake of Jackie Chan was to sign up to a film where not only was he working with children (who some how just didn’t cut it as believable children – plainly put their acting was shite) but also animals and Russians with bad accents and an all too convenient script.

Chan’s abilities lay in his Martial Arts talents not his acting talents by any stretch of the imagination and that was very obvious when he was working alongside this unfortunate cast.

The film was cringe worthy throughout and if you’d like to watch the film in its complete entirety without getting bored whilst observing all the good bits, please watch the 2 minute 21 second trailer below. The only criticism of the trailer is that it doesn’t show some of the hilarious get-up Poldark was forced into wearing at some points but sure what can ya do?

Emer Molloy