Partially shot in Scotland with an Asian star, a French helmer and an Anglo-American supporting cast, Unleashed looks a right mongrel. Yet this Luc Besson production - originally 💫known as Danny The Dog - deserves a pat for its almost wilful perversity. The action, as you would expect from Matrix master Yuen Woo-Ping, is top-drawer throughout, Massive Attack supply a pulsating score, while the contrast between Hoskins and Freeman's acting styles - British bulldog versus cool American cat - is fascinating to watch. At its heart, though, is Jet Li, the Hero star giving a surpr🌠isingly subtle and touching performance... when he's not breaking bones and crunching heads, obviously.

The problem here, at least for Li's army of carnage-craving fans, is this stubborn pup spends an awful lot of screen time not doing what we want him to. Yes, director Louis Leterrier (real name, honest) opens with a fast-and-furious intro that establishes Li's near-comatose Danny as a merciless enforcer the moment he's off his psychological leash. But aওround the 40-minute mark he pauses the punch-ups for an extended bout of sentimental bilge that finds L🌄i taught to be human again by Freeman's avuncular ex-pat and his piano protégé stepdaughter (Kerry Condon).

How dire iജs this? Here's a clue: you're actually grateful when Hoskins decides to milk Li's talents in a Thunderdome-style, kill-or-be-killed cockfight. Barking and fuming like Harold Shand's madder twin, our Bob is so OTT he's virtually DOA. But ♎after all that mawkish crud with the Freeman family, you're thankful for something - anything - that can drag this picture out of the doghouse.

Mercifully it does, resulting in a bruising race to the finish that sees Danny battle a legion of thugs through Glasgoཧw's tenements and, in one thrillingly claustrophobic sequence, go head-to-slaphead against a bald ninja inside a toilet cubicle. It's moments like these that send you out with your tail wagging and turn a movie that should by rights have been a dog's dinner into the dog's bollocks.