  |
This article's content is marked as Mature The page Liu Jian contains mature content that may include coarse language, sexual references, and/or graphic violent images which may be disturbing to some. Mature articles are recommended for those who are 18 years of age and older. If you are 18 years or older or are comfortable with graphic material, you are free to view this page. Otherwise, you should close this page and view another page. |
| “ | The best thing to do - when you lose your way, you go back to the beginning. | „ |
| ~ Liu Jian to Jessica Kamen. |
Liu Jian (劉健 in Chinese) is the main protagonist from the 2001 French American action movie Kiss of the Dragon (Le Baiser Mortel du Dragon in French).
He is an elite Chinese police and intelligence agent in a foreign land caught in a conspiracy engineered by the corrupt vice squad of that country which attempts to kill him at every chance. But with various lethal skills at his disposal, Liu manages to out-fight and outmaneuver his enemy. Also to Liu's enemies, he is like a phantom; being present in one minute, only to vanish completely out of sight the next.
The character is portrayed by Jet Li.
Story[]
Background[]
When he was a cadet in Chinese police academy, Liu Jian was a top man who excelled all in his classes. Liu also received his training in martial arts, weapons and police tactics. After his graduation as a Valedictorian, Liu had been decorated for his valor in the line of duty six times, had been promoted five times and had never lost a case. Liu has no wife, and no children; just him and his dedication to his police work.
Main Plot[]
Liu Jian is sent to Paris to help the French vice squad apprehending Chinese crime lord named Sung (aka Mr. Big), who is involved in heroin smuggling in France and also to find who is Sung's French connection. After meeting his sleeper supporter 'Uncle Tai' who poses himself as an owner of seafood shop in a hooker-ridden slum of Paris and setting his base of operation there, Liu goes to a hotel where he meets inspector Jean-Pierre Richard who is assigned to Sung case. But Richard turns out to be a corrupt man with a very violent streak who treats Liu with a mixture of a cynicism and a thinly veiled contempt. The mutual displeasure the two men have on one another is evident when Richard impolitely calls Liu 'Johnny' without his consent, citing that Liu's full name is hard for him to pronounce. Liu replies to Richard with a cold look of disapproval.
After taking away Liu's handgun, Richard explains to Liu that he is simply providing reconnaissance of a meeting involving Sung and his French connection. The stakeout gets complicated when Sung is introduced to two prostitutes, Aja and Jessica Kamen, the latter being an inexperienced hooker with American nationality. When the introduction is done Sung takes them to his room to have fun. Liu voices his unease over the situation of Sung being altered, but Richard simply tells him to come to surveillance room and 'enjoy the show'. While Liu and the rest are watching through the surveillance camera, Sung hastily kicks out his bodyguards except for the two prostitutes. After pretending to seduce him, Aja drops her guise, revealing herself as an assassin and stabs Sung multiple times with her hair pin.
Overseeing the events from the surveillance room, Liu quickly rushes out to stop the killing, knocking out Sung's bodyguards outside and - here Liu is seen being an expert in acupuncture; he paralyzes rampaging Aja with his needle by stabbing her vital body point. Liu carries those needles on his wrist in what looks like a bracelet, something Richard failed to notice when he took away Liu's hand gun. Liu stops Sung's hemorrhage with his needle and attempts to call the hospital to save the dying crime lord, but Richard enters shortly later to shoot Sung and Aja with Liu's own handgun, effectively framing Liu for the murders much to Liu's outrage. It turns out that Sung's French connection, was none other than Richard himself; realizing that his corruption can be exposed, he proceeded to kill Sung and Aja to keep his criminal activity in secret.
Realizing he has been set up, Liu escapes from Richard when he took his eyes off of Liu for a second or two. And the chase throughout the hotel commences. Liu's elusiveness proves to be very difficult for Richard to handle however; when Richard chases Liu down to the fifth floor, Liu is already back on the eighth floor where the surveillance room was. After punching out the surveillance team, Liu secures a cassette that contains Richard murdering Sung and Aja. Securing the evidence, Liu successfully fights his way out of hotel brimming with Richard's henchmen attempting to kill Liu at every corner and turn. Realizing Liu has the cassette containing the truth, Richard sets out to retrieve the cassette from Liu. Liu goes to Gare de l'Est train station where firearms were stashed for him in a safety locker, but he was spotted by the station's security personnel before he can retrieve his arsenals, forcing him to flee empty-handed. After returning, Uncle Tai comments to Liu that he is going to be in Paris longer than expected, to which Liu curtly replies, "a little longer". It is here Liu meets Jessica Kamen second time, at first not knowing that she was also present in the hotel where Sung stakeout gone awry (at the time she is wearing a disguise). Here Liu witnesses her going through abuses at the hands of Lupo, Jessica's brutish pimp. But he was in no position to help her. It is revealed that Jessica is Richard's property and the corrupt inspector drugs her and forces her into prostitution.
Chinese liaisons are dispatched to France after the Sung case debacle to investigate the matter. Richard, with his carefully trumped-up alibis, incriminates Liu as the primary suspect. However, the liaisons, knowing Liu's background, do not believe the story Richard provides. Liu manages to contact Chen, one of the liaisons, to tell him what really happened. Chen then tells Liu to meet at a pleasure boat to discuss what happened and what should their next option be. Upon meeting Chen, Liu passes on the tape that reveals the truth to Chen. But Richard already had the French police tailing the two Chinese men. The meeting between Chen and Liu is spotted, and Chen is assassinated with the cassette falling into the hands of Richard's minions. Liu is once again forced to fight his way out from a horde of Richard's corrupt cops and even GIGN commandos, the elite French anti-terrorist unit requested by Richard to ensure Liu's capture/demise. Although almost being corned under the bridge, Liu once again escapes, but he is wounded and is forced to maintain a low profile.
As he bids his time to have his wounds healed, he meets Jessica Kamen for the third time. While Tai leaves to buy disinfectants for Liu's wound, Jessica offers help to sew his wounds, a feat she masterfully accomplishes. As Liu tentatively listens to how Jessica ended up being stranded in France, how she is unable to escape and became a hooker in foreign land, Lupo bursts into the shop and abuses her. Liu at first politely and civilly asks Lupo not to abuse her in his presence, but when Lupo ignores him, Liu physically disciplines the pimp along with Lupo's bodyguards. After dealing with Lupo and his cronies, Liu is forced to fight Lupo's third bodyguard, a muscular French-African brute. Although he proved somewhat more of a challenge to Liu, Liu ultimately came out victorious. But Liu's fight with Lupo attracts unwanted attention to Richard's right-hand man Max, who saw Liu fighting and proceeds to strafe the seafood shop with machine gun fire. Although Max was swiftly done away with by Liu, Uncle Tai who just returned from shopping, was caught up and killed in the chaos and Liu's hideout was destroyed, forcing Liu and Jessica on the run. Richard meanwhile, is enraged that one Chinese is giving him so much problem, that his entire vice division cannot find him and with every encounter he had against Liu so far produced at least one of his men turning up in a body bag.
As Jessica and Liu bickered over their plight, each other discovers that they were at the hotel during the night of Sung's murder. Liu realizes she can prove his innocence and attempts to take her to Chinese embassy, but she refuses to go without retrieving her daughter named Isabel (and in addition to the fact that she had a very bad experience in trusting the wrong people). It is additionally revealed that Richard has Isabel hostage, effectively rendering Jessica impossible to escape Richard's grasp. After some words of assurance, Liu strikes the deal with Jessica: Liu decides the tape would still provide the best evidence, so if Jessica goes to Richard's office and can steal the tape for him, Liu will find Isabel and return the girl to her. Jessica (after some difficulty) manages to get the tape. Liu attempts to convince Jessica that it would be easier if they take the tape to Chinese embassy first, but Jessica vehemently demands Liu that he keep the end of his bargain. So, Liu and Jessica head to an orphanage where Isabel is kept. However, Richard had foreseen this move after discovering Jessica has stolen the tape and fled, so the corrupt inspector already had Isabel taken off the orphanage, ambushing the couple with his thugs. While Liu, thanks to his fighting skills managed to escape unharmed, Jessica is shot in the chest during their escape. Liu manages to get her to the hospital in time and has her sedated using his acupuncture pin. After returning the cassette to the Chinese embassy, Liu now becomes driven to retrieve Isabel - and to kill Richard.
Liu arrives outside the police station where Richard is holding Isabel hostage, calling the inspector and tricks him into revealing his location. After pinpointing Richard's location, Liu dares Richard to stop him if he can as Liu forces his way into the precinct. Richard sounds an emergency alarm, sending out all his available men and women to stop oncoming Liu. Liu either fights his way through or bypasses Richard's minions. First, Liu knocks out security personnel at the front, then fights about two dozen police officers in a close combat in a gym, with Liu emerging as the winner. Although armed with guns and have numerical superiority, Richard's henchmen are unable to keep up with Liu's elusiveness. After making his way up to upper floor using ventilation shaft, Liu knocks out a thug in an elevator room. Liu uses his body to have elevator door stay opened, and sabotages the heavy alloy steel door that connects from top floor to bottom floor, thus cutting off and isolating any reinforcement from coming up.
Once at the personnel section of the upper floor, Liu takes on The Twins, an aptly named twin thugs who are the strongest force at Richard's disposal, standing as final obstacle to the office where Richard holds Isabel hostage. Although the Twins managed to give Liu a hard time with their martial art skills boosted by their superb coordination, Liu ultimately kills them both by having their necks broken once he manages to figure out their weaknesses. With the final obstacle dealt with, Liu bursts into Richard's office only to get shot by Richard. Liu survives the gunshot wound however, and to save Isabel Liu kills Richard by sticking an acupuncture needle into the nape of his neck in a forbidden location known as the 'Kiss of the Dragon'. Liu's final parting words to Richard was, "my name is not Johnny" - apparently having been bothered being called by that all this time. Liu leaves Richard to die in a horrible agony in his own pool of blood, escaping the French police department with Isabel as the department was swarming with RAID (an elite tactical unit of the French National Police - Recherche, Assistance, Intervention, Dissuasion) units. Liu returns to hospital where Jessica is, and returns Isabel to her mother.
Meaning of the Title[]
| “ | The blood from your whole body goes to your head. It stops there... Never comes down. But soon, it will come out of your nose, your ears, and even your eyes. And then, you will die... Painfully. | „ |
| ~ Liu Jian explains Kiss of the Dragon to Richard and how Richard is going to perish. |
Not all acupuncture techniques are intended to cure.
The title 'Kiss of the Dragon' (龙之吻 in Chinese) is a lethal and forbidden technique that is shown near the last scene of the movie, in which Liu punctures Richard in the nape of the neck with an acupuncture needle at a fatal point on Richard's body. The technique at first paralyzes its victim, then has the victim's blood circulation travel in reverse and entraps all the body's blood in the head. The blood then stops in the brain and never comes down. After that the victim hemorrhages through the mouth, eyes, ears, nostrils etc. followed by a very painful death via a brain aneurysm.
Gallery[]
Images[]
Trivia[]
- Despite both men being from China, Liu Jian and Uncle Tai only speak English with each other even in private. It is possible that one speaks Mandarin while the other speaks Cantonese, though this is never touched upon during the film.
- The number plate of the taxi Liu was in during the opening titles is 5080TAG4 - code name for sabotage, a taste of what is to come.
- There are only seven wires used in the entire movie.
- There are conflicting informations about his name. His surname is Liu, his given name is mostly Jian, be it in the Internet Movie Database, Fandom, but also on DVD and Blu-ray covers. However, his full name is mentioned twice, his surname overall three times, twice by Inspector Jean-Pierre Richard, once by his fellow chinese policeman. And any time his surname is pronounced as Ouyang, which is a very comon surname in China. When Richard mentions his full name for the first time, it sounds very much like the real life person Ouyang Ziyuan, and the subtitles also shows the name as Ouyang Suiyan. When Richard mentions his surname for the second time, he also pronouces it like Ouyang, but in the subtitles in all languages the name appears as Liu Ciu-jian (in Pinyin style without hyphenation Ciujian). Same does Liu/Ouyang’s fellow chinese policeman, pronouncing the surname as „(Inspector) Ouyang“. So it seems very likely his original surname was supposed to be Ouyang, and his given name Suiyan or Ciujian, but Ouyang Suiyan/Cuijian was later falsly changed to Liu Jian.