OUT FROM LEFT FIELD: LEGENDARY TOMB OF THE DRAGON...or something...

Let's make it a double feature, shall we? I think the writing is much better for this one...

This time its another creature feature...and I loooove monster movies. This one's not overly gory and really not all that scarey, either but I enjoyed the somewhat disjointed ride it took me on. Boasting (?) a cast of nobodies (Dolph Lundgren included, altho' for some odd reason I have a soft spot for the dopey guy), but at least it kept my interest because of the passion that Scott Adkins' character Travis portrays. He also kinda looks like a beefy Ben Stiller. That could be a deterrent for some of you..

Beefy Ben Stiller-like Scott Adkins as Travis

The name of the movie is "Legendary Tomb of the Dragon" and it seems to be a joint British/China/(maybe)U.S. project. Don't let the "dragon" part fool you..its not what you think...sorta.
The movie starts off with an expedition in-progress introducing the aformentioned Travis and his team: animal pathologist Katie, Tech Wiz Brandon (a Chinese guy..stereotype? Maybe...), their guide, some French dude who was quite panicky, Chuck (don't know this forte) and Dolph Lundgren as egotistical mercenary/security Harker.

Dolph...still working after these...decades...

I just realized that half the characters do not have last names...

The expedition is tracking what seems to be a large animal and come across a fresh kill so they stake it out in case the animal comes back. It does, and a conflict ensues over Travis' plan to tag the animal versus Harker's plan to take it down. The resulting clusterf**k ends with Chuck Nolastname's untimely demise.

Fast forward (no timeframe given) and we see that Travis is pacing in his office, a couple of lawsuits strewn across his desk shows the fallout from the expedition. A knock at the door hails a suit-wearing gent and Travis smells lawyer all over him...and he's not wrong. But this lawyer has nothing to do with Travis' current problems, as he comes bearing footage of something Travis has never seen before. And we're off to get the band (what's left of them) back together on another cryptozid hunt.

Travis, Katie and Brandon arrive in China and meet up with lawyer, Doug and his translator (the VERY cute) Bai Xi. Together they set off to set up base on the riverbank where the creature-in-question has been seen. The team is essentially here to find out what has been attacking the local townspeople and well as workers on the nearby oil pipeline.

Yang Caiyu as Bai Xi...forget the rest...

Meanwhile another attack occurs and Travis, Doug and Bai Xu head for the attack site. But guess who's already set up camp? Harker, with Lan Zeng, she's a spunky Chinese scientist unfortunately assigned to help Harker track the beast.

Witnesses to an attack: Ooh, that's gotta hurt...

 A tug-of-war game between Travis and Harker is renewed and of course, Harker can only follow Travis as he and his team figure out what the creature is doing, where it might live, etc. Clues are left in the creature's wake and it seems only Travis' team knows how to decipher them. Many more clashes between these two alpha males occur, one ending in Lan Zeng being abandoned by Harker's men when the creature attacks. Lan Zeng ends up joining Travis' team as a big f**k you to Harker.

Tee-totaller no more: Lang Zeng takes a swig after Harker's men abandon her during an attack.

Eventually we get to see the creature and, well, things get wrapped up fairly quickly after that.

Now this is by no means a big-budget flick, although the camerawork was above average for this type of fare. Acting was passable..and Lundgren can play a greasy self-centered egomanic well. I really wanted to punch him myself. This was just one of those really, REALLY out-in-left-field, under-the-radar movies...and some will say it should stay that way. But b-movies are what keeps the industry going when Hollywood churns out less-than-stellar product. What I liked about it was the "monster" factor and the fact that Travis was so gung ho about catching the creature. The peripheral characters, namely Lan Zeng, made the movie bearable (pun?) because of her spunkiness...and she was just as gung ho as Travis. The love interest card was not played heavily, just hints and quick glances, nothing more.

This can make, like, a 100 pairs of shoes, dude!

The fx were terrible-to-OK. The underwater CGI needed to be better but the on-land fx were better, especially the confrontations in the creature's cavernous lair. There was some fx goofs in there that were glaring..don't know how that got by the director..unless that was the best they could do. I still enjoyed it enough to watch the whole thing. That's gotta count for something.