This movie occasionally manages to be a genuinely amusing send-up reminiscent of "Sherlock Holmes" combined with "Charlie Chan," and even touches on elements of "High Noon," but mostly it’s an overlong and disorganized film. The narrative involves the Manchu court, facing similar geopolitical tensions as depicted in "55 Days at Peking" (1963), sending their top agent to San Francisco to find a traitor. Simultaneously, the Holmes-inspired “Fu” (played by Haoran Liu) is also in that city investigating the murder of Senator "Grant’s" (John Cusack) daughter. Their investigations quickly intersect when this “Fu” and his new spiritual guide "Gui" (Baoqiang Wang) discover that the main suspect in the killing (Steven Zhang) is the son of local businessman "Bai" (Chow Yun-Fat), and that the senator is exploiting the situation to fuel anti-Chinese prejudice so he can force them out and take their property. What follows is a collection of loosely connected sequences blending murder mystery, western elements, romance, and plenty of scheming as they attempt to prove young “Bai” was set up. "Fu" and "Wang" have moments where they work well together, but the plot frequently loses its focus, and eventually the characters—particularly "Bai" and "Grant"—become thin and exaggerated caricatures. Luckily, after roughly two hours, director Sicheng Chen seemed to realize he needed to finish the film, and the final fifteen minutes tie together what we already know with new information, offering a rather weak resolution that hints at further adventures for “Gui” and “Fu.” A powerful moment comes from older "Bai," who reflects on the importance of immigrant labor in building a country that later quickly turned its back on that community when it was convenient. However, this message is delivered awkwardly and overshadowed by an intrusive musical score, diminishing its potential impact within a United States still grappling with how to acknowledge those who performed essential work but may not have had the same opportunities or documentation. It has flashes of brilliance, but they are few and far between.

Source on TMDB