If you don't have access to Chinese-language DVDs, you probably haven't seen Jackie Chan and Jet Li at their best. In the '70s, the circus-trained Chan made acrobatic comedies that were worthy of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin; 10 years later, Li entered films as a national martial-arts champion.

But in trying to crack the American market, these two Chinese giants have been reduced to playing supporting roles in films like "Lethal Weapon 4" and the embarrassing "Rush Hour" movies.

The middle-age martial artists are teamed for the first time in "The Forbidden Kingdom," an English-language adventure comedy from the director of "The Lion King." The way it waters down ingredients from Chinese folklore and the stars' own filmographies may offend some purists, but the lingering whiff of greatness makes this stir-fried fantasy surprisingly flavorful.

Both stars play dual roles. Chan is the elderly proprietor of a Boston pawnshop who gives an ancient Chinese staff to a kung-fu obsessed teen named Jason (Michael Angarano) before they are both injured in a hold-up.

Jason awakens with the staff in 16th century western China, where he meets a drunken kung-fu master named Lu Yan (Chan). Lu tells the boy that he's been prophesied to return the staff to the Monkey King (Li), a mischievous marital artist who was turned to stone by an evil warlord (Collin Chou) 500 years earlier.

On their perilous desert-and-mountain trek to return the staff to the Monkey King, they are joined by Golden Sparrow (Yifei Liu), a lovely girl with a familial grudge against the warlord, and by a mysterious monk (Li) who tries to seize the staff.

The tug of war between Lu and the monk, pitting two legends of martial-arts cinema, is a high-wire wonder of symbiotic skills. It's decided that both men will teach their secrets to the gawky Jason, to prepare him to battle the warlord.

The training sequences provide both philosophical fluff and light comedy, as the rigid Li and the loose-limbed Chan rely on their contrasting temperaments more than their still-limited English.

Along with the linguistic compromise, die-hards may complain that "The Forbidden Kingdom" is not as campy and overamped as a Shaw Bros. action flick or as ravishing and magical as epics such as "Hero" or "House of Flying Daggers."

Yet the fights were choreographed by Woo-Ping Yuen, the director of Chan's classic "Drunken Master," and this film has the same cinematographer as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," so the technical credentials are solid.

And if the English dialogue and likable teen sidekick lead American kids to explore the kung-fu legacy that the two stars represent, that kingdom will reward them with riches.

joewilliams@post-dispatch.com

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