Then along came Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and The House Of Flying Daggers, which - while fine - were basically epic martial arts ballets. Yeah, sure, they looked good, but it was the ultimate example of style over substance. Still, can't deny it gave an ailing genre a kick in the tights.
So what, then, is Dragon here to do? Reinvent the wheel? Provide mindless violence? Makes us laugh? Well, kind of all of the above...
You see, thanks to Daggers, I approached this with caution. Having been sold the whole 'OMG it's totes amazeballs' stuff, it left me cold. So, when the world started telling me how Dragon was reinventing the martial arts genre, I was curious but a little sceptical.
And yet, it kind of is. But not in any way you'd expect. It's less Daggers, more CSI Beijing...
From the off, however, the story has your attention. A man is living his life and doing his thing in rural 1917 China. Parenting, eating, fixing stuff, helping his neighbours - you get the drill. It's all nice and gentle.
And then the bad guys come and ask the local butcher for his money. Our man Liu Jin-xi (played by the excellent Donnie Yen) is on site and decides to help out by beating the would-be thugs up. No mean feat as he does little but seemingly cling on for dear life. Suddenly we're in top gear.
He manages to kill them both - leading to the arrival of the authorities, a post mortem in the town square (nope kids, no telly in them days) and the discovery that he's only gone and offed a major criminal.
This leads our other hero, Detective Xu Bai-jiu, (Takeshi Kaneshiro, off of The House Of Flying Daggers) to start asking questions and come to the conclusion that our little hero is in fact a major gang member on the run - something Liu denies. And this is where it starts to get interesting.
You see, Dragon isn't playing by the normal rules. Yes, it's set in 1917. Yes, it's set in rural China. But that doesn't mean you can't have some great comic moments with Kaneshiro, or much use of CSI special effects explaining how various nerves can kill you.
It's the ultimate mash-up. And it shouldn't work. But it does.
But that's not to say it's just flashy with a new sense of style - there's a moral quandary at the heart of Dragon that will keep you thinking and talking long after the credits roll. And it's this - is it better to do the right thing legally or morally? And who pays the consequences? If two people believe their path is right, who is actually right?
I've seen criticism elsewhere (one random comment on Facebook, but hey, it's out there) that there isn't enough action in Dragon - and yeah, sure, there could be more. But that's not the point. There's brains at work here to back up the brawn.
And it's good brawn. Good use of slo-mo shots allow for slight comic touches as blood and teeth spew across shops, houses, barns and village squares. An ear is sliced off with precision, heads are hit, ribs are broken, knives and swords are batted away - to have any more would actually detract from what's going on.
That's not to say it's perfect. It's not.
The use of music is eclectic to the point of annoyance (the mash-up works visually, but it needs a singular style on the score front) and the visual tone is similarly all over the shop. Scenes switch from lush greens to drab greys to sepia tones with no apparent point. It's not a major negative, but it definitely niggles.
Then again, if that's the worst thing you can say about a film...
Because, the one thing Dragon has in abundance is fun. And there's not a bad performance to be seen (including the really young cast members). And there's a lot to say for that - because you can have all the style you want, adding substance is a huge boost, but if the audience don't enjoy themselves, you're in trouble.
That's not to say Dragon is going to waltz into people's hearts, I fear. In a screening of seven people this afternoon, only five made it to the credits. Quite what the other two people say after an hour or so that they hadn't been expecting I've no idea, but off they went. Maybe they finally noticed the subtitles...
But it was their loss to be honest. Because while I didn't love Dragon, it kept me in my seat from start to finish. I cared about the characters, I was enjoying the action, I was really liking the CSI elements, and the humour, and the philosophical elements. And that's a lot more than can be said of a lot of the crap that is landing on our screens this year.
If you go into Dragon with expectations, they are unlikely to be met - this is a film dancing to its own multi-cultural tune. But if you go in with your eyes and mind wide open, you're in for one hell of a ride.
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