In this jazzed-up action comedy, Samuel L. Jackson plays his usual cool customer caught up in a maelstrom of underworld shit. Here he's Elmo McElroy a chemist who's created the ultimate recreational drug. It's 51 times more potent than cocaine, LSD, or Ecstasy ("It's like getting a personal visit from God"), and it's cut from legal ingredients. After pissing off (blowing up) his stateside backer, McElroy hops the pond to Liverpool, where he's pursued by Meat Loaf, a gaggle of bugling skinheads, and a comely assassin (Emily Mortimer) who makes La Femme Nikita look like a schoolboy with a BB gun. They all want his head or the intellectual property in it. Guiding Elmo through the quagmire is Felix DeSouza (Robert Carlyle reprising his psycho from Trainspotting), a rogue henchman who'd rather be at a soccer match than saving a "Yank's" arse.

Much of what action director Ronny Yu and writer Stel Pavlou cook up are thunderous, crash-bang encounters that don't particularly thrill. It's akin to Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels or Snatch, long on frenetic style and short on substance. The good news is that the smoky-cool Mr. Jackson is on hand to pop off the tangy one-liners. He even dons a kilt, does a Cheech & Chong imitation and whips up a batch of fast-acting laxatives to dispatch a gang of sadistic punks. Now that's some funny shit! (92 minutes) At the Entertainment, Flagship, Holiday, Providence Place 16, Showcase, and Tri-Boro cinemas.