Once Lee establishes what he can do with technology in Gemini Man – and it’s a lot – it becomes difficult to refocus emotion onto anything more human. By multiplying life, Gemini Man too often merely dilutes it.

Seen at 60 frames per second (fps) on 3D-Plus (2K resolution), Ang Lee’s action spectacular Gemini Man proved a compulsive watch: not for the usual ingredients of can’t-look-away Hollywood cinema such as acting – Will Smith takes a dual role - or plot, both of which fell a little flat, and seemed almost wilfully generic. As a viewing experience, though, this picture delivers as a prototype of future action film-making.

Unfortunately, Gemini Man is saddled with a fatally weak story, almost as if Lee chose a predictable action-thriller narrative so that he could focus his energy on the effects and frame rate. But the result is a quirky-looking movie that’s generally boring.

Somehow though, the film registers as a strange, airless whiff — stale, inert, and oddly melancholy. The script rarely rises above the schematics of a thousand thrillers that languish on late-night cable, and the almost willfully cliché dialogue sounds as if it’s been generated by some kind of free-with-purchase screenwriting app.

Come for the technical innovations, stay for… hmm. Two Will Smiths for the price of one just ain’t worth it.