I thought it was fairly standard stuff, as far as these things go. It was like a typical, 70s Ali-Baba adventure movie. I agree that the exposition was kind of ham fisted though.

Whilst there were some cool action scenes (the knife fight towards the end was especially so), My main beef with the movie is the cinematography. I couldn't see what was going on in half the action sequences because the camera was doing that frenetic, fast-cut, shakey-hand crap that directors seem so fond of now. Plus they kept using slow-mo shots to depict stuff that didn't need to be seen in slow-motion. They should be using those effects to place emphasis on the cool moves and expressions, not the mundane bits.