Police Story 4: First Strike

Title: Police Story 4: First Strike

Director: Stanley Tong

Released: 1996

Starring: Jackie Chan, Jackson Lou, Annie Wu, Bill Tung, Yuriy Petrov, Nonna Grishayeve, Terry Woo, Ailen Sit, Nathan Jones

Plot: Recuited by the CIA, Insp. Chan (Chan) to follow leads connected to a nuclear smuggling case, only to soon find himself on the trail of a missing nuclear warhead.

Review: Despite being the forth entry in Jackie Chan’s legendry “Police Story” franchise you really don’t need to have seen the previous three to enjoy this film and hence why it was sold to western audiences as just “First Strike” giving it the illusion of being a stand alone film especially to cash in on the success of “Rumble In The Bronx” which had introduced Chan finally to audiences not familiar with the Hong Kong cinema.

While this film takes perhaps alittle longer than his other films to get going with Chan engaging in some espionage antics before giving us the first of the films big set pieces on the snowy mountains of the Ukraine with Chan wearing little more than a humorous seal hat for warmth chases after a suspect and it what really sets the tone for the film as here we get to see Chan really working at the height of his powers as certainly highlighted by the now legendary ladder fight sequence whose painful screw ups really only demonstrate just how good Chan and his stunt team are. Its during the traditional mistake reel in the credits and you also see that Chan really wasn’t wearing anything remotely warm during the mountain sequences when snowboarding or being thrown into icy water that you may find yourself questioning the general sanity of Chan to put himself through such things.

Perhaps to the benefit of Chan for doing all those snow sequences the majority of the film takes place in Australia were he soon finds himself caught up with the sister of the suspect he’s been pursuing Annie here played by Annie Wu in her film debut. Of course the general plot is pretty thin and this is especially the case with her character whose only real purpose is to play the damsel in distress while the fact she works at the aquarium really is just to setup the finale. This isn’t a major issue thanks to the general charm of Chan’s performance aswell as the fact that most viewers will be here for the stunts and fights than the plot.

This is a great film for newcomers thanks to the light-hearted plot let alone how frequently ludicrious it is to have a film which features an aquarium of man eating sharks and a final showdown which takes place underwater. This of course is largely thanks to Chan’s performance as he’s essentially the every man rather than the bad ass, its just he also happens to be a martial arts master. At the same time he taps into the same slapstick action energy of Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd especially with the fight scenes being focused on using the environment around him and making one movement flow into the next. There is no better example of this than in this film when he is attempting to escape from a pair of Russian thugs, one being played by man mountain Nathan Jones.

As I mentioned already the action is really the star of the show here and while it might not top what we’ve seen in the previous three films in the saga it is still inventive and unquestionably better than his current output were its clear as he’s getting older he’s less willing to maim himself for his art especially when those bones don’t heal as quick as they used to, but hey this is the guy whose had so many injuries that he can no longer get insurance so you can hardly fault him for wanting to take it easier in these later years of his career. As such its fun to see a film like this when he was wanting to take those risks. Here Chan is clearly trying to give the audience something they haven't seen before which might explain the underwater fight finale, while the snowboard chase and the apartment escape which sees Chan repeatedly running into closed windows all make for fun highlights.

Frustratingly all the releases of this film bar the Japanese DVD are missing 21 mins from the film, while also dubbed which is less of an issue considering the style of film, but you would think that by now we would be able to get the original version of this film which sadly is still not an option.

A fun entry in the “Police Story” saga though while perhaps not the best film of this period it is still miles better from his current output, while providing the perfect start point for the newcomers to his extensive body of work.

Rumble In The Bronx

Title: Rumble In The Bronx

Director: Stanley Tong

Released: 1995

Starring: Jackie Chan, Anita Mui, Francosie Yip, Bill Tung, Marc Akerstream, Garvin Cross, Morgan Lam, Kris Lord

Plot: Keung (Chan) travels to New York to attend his uncle’s wedding, who has recently sold his supermarket to Elaine (Mui) only for her to soon find herself the target of a local motorcycle gang. Things only get more complex when the bikers occur the wrath of the powerful gangster White Tiger (Lord)

 

Review: After several failed attempts to break into the American market with films like “Battle Creek Brawl” and the ill-advised attempt at turning Chan into a tough cop in “The Protector”. A film which would ultimately end up being re-edited by Chan for the superior Hong Kong cut, while in turn inspiring him to make arguably his best film “Police Story”. Here though we get an interesting mixture of Chan’s usual slapstick and breath taking stunt work only now with attempts to make Chan more sexually appearing as gone is the Beatles haircut while he seems to now favour vest tops which emphasise his toned form more than in previous films, were he seemed to dressed to cover his physique to make him seem much more of an everyman.

In a story which seems to be a reworking of Bruce Lee’s “Way of the Dragon” Keung finds himself frequently having to defend the store against the local motorcycle gang, whose paths frequently cross with Keung including a surprisingly brutal sequence in which Keung is pelted with glass bottles while cornered down an alleyway. Things only get more complex when Keung discovers that Nancy (Yip) the sister of his disabled next door neighbour is also the girlfriend of the gang leader Tony (Akerstream). For the established fans of Chan’s work this film is essentially business as usual bar the slight aforementioned changes to his usual style of character and the change of location which sees Vancouver standing in for New York which for the most part works, bar the occasional shots where mountains are visible in the background. This however is really nit picking especially when it only becomes noticeable when highlighted.

While this might have been designed as a vehicle for Chan, fellow Hong Kong cinema favourite Anita Mui appears here, mainly for comic relief which might come as a disappointment to fans of her films like “Saviour of the Soul” and “The Heroic Trio” and despite initially being setup as a romantic interest. Introduced as the attractive business woman, she is bizarrely dressed down as soon as Keung starts getting involved with Nancy and her brother. Despite this sudden change of direction for her character she still manages to put in a fun performance throughout which at times seems to echo Maggie Chung’s performance as May in “Police Story”.

The story on the whole is pretty flimsy in places and isn’t helped by some over acted performances by some of the cast members, whose performances are only further hammed up with the questionable dubbing track which the studio decided to add for many of its English speaking cast. While the film starts off with Keung taking on the biker gang which would have worked fine, the fact that we get a second group of bad guys only seems to highlight the lack of faith in them being a believable threat. More baffling is how it only takes a beatdown at their hideout for them to suddenly make them allies, despite all the destruction they caused to the store and let’s not forget they also projectile bottled Keung earlier in the film, but he’s more than happy to let all that go, even hoping that their next meeting will see them drinking as friends. Ok true the last part is said in his native tongue and makes for a badass end to an equally badass showdown between Keung and the bikers

The fact that the plotting of the film is so questionable is not a huge issue thanks to some engaging performances from Chan, whose kung fu klutz style transfers well here while Chung provides some fun comic relief which helps to make up for the lack of action she gets here. The action scenes through are unquestionably the real draw here, with Chan crafting some memorable and as always creative fight scenes as he manages to turn any number of objects into surprisingly effective weapons, with a hijacked hovercraft chase providing an equally inventive finale including Chan making a leap which resulted in breaking his leg which like so many of the mishaps you get to see during Chan’s traditional end credits outtakes.

Thanks to Golden Harvest handling the production, Chan has clearly been afforded the same time to work on his fight scenes that he was afforded with his other Hong Kong productions which helped them to stand out from the American productions which regularly suffered from comparisons to the fights and stunt work seen in his earlier films, thanks largely to American studios not being willing to schedule Chan the kind of time he has become legendry for assigning to these sequences with his quest for perfection seeing Chan more than happy to shoot the same scenes over and over, which he wouldn’t be afforded with his American productions. This film clearly argues the case for Chan being assigned this time.

While perhaps not as good as many of his earlier Hong Kong productions, this is certainly one of the strongest of his later films and unsurprisingly would be the film which helped his break into Hollywood.