Tweet
Released by: Shout! Factory
Released on: April 25th, 2023.
Director: Eric Tsang, Jackie Chan, Wong Jing, Kirk Wong
Cast: Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Lola Forner, Gary Daniels, Richard Norton
Year: 1986, 1991, 1993, 1993
Purchase From Amazon
The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 – Movie Review:
Shout! Factory brings together eight more films featuring the legendary Jackie Chan in Volume Two of their Jackie Chan Collection.
For part one of our coverage of this set, click here!
Disc Five – Armor Of God:
Released in 1986 and co-directed by Eric Tsang and Jackie Chan himself, is less a pure martial arts film than a straight up adventure movie but it's a really good film regardless.
The story revolves around Jackie (Jackie Chan), a man who used to be a musician who has since become a treasure hunter - sort of an Indiana Jones type, but without the archeology degree. When the movie begins, he steals a sword from a remote jungle tribe in Africa and, after narrowly escaping with his life, has the artifact auctioned off to the highest bidder. The winning bid belongs to May Bannon (Lola Forner), the gorgeous daughter of one Count Bannon (Božidar Smiljanić).
A short time later, Jackie gets together with former band made Alan (Alan Tam), who wants Jackie to help him track down Loralei (Rosamund Kwan), his missing girlfriend who has seemingly been abducted by a bizarre religious sect who intend on holding her hostage in exchange for Jackie doing a job for them. See, the sect has two pieces of an artifact dubbed the 'Armor Of God' and want to get their hands on the three pieces they've yet to acquire - the sword he just swiped being one of them. When it turns out that Count Bannon, antiquities collector that he is, actually has all three pieces that the sect needs, he agrees to let them use his pieces on one condition - Jackie and Alan do what they need to do in order to save Loralei but once the Armor Of God is completed, they bring it back, intact, for him. In order to ensure that Jackie and Alan keep everything on the up and up, the Count has his daughter go along for the ride.
Highlighted by an impressively shot and choreographed scene in which Chan jumps off of a mountain onto the top of a hot air balloon (the extras on the disc do a great job of explaining how this was done), Armor Of God definitely borrows elements from films like Raiders Of The Lost Art but also throws in some neat gimmicks and gadgets, they kind that wouldn’t be so far removed from a James Bond movie. Chan is his typically amiable self here, hamming it up just enough to keep things fairly light but never overdoing it. Supporting work from Alan Tam is pretty solid and lovely Lola Furner is once again just fine as the films female lead.
The action is on a pretty big scale in this one – the sets are huge, the stunts nothing short of impressive and the cinematography generally does a really strong job of capturing it all. There are some odd shifts in tone here and there, likely due to the fact that Tsang basically directed all of the dramatic bits and Chan, kinda-sorta officially, directed the action set pieces but overall, this makes for a good time at the movies and holds up really well.
Disc Six – Armor Of God II – Operation Condor:
The 1991 sequel to the last film was directed entirely by Jackie Chan this time around. In this second story, Jackie's presence is requested by Duke Scapio and, as such, is whisked off to the man's mansion in Spain where the Duke tells Jackie of a World War II German officer named Hans von Ketterling who had the soldiers under his command stash a massive amount of gold at a base hidden somwehere in the Sahara Desert. The men under his command have since all disappeared and, with the blessing of the United Nations, Scapio would like Jackie, in exchange for one percent of the haul, to find the gold. Scapia partners him up with a woman named Ada (Carol Cheng), an expert on African geography.
Jackie agrees and not too long after arriving in the area, he meets a German woman named Elsa (Eva Cobo de Garcia) when he saves her from an attack by some locals also on the hunt for the lost treasure. This gets Jackie on their radar and soon enough, he finds himself pursued by various nefarious characters all out for their piece of the pie. Elsa soon joins up with Jackie and Ada and eventually they learn that Hans von Ketterling was her grandfather and that she's actually looking for him. They head out to the desert and meet up with a Japanese woman named Momoko (Shôko Ikeda).
Bad guys eventually kidnap Elsa and Ada, leaving Jackie and Momoko to try and save them, which leads to their uncovering a slave trade. Meanwhile, a gang of mercenaries kills off different parties hoping to get to the gold first, including some of the people that Jackie and Ada were travelling with. Clues are uncovered and, as they get closer to finding out where the gold is and the truth about Hans von Ketterling, things become increasingly dangerous for all involved.
A very solid follow up to the first Armor Of God movie, this one hits pretty much all the right notes at all the right places. There’s a good sense of grand adventure here and the Nazi gold plot gives it a very pulpish feel that works nicely in its favor. Jackie and his fairly international supporting cast are in fine form and the stunts and fight choreography are both up to snuff throughout. We get strong camerawork and a good score as well. The pacing is pretty strong and while the movie does jump around a fair bit and isn’t especially concerned with rich character development, it offers up just the right amount of thrills, chills and spills to ensure that you’ll be consistently entertained throughout.
Disc Seven – Crime Story:
Directed by Kirk Wong, 1993's Crime Story is one of Jackie Chan's more serious films and like a lot of Wong's movies, it is a bit of a police procedural in some ways. The story revolves around Eddie Chan (Jackie Chan), a cop who is a bit of a loner. When we meet him, he's injured from his attempts to foil a bank robbery but that doesn't stop him from answering the call of duty when the police hear from a business man named Wong Yat-Fei (Law Hang Kang) who is concerned that he is being targeted by a kidnapping ring. Before the cops can do anything, Wong is snatched up in broad daylight and Chan and his crew are left with no course of action but to give chase and try to bring him back alive. Wong's wife (Puishan Auyeung), meanwhile, debates paying the massive ransom they are demanding - the cops encourage her to do so in order to trail her and catch the crooks, but of course, it doesn't go as planned.
As Chan ramps up his investigation, he uncovers evidence that indicates fellow cop Detective Hung (Kent Cheng) may actually have some involvement with the kidnappers. Hung is clever though, and he does an excellent job not only of covering his tracks but of sending Chan in one direction after another...
Darker than many of Chan's other action films, Crime Story attempts to give the world's most popular action star a more dramatic role than most would associate with the clown prince of kung-fu. Chan handles the more dramatic aspects of the role reasonably well here but the end result is a movie that, while not necessarily short on the stunts or action you want out of a Jackie Chan movie, doesn't quite compete with the best of his pictures in that department. The plot is sufficient if a bit pedestrian and the twists aren't necessarily all that difficult to see coming but if the plot is more than routine, it's not much more than routine. It works - but don't expect to be wowed by it.
This leaves Chan and the action scenes to carry the picture. Chan isn't quite the completely charming, smiley guy here that he is in other films. He's a bit more brooding and a bit more 'human' here in that he does suffer the consequences of his actions both physically and psychologically but the movie never quite 'goes for it' in this regard and the character of Eddie Chan isn't as well fleshed out as we might want him to be. The action scenes, however, deliver. Chan was still in great shape at this point in his career and he shows no fear when it comes to the stunt work or the fight scenes even if they aren't on par in terms of spectacle and scale with what we'd see in movies like the Police Story films or Rumble In The Bronx. Ultimately, this isn't Chan's best movie but it's definitely a solid thriller and a quite underrated picture, with some quality action scenes and a very good performance from Jackie in the lead not to mention surprisingly solid supporting work from Kent Cheng. You've got to give the guy credit for trying something a bit different here and you can't blame him for wanting to take on a more serious role.
Disc Eight – City Hunter:
Last and, unfortunately, least is the mess that is Wong Jing’s 1993 film, City Hunter, a live action adaptation of the Japanese manga series of the same name.
In this one, Jackie Chan plays Ryo Saeba, a private investigator known as the 'City Hunter.' Ryo works with his assistant, Kaori Makimura (Joey Wong), who just so happens to be the younger sister of his former partner, Hideyuki who made Ryo promise, before he passed away, that he'd never make a move on Joey. This, however, has not stopped Kaori from falling head over heels for her employer and she can't help but feel hurt when he doesn't respond back to her flirtations.
At any rate, Ryo and Kaori are hired by the man in charge of a big time newspaper to fine his daughter, Kiyoko Imamura (Kumiko Goto), who has gone missing somewhere in Hong Kong. They head over to investigate but before long, broken-hearted Kaori splits, hurt that Ryo doesn't share the affections she has for him. When Ryo eventually finds Kiyoko, she runs and manages to hide out on a cruise ship, with Ryo giving chase completely unaware that Kaori and her cousin Rocky (Pal Sinn) along for the ride. What none of them know is that a former American Special Forces operative named Colonel "Big Mac" MacDonald (Richard Norton) plans to launch a hostage situation on the ship. A few undercover cops, Saeko Nogami (Chingmy Yau) and her assistant Kasumi Asou (Carol Wan), are thankfully on the case.
Kiyoko, however, figures out what McDonald is up to and winds up the target of his gun toting cronies but is thankfully saved by Ryo who, when the cops are captured, has to do what he can to save the day.
City Hunter is a mess. The locations are great – most of it was shot onboard a real cruise ship and the rest in and around Hong Kong – and the whole thing looks really good, making great use of color and boasting strong cinematography. Sadly, the story is sloppy and uneven, and the whole thing feels rushed and nonsensical. The storyline jumps around all over the place and what might have worked as an animated take on the source material winds up feeling just plain off.
Chan isn’t completely to blame here, in fact, most of the cast do what they can with the material, but the script, which according to Daniels didn’t really exist (more on that in the extras), clearly needed more work and Wong Jing’s direction is… directionless.
Ah well, you can’t win’em all, right?
The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 – Blu-ray Review:
Shout! Factory brings The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 to region A Blu-ray on eight 50GB discs with each film properly and framed its original widescreen aspect ratio in AVC encoded 1080p high definition. All seven films are framed in their original theatrical aspect ratio. The packaging notes the following details about the transfers:
-Armor Of God: "2K Restoration From The Original Film Elements For The Hong Kong Cut"
-Armor Of God II – Operation Condor: "2K Scan Of The Original Film Elements"
-Crime Story: "2K Scan Of The Original Film Elements"
-City Hunter: "2K Scan Of The Original Film Elements"
Generally speaking, the picture quality is really strong for these four movies. Colors in particular fare really nicely and look consistently bright and bold without appearing oversaturated. Black levels are also typically pretty solid and while there are some minor compression artifacts evident in a few spots here and there, the transfers generally avoid crush and show no problematic noise reduction or edge enhancement issues. Detail is pretty solid and there’s good depth and texture here as well. The transfers are also almost shockingly clean, showing pretty much no print damage at all while generally retaining the expected amount of natural film grain.
Audio options are surprisingly plentiful across the seven discs in this collection. Options for each film are laid out below, English subtitles are provided for each movie in the set:
-Armor Of God: Mandarin Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio, Cantonese Mono DTS-HD Master Audio (Original Theatrical Mix), Cantonese Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio, English Mono DTS-HD Master Audio, English Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio, English 5.1 Dolby Digital, Japanese Theatrical Mandarin Mono DTS-HD Master Audio
-Armor Of God II – Operation Condor: Cantonese Mono DTS-HD Master Audio, Cantonese Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio, English Dub DTS-HD Master Audio
-Crime Story: Cantonese Mono DTS-HD Master Audio, Cantonese 5.1 Dolby Digital, English Mono DTS-HD Master Audio, English 5.1 Dolby Digital
-City Hunter: Cantonese Mono DTS-HD Master Audio, Cantonese Stereo DTS-HD Master Audio, Cantonese 5.1 Dolby Digital, English 5.1 Dolby Digital
Each disc has English subtitles translating the main Chinese language options and an SDH option for the English language tracks. Each of the DTS-HD options is a 24-bit track. While audio quality is generally pretty solid across the board here, the original language tracks always play better than the dubbed versions do – though it’s definitely nice to have them included here. Either way, those who want the 5.1 experience have that option, but most will probably opt for the original theatrical tracks as they’re how the films were originally presented. Tracks are properly balanced and quite clean and clear throughout. No problems to note here in that department.
Extras are spread out across the eight discs in the set as follows:
Disc Four – Twinkle Twinkle Lucky Stars:
Once again we get a commentary from David West that offers up plenty of detail about Sammo Hung's work behind the camera as well as in the acting realm, his relationship with Golden Harvest, how the Lucky Stars movies became so popular, the broad comedic appeal of these films, the different supporting cast members that show up in the movie, how the plot takes twenty minutes or so to really be established, when and where the movie feels like a product of its time and other details surrounding the film and its history.
The disc also includes the alternate extended Taiwanese version of the movie taken from a 4K transfer from the original film elements. This version runs 1:47:01 as opposed to the feature version which runs 1:35:00, both running times taking into account the Fortune Star opening logos. The Taiwanese version features some differences to the opening, different credits, a longer breakfast scene and quite a few other scene extensions placed throughout the movie, some of which elaborate a bit on Sammo Hung's character arc.
A Life Of Laughter is a twenty-one minute interview with actor Richard Ng who talks about being born in Hong Kong but educated in the United Kingdom where he spent fifteen years and working as an actor in London in the late sixties. He then goes on to detail appearing in Empress From Hong Kong with a walk-on role, why he moved back to Hong Kong, getting his start in the film industry there, doing television work and writing work, how he came to team up with the Lucky Stars, how they connected with Jackie Chan, what it was like working with Chan and Sammo Hung, the collaborative nature of many of the films they worked on together, what the other Lucky Stars were like personality wise, his thoughts on Jackie Chan's abilities to do comedy as well as action and shooting his nude scene!
Gentleman Warrior is an interview with actor Richard Norton that runs for thirty-three minutes. He talks about how he got into martial arts as a kid in Australia, details on his training and some of the people that he worked with early on, what he did before he got into making movies, the importance to his life and career of meeting Chuck Norris, working with Norris on The Octagon, where his weapons fighting experience came in handy, how he came to Hong Kong and started working in the movie industry there, getting involved in Twinkle Twinkle Lucky Stars, working with the different actors in the movie, filming his fight scene with Sammo Hung, working with Jackie Chan, the dubbing done in these movies and his own thoughts on Jackie Chan's abilities as an actual martial artist.
This fourth disc also includes four minutes of outtakes, an original theatrical trailer, an English trailer, a Japanese teaser, a Japanese trailer as well as a still gallery, menus and chapter selection options.
Disc Five – Armor Of God:
Disc give includes the international cut of the movie which runs 1:24:55 versus the feature at 1:38:28, both running times including the Fortune Star opening logo. Some of the comedic sequences are cut from the international cut which might appease those who don’t want comedy to mix with their action films – but this is a Jackie Chan movie, so….? Either way, nice to have both versions here. The international cut is presented in a 1.33.1 fulframe 480i interlaced standard definition presentation with Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo audio and optional English subtitles.
The disc also includes a new audio commentary from James Mudge, veteran Hong Kong Film critic at easternKicks.com, that goes over how Jackie Chan came to direct the movie after Eric Tsang bowed out, the different locations that are used for the movie, where parts of the film haven't aged so well, the film's release history, Jackie Chan getting more into adventure movies rather than pure martial arts movies, the unusually high amount of bloodshed in some of the key scenes and how that is unusual for a Jackie Chan movie, where the movie toys with the theme of brotherhood, details on some of the stand out action set pieces, thoughts on how the comedy and action mix in the movie, how Jackie Chan's acting had started to improve by this period in his career and, of course, the film's big finale and what went into getting it all to work without Chan falling to his death.
As far as featurettes go, Rise Of The Phoenix is a piece with Radek Sienski on Armour Of God that runs for twenty-one minutes and which goes over the making of the movie with an emphasis on the editing of the main stunts in the opening and ending scenes. He also covers how busy Chan was during this period, scenes that were shot for Armor Of God but later cut, the different locations used for the movie, how Chan got injured during the making of the movie, Eric Tsang's involvement in the movie, why the movie was shot in 1.85.1 instead of 2.35.1, where a stunt double was used while Chan was in the hospital and how the balloon sequence was shot.
There are also some archival interviews here, including a four minute piece with Jackie Chan himself, where he talks about wanting to do something different and special with this movie and its fight scenes by deciding to fight four women and the specifics of shooting some of that material.
Up next is an interview with Willie Chan running just under four minutes that covers his time in Yugoslavia working on the movie, hearing about Jackie Chan getting injured on the set, dealing with the hospital and not having much confidence in the doctors and how that incident changed Jackie Chan's entire attitude towards life.
A third archival interview features editor Peter Cheung for five mintues talking about how he got into working with Jackie Chan after Burce Lee passed away, working with him from 1975 to 2007, what both Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan were like to work with and what went into editing films like Armor Of God.
Closing out the extras on this disc are four minutes of outtakes from the Japanese release, an original theatrical trailer, a Japanese theatrical trailer, an English theatrical trailer, a still gallery, menus and chapter selection options.
Disc Six – Armor Of God II – Operation Condor:
Disc six includes the extended cut of the movie, which runs minutes 1:57:10 versus the feature version at 1:47:07. The extended cut is presented in AVC encoded 1080p with English and Chinese language Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo audio and optional English subtitles, though it is definitely more compressed than the feature version. The longer version includes a bit more comedy and has some different music when compared to the shorter feature version.
The extended cut also features a new audio commentary from James Mudge that goes over the different titles that the movie is known under and the different versions that exist for it, why Chan decided to direct this movie after his experiences on the first Armor Of God movie and why that results in a more coherent film, the movie's emphasis on comedy, the influence of the James Bond movies, details on the different people that Chan collaborated with on the movie, the film's portrayal of racial stereotypes, details on the different cast members that pop up in the movie, the location photography used in the movie, the very ambitious nature of the movie and some of its more impressive set pieces and how Chan's career evolved up to this point in time.
Notes For A New Direction is a new interview with composer Stephen Endelman where he talks for fourteen minutes about what went into creating the soundtrack for the American cut of the movie. He talks about how he wound up scoring movies for Miramax, the two different approaches that he took to creating the music for the movie, some of the different people that he collaborated with on the score, details on working with the Weinstein's on different projects and why they prided themselves on Americanizing foreign films to give American audiences what they wanted, how and why he's gotten into producing in recent years and trying to think about actors' motivations while working on musical selections for film scores.
An original theatrical trailer, a still gallery, menus and chapter selection options are also included.
Disc Seven – Crime Story:
Once again, we get a new audio commentary with James Mudge that covers where the movie falls in Chan's filmography and what sets this movie apart from his other pictures, the serious nature of the movie, how Chan's acting was developing around this period, how it was rare to see Jackie act emotional before this movie was made, how the movie deals with the theme of sacrifice, the different look of the movie and some of its jarring elements, the location work used in the movie versus what looks to have been shot on a set, the clash of styles on display in the movie, how the state of Hong Kong and its film industry affected the movie, the different cast and crew members that worked on the picture and more.
Also new to this disc is Criminally Creative: The Story Of A Stylistic U-Turn, in which Andrew Heskins, a film critic For Easternkicks.com, goes over how Jackie Chan made a pretty drastic change of pace with his work on Crime Story. Over ten minutes, Heskins talks about what makes the movie unusual by the usual Jackie Chan standards, how the movie was ripped from the headlines in Hong Kong, how audiences would have been confused by the different nature of this movie, how Chan got injured on the shoot in the opening scene, the film's reputation as a Cat III film (which it isn't) and thoughts on Jackie Chan's performance in the movie.
Up next is an interview with Bruce Law that runs fifty-seven minutes and covers a lot of ground including how he got his start as a stuntman, how he learned to do stunt work in the first place, what the industry was like when he got his start and why he is often the one performing the most dangerous stunts. He also talks about training new stuntmen, what qualities in a person make a good stuntman, what goes into staging different kinds of action set pieces, his thoughts no Chinese cinema and Hong Kong cinema, trying to bring realism to his work on Crime Story, how budgetary restraints affected his work on the movie, what Jackie Chan was like to work with on the movie, Kirk Wong's abilities as a director and quite a bit more.
The disc also has an archival interview with writer Teddy Chan running twelve minutes. Here he speaks about how he started writing Crime Story, working with the film's director Kirk Wong, the true events that inspired the movie, trying to keep things realistic and working with the police department for that reason, how the film was originally intended for Jet Li, learning from Kirk Wong and working with Jackie Chan later on The Accidental Spy.
We also get an eleven minute archival interview with director Kirk Wong which allows the director to share his thoughts on the story and the script as well as memories on the making of the movie and what it was like working with Jackie Chan on the project.
Finishing up disc seven are seven minutes of deleted scenes from the Singapore version of the movie and an original theatrical trailer.
Disc Eight – City Hunter:
The last disc in the set features a new audio commentary with David West who talks about the manga series that inspired the movie, details on the history of the property, the film's box office success, some of the more absurd elements in the movie, details on the different cast and crew members that worked on the movie, Wong Jing's career and some of the controversy surrounding him, the quality of the action scenes in the movie as well as the fight scenes.
what makes City Hunter unique, how Jackie Chan's star was just starting to rise in the west despite his massive success in Asia, how Chan was taking risks during this period, some of the films that Jackie Chan produced around this period, how the ratings system affected the movie, thoughts on some of the supporting players in the movie, how the stunts have a very different feel in this movie and why this will never be one of his favorite Jackie Chan films.
From there we dig into a selection of archival interviews, starting with Jackie Chan himself in a fourteen minute piece where he talks about some of the more ridiculous aspects of the movie, how he tried to make the movie almost like a live action cartoon, changes that were made in the movie that he didn't agree with, having to overcome the stigma early in his career that he was another Bruce Lee knock off, going on to make movies like Rush Hour where it was okay if his English wasn't 100% perfect, working with Richard Norton and more.
An archival interview with Director Wong Jing runs seven minutes and lets the director speak about where the original idea came from for City Hunter, working with Golden Harvest, thoughts on the source material, working with Jackie Chan as well as some other Hong Kong stars, what Chan was like to work with, wanting the movie to be fun, working with Jet Li and Sammo Hung and the Hong Kong film industry in general.
Stuntman Rocky Lai is up next in an eleven minute archival piece where he talks about how he got into the film industry and into stunt work after first being hired as a driver, how having martial arts training helps in stunt work, working with Wong Jing, memories of shooting specific action set pieces, what Jackie Chan was like on set, getting injured on set and how filmmaking and stunts have changed over the years.
The archival interview with Richard Norton sees the actor speak for fifteen minutes about how much he enjoyed working with Jackie Chan, what some of the sets and locations were like, how complicated and long it can be to shoot a lengthy fight scene when Jackie Chan wants to get it his way, what his experiences as an actor in Hong Kong have been like and how common it is to not have a proper script to work with, how you wind up doing things in Hong Kong movies that you'd never do in a western film, how Wong Jing directed the drama and Jackie Chan did most of the action and lots more.
The last archival interview is with Gary Daniels and it runs thirty minutes and it covers how he got his start in martial arts at eight years old after seeing a trailer for Enter The Dragon, his love of Marvel Comics heroes, how he got into acting and film after his martial arts training, his thoughts on Bruce Lee's philosophy and teachings, some of his experiences early in his film career and what went right and what went wrong, how he wound up in City Hunter, working with Richard Norton and Jackie Chan, why he likes the unpredictable nature of Hong Kong movies, his thoughts on shooting fight scenes, how the Hong Kong industry differs from the typical Hollywood production and the importance of getting the right rhythm down when shooting a fight scene.
The disc also includes an outtakes music video, a five minute collection of outtakes, the Japanese ending credits sequence, the original theatrical trailer, a still gallery, menus and chapter selection options.
The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 - The Final Word:
Shout! Factory’s Blu-ray release of The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 is, overall, really strong. It brings together an excellent assortment of Jackie Chan’s films from what is the most popular era of his career for a reason. While not all of the films here are classics, most of them are and each one is given a very nice presentation and loads of extra features documenting its history and cultural significance. Here’s hoping there’s a third volume in the works!
Click on the images below, or right click and open in a new window, for full sized The Jackie Chan Collection Vol. 2 Blu-ray screen caps!
