The Best of Jackie Chan

[Jekyll]

Jackie is one of my all time favorites and each year I have a blast revisiting some of his films. Thought it would be fun to make a list and compare with other fans:

Here are the categories:

Top 3 favorite films
Top 3 stunts
Top 3 fights or action sequences


My list:
Top 3 Films
1. Dragons Forever
2. Police Story
3. Wheels on Meals

Honorable mention: Project A

Top 3 Stunts:
1. Who Am I, building slide
2. Police Story, pole slide
3. Project A, clock tower fall

Top 3 Fights or Action Sequences
1. Jackie Chan vs Benny The Jet: Dragons Forever and Wheels on Meals
2. Drunken Master 2 final fight sequence
3. Police Story mall fight

[SpiderClops]

Ooof!! Those are hard to pick! So much greatness. But I'll try:

Top 3 Films:

1. Police Story
2. Drunken Master 2
3. Who Am I?

Top 3 Stunts:

1. 100 Ft Pole Slide decorated with bulbs and everything from Police Story
2. Clock Tower fall from Project A
3. Rotterdam building slide from Who Am I?

Top 3 Fights:

1. Rooftop fight from Who Am I?
2. Drunken boxing climax from Drunken Master 2
3. Shopping mall climax from Police Story

[Tien Long]

Ha nice. Can only say that I'm more familiar with Jackie's fights. Here are mine:

1) Drunken Boxing climax from Drunken Boxing 2 - This firmly cemented me being a practitioner of Kung Fu. For a good while in 2000, I'd spend every Friday night watching this fight on my Legend of Drunken Master DVD.

2) Shopping mall climax from Police Story - Still love this. Fight scene and action are top notch. It's endearing to me since I lived close to the Wing On Plus mall (the mall where the fight took place) while I lived in Hong Kong! Visited that place dozens of times too. It's definitely not as popping as it used to be like in the film, but bought some things there once or twice.

3) Fight scene in the church, Shanghai Noon - This movie came out when I was just becoming a fan of Jackie Chan back in 2000. Jackie was riding a wave of popularity then in Hollywood. (Granted, he was usually paired with a Hollywood actor, like Owen Wilson or Chris Tucker, but he was still getting exposure). In any case, I liked his fight scene with a fellow imperial soldier in this scene. Both are using traditional weapons like the spear, saber, and three section staff. The director on the DVD commentary said that they couldn't out-Matrix the Matrix so they decided to go old school Kung Fu film. Great stuff!

[Jekyll]

Ha nice. Can only say that I'm more familiar with Jackie's fights. Here are mine:

1) Drunken Boxing climax from Drunken Boxing 2 - This firmly cemented me being a practitioner of Kung Fu. For a good while in 2000, I'd spend every Friday night watching this fight on my Legend of Drunken Master DVD.

2) Shopping mall climax from Police Story - Still love this. Fight scene and action are top notch. It's endearing to me since I lived close to the Wing On Plus mall (the mall where the fight took place) while I lived in Hong Kong! Visited that place dozens of times too. It's definitely not as popping as it used to be like in the film, but bought some things there once or twice.

3) Fight scene in the church, Shanghai Noon - This movie came out when I was just becoming a fan of Jackie Chan back in 2000. Jackie was riding a wave of popularity then in Hollywood. (Granted, he was usually paired with a Hollywood actor, like Owen Wilson or Chris Tucker, but he was still getting exposure). In any case, I liked his fight scene with a fellow imperial soldier in this scene. Both are using traditional weapons like the spear, saber, and three section staff. The director on the DVD commentary said that they couldn't out-Matrix the Matrix so they decided to go old school Kung Fu film. Great stuff!

That is so neat! Living in the south my options at the time were limited when it came to martial arts studios, so I took Tae-Kwon-Do for years and loved it! Late 90s/early 00s is when I discovered Jackie as well and I started tracking down his films on VHS at pawn shops, I had quite the collection. I am going back and replacing with either Blu ray or DVD but some of them are hard to track down.

[Jekyll]

Ooof!! Those are hard to pick! So much greatness. But I'll try:

Top 3 Films:

1. Police Story
2. Drunken Master 2
3. Who Am I?

Top 3 Stunts:

1. 100 Ft Pole Slide decorated with bulbs and everything from Police Story
2. Clock Tower fall from Project A
3. Rotterdam building slide from Who Am I?

Top 3 Fights:

1. Rooftop fight from Who Am I?
2. Drunken boxing climax from Drunken Master 2
3. Shopping mall climax from Police Story

Nice list! Quite similar to mine That roof top fight in Who Am I is fantastic.

[marshal88]

Nice list! Quite similar to mine That roof top fight in Who Am I is fantastic.

speaking of the rooftop fight , they used a lot of camera cutting for the dutch martial artist ron smoorenburg fight scenes with jackie chan as ron couldn't get in sync with jackie's timing so brad allen (from gorgeous) who is shorter than jackie has to sub for ron.

[LoganAlpha30X33]

I know that he does fights well but I almost like his bloopers better...

[Cyke]

The fight against Jeice and Burter in Who Am I is iconic for me. And of course, Drunken Master 2.

Favorite Honorable Mention: It's not his best work since it's merely just a cameo, but the sheer novelty of human Jackie Chan vs. a superhuman vampire is just great. He has to give it his all while the vampire has all its physical advantages, and to further emphasize the point, the vampire has wirework while Jackie... does not (aside from maybe one fall, and if so it's likely more for him to fall safely rather than any ability feats).

[Jekyll]

speaking of the rooftop fight , they used a lot of camera cutting for the dutch martial artist ron smoorenburg fight scenes with jackie chan as ron couldn't get in sync with jackie's timing so brad allen (from gorgeous) who is shorter than jackie has to sub for ron.

Holy cow! Never knew this. This is fantastic! Thanks for sharing.

[Jekyll]

I know that he does fights well but I almost like his bloopers better...

Definitely!!!

[Cyke]

Skewing a little off topic, but Team Jackie member Brad Allen (who subbed in for Smoorenburg in that clip above) went on to become a successful fight choreographer in his own right, thanks to Jackie's tutelage. He's worked for big films like in the MCU, but he also did one of my favorite unexpected fight movies of all time, The World's End:



It's one thing to work with super-fit actors and ultra-skilled stuntpeople, it's totally another to choregraph a fun and kinetic (and highly improbable) fight scene featuring middle aged men past their prime.

[SpiderClops]

Holy cow! Never knew this. This is fantastic! Thanks for sharing.

Then you really need to see the documentary 'Jackie Chan: My Stunts'.

[Tien Long]

That is so neat! Living in the south my options at the time were limited when it came to martial arts studios, so I took Tae-Kwon-Do for years and loved it! Late 90s/early 00s is when I discovered Jackie as well and I started tracking down his films on VHS at pawn shops, I had quite the collection. I am going back and replacing with either Blu ray or DVD but some of them are hard to track down.

Ha, that reminds me how I first was introduced to Drunken Master 2. Yeah, I got the DVD back in 2000, but I was first exposed to the movie around the mid-90s. There was an Asian supermarket where I used to live that rented out bootleg VHS' copies of Chinese films. My dad and I rented it and it just floored me. The 9 minute fight scene at the end was just pure perfection and exceeded any of the American martial arts films. Wasn't able to rent it again since I didn't exactly know the name of the film and my dad was the translator. But I caught a glimpse and that primed me to watch out for the DVD American release.

speaking of the rooftop fight , they used a lot of camera cutting for the dutch martial artist ron smoorenburg fight scenes with jackie chan as ron couldn't get in sync with jackie's timing so brad allen (from gorgeous) who is shorter than jackie has to sub for ron.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtbPHmPJB1A

Heard about this. That's the thing about HK martial arts fight choreography, there's a rhythm to them. That's because Jackie and many of his generation were raised in the Chinese opera, which uses this music to tell a story. Check how it's explained here:



A lot of fighters when they come to Hong Kong have trouble getting into this rhythm.

Skewing a little off topic, but Team Jackie member Brad Allen (who subbed in for Smoorenburg in that clip above) went on to become a successful fight choreographer in his own right, thanks to Jackie's tutelage. He's worked for big films like in the MCU, but he also did one of my favorite unexpected fight movies of all time, The World's End:

It's one thing to work with super-fit actors and ultra-skilled stuntpeople, it's totally another to choregraph a fun and kinetic (and highly improbable) fight scene featuring middle aged men past their prime.

Brad Allen is awesome. He's the stunt supervisor for the upcoming Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings film.

[Angilasman]

Hmmm... there's a lot of holes in my HK film knowledge, but the first two Police Story films and Wheels on Meals are the favorites of what I've seen. Love those flicks! The fight between Jackie and Benny is probably my favorite movie fight.

[Jekyll]

Hmmm... there's a lot of holes in my HK film knowledge, but the first two Police Story films and Wheels on Meals are the favorites of what I've seen. Love those flicks! The fight between Jackie and Benny is probably my favorite movie fight.

If you loved Wheel on Meals, I highly recommend Dragons Forever which features another fantastic fight between JC and Benny.