| Jackie Chan finally reveals the tricks and the trades of his business for you to enjoy but how does it rate? I will reveal all. First, I just want to point out that I am reviewing the Mandarin version, the one in which Jackie Chan can speak fluently and can fully explain himself without the need of help (his english is a little broken). Jackie Chan: , (now refered to as 'JC'), My Stunts starts off with a narrator talking briefly about JC before he made it as a superstar. This then moves on to a section where JC talks about how they used to do special effects and choreography, back in the days when he did The Young Master and The Hand of Death. This section has interspersed bits of the mentioned movies plus many other in it. This section lasts for approximately 15 minutes.
The second section, called 'Training For Danger' has clips of JC, Ken Lo and the Sing Gar Ban doing rigorous training with weights and the punch bag. However this section really emphasizes on the falls in his films, such as the 360, 420, front fall, back fall stopping in mid-air etc. JC just explains that it's really just jargon and that he gets confused too! It just has the Sing Gar Ban demonstrating the fall and then clips of JC's film with people doing the same fall. This last for about 10 minutes.
The third section talks about the Police Story-series and the success of it and that it got Hong Kong into the modern era. He revisits the sites of Police Story 1 & 2, with the bus stunts in PS1 and the second floor break-in through the glass in PS2 getting emphasized on. Also explained is the Police Story shopping centre scene, with the infamous pole slide stunt. This section last for about 15 minutes.
Next, is a section on Who Am I?. This part mainly talks about the fight sequence on top of the skyscraper, using the wind and extra props to make the action as exciting as possible. Ron Smooenberg (the tall gwailo at the end of Who Am I?), as JC finds out, is quite useless in choreographed action and has to doubled by none other then respected Jackie Chan Stunt Team member, Brad Allen. Other topics include the other action sequences such as the car chase and the BMW drop from the skyscraper. This section last for a good 30 minutes or so.
The fourth section is where it REALLY begins! Enter, JC's Stunt Lab, where him and his people create and practise their stunts. Demonstrations in this section includes: How to make kicks/punches look more powerful, (with my favourite JC Stunt Team member, Rocky Lai from No Problem 2) how to kick someone in the head without hurting them and how to use glass properly. After all of that, the Sing Gar ban strut their arse kicking stuff to show us how stunts should be done. Also explained are guns, and how not to flinch when using them, and of course, explosions. This section last for about 25 minutes.
The fifth and sixth section has JC explaining throughly the use of props and how to use them to a comedic effect, such as using a shopping trolley's baby seat to hit people and the use of a fridge, where JC could, after a fight, eat an ice cream! The masterpiece of this whole disc is the JC choreographed fighting sequences, and the faulty outtakes that are narrated by JC himself, explaining what's wrong in each shot or piece of action. Highly informative, really makes you think about how much effort is put into a sequence like this when you watch something like The Young Master. +
The seventh section talks about Jackie on set of Rush Hour. The narrator explains about what is happening on the scene that is being shown and what JC is trying to achieve in the scene. After that, a short conclusion comes in, explaining what has been said to you, and a summary. The eighth, and final section, has JC talking about his future aims, what you have seen what has been uncovered by JC himself and what YOU can do to become a action chorographer.
Jackie, I feel has directed this piece very well, pointing at camera at where it should be, using a lot of different camera angle to focus on what he is trying to say. JC uses, most of the time, mid shots to film this, some times using a very panned out shot to show something like a fight. Jackie explains his views very clearly, even though I feel he has uses onomatopoeia too much, (too many 'BOOM!'s), and he does describe everything as beautiful, which explains his education and lack of vocabulary...
Overall, highly informative, well worth getting and very interesting, especially if you're a huge JC fan, (like me). |