However, Ryu's romantic plans quickly go astray when a gang of ruthless criminals hijack the ship and hold the passengers to ransom. To save the day Jackie Chan's unique action style reigns supreme in a series of brilliantly conceived fight sequences as Ryu swings into action to dispatch the bad guys and rescue the gorgeous Shizuko!

Jackie Chan is Ryu Saeba, the eponymous City Hunter. He's a private investigator, womaniser, and all-round arrogant hero. He once had a partner who was unfortunately killed (though Ryu claims it was because he wasn't there). His partner's dying wish was that he looked after his sister, pre-teen at the time, and to promise that he would never seduce her like he had a tendency to try and do, looking at the 12 year old girl Ryu agrees. Unfortunately for Ryu, his partner's sister Kaori grows up into a lovely-looking young woman who not only becomes his new assistant but is also in love with him. She is constantly frustrated by Ryu's fondness for the ladies, but keeps trying to win his affection anyway, planning a cruise on a new liner for the both of them to celebrate his birthday. However Ryu is called to the building of a Japanese businessman who wants the City Hunter to locate his teenage gymnast daughter Kiyoko, who ran away from home when he wanted to remarry. Ryu and Kaori travel to Hong Kong to find her, but after an elaborate skateboard chase she eludes Ryu, and stealing a man's clothes as a disguise she discovers the ticket for a cruise in one of the pocket. Meanwhile Ryu returns home to find a gaggle of women waiting for him, who secretly want revenge for our hero getting them all arrested and put in prison. Kaori returns to find Ryu with the woman, gets annoyed, and takes her lecherous cousin on the cruise with her instead, which incidentally is the same cruise Kiyoko just boarded!

Ryu desperately tries to catch Kaori before she gets on the cruise liner, but finds himself having to stow away on board when he's kicked out for not having a ticket. Also on board the liner are some suspicious westerners lead by MacDonald (Richard Norton) and Kim (R0D fave Gary Daniels!), an agent of some sort named Saeko Nogami (Chingmy Yau of Naked Killer fame) who is on board with her goofy cousin as a cover for an investigation into an alleged hijacking attempt to be made on board. Are you keeping up so far? There's also Tramp Kao Ta, the gambling king of Asia who happens to also be an expert martial artist who has a talent for using playing cards as deadly weapons, there's also a couple of incredibly goofy comic relief guys who turn up occasionally to be invasively annoying. Kiyoko (that's the businessman's daughter in case you're getting lost, I know I am) is unfortunate enough to be in the cabin next to our scheming whitey bad guys and after one of the henchmen accidentally sets off his gun, Kiyoko puts her ear to the wall and hears their whole plan for taking the millionaires on board the ship hostage and taking them to Thailand. She is discovered however and tries to escape, saved by the hungry Ryu, desperately searching the ship for food without being caught by any of the crew. MacDonald crashes the festivities on board the ship and takes control with his heavily-armed cronies, intent on taking all the money he can and killing everybody. However with Kaori and her lecherous cousin, Saeko, Tramp Kao Ta, and the City Hunter himself on board, he's got his worked cut out!

Like I said, I haven't seen the City Hunter manga or anime at the time of writing this, so I have to review this without making any comparisons to the source material. However, on its own merit, this is comical, crazy, yet rather violent movie. Apparently Jackie and his co-director Wong Jing did not get on at all during the making of this film, leading to a rather public dispute between the two, though the film has not noticeably suffered for it. City Hunter is a little like Steven Segal's Under Siege, only with Jackie Chan's trademark wacky sense of fun soaking into much of it. Jackie totally plays Ryu Saeba for laughs, constantly mugging and acting foolishly, though that still doesn't get in the way of his performance in the action sequences, his fights looking as crisp as ever, this IS the perfectionist Jackie Chan after all. The film is filled with pratfalls, stupid facial expressions, and inane dialogue and performances. There are a number of entertaining action sequences too, though most are played for laughs or have such a zany soundtrack playing over them that they can't be taken seriously. The combination of comedy and action reaches a demented peak when Kim throws Ryu into a Street Fighter 2 arcade machine, and they take on the appearance of the characters and are accompanied by music from the game, which anyone who has played it should get a kick out of.

The comedy doesn't always quite fit though, especially due to the surprising amount of violence in the movie, especially towards the women. The four female characters, at one time or another, are punched, kicked, dropped, fall down stairs, get knocked silly, and are generally bashed about in the name of comedy. Sometimes it works, but it occurs far too often and goes against the fun-loving nature of the movie. Also, there is perhaps just a little too much comedy. Kaori has her weird cousin who hates City Hunter and wants to get in her pants, Saeko has her goofy cousin who keeps getting into mishaps, then there are the two weird guys who just pop up and act like idiots for no good reason, and lets not forget that Jackie is playing City Hunter for laughs too. The wacky spirit of the production has a habit of diluting the action at times, such as the fight sequences being accompanied by cartoony music, and women getting punched in the stomach just so they can lie on the floor with stupid expressions on their faces. As with a number of Hong Kong movies I've seen, there are quite simply too many characters, Tramp Kao Ta is especially useless and feels very tacked-on, he has a couple of memorable sequences but they make no difference to the plot and don't really seem connected to the rest of the movie, ultimately he's wasted.

However, this is still an extremely enjoyable movie. Jackie, as usual, has a couple of great fights, one with Gary Daniels and then the final showdown with Australian martial artist Richard Norton. The one with Norton was especially good, taking six weeks to shoot you can see just how much work went into each intricate set of moves, and it makes for a spectacular climax. The fight sequences are probably where Jackie's goofing off works the best too, it never gets old seeing him block attacks with a part of his body and then having to retreat because it hurt him so much, makes him far more human. There is also a nice tribute to Bruce Lee as Jackie fights two large black fellows in a theatre that is showing the fight between Bruce Lee and Kareem Abdul-Jabaar from Game of Death, Jackie copying Bruce's moves against Kareem in order to beat them. The humour, though at times excessive and not always hitting the mark, is broad enough for most people to ‘get', rather than some Hong Kong comedies that don't translate so well to people unfamiliar with the culture of its origin country. Indeed, I laughed out loud a couple of times which I've not done since I first saw Chan's excellent Armour of God.

Being a Hong Kong movie its still not going to appeal to everyone, but Chan has created another action packed comedy that is a fine addition to the genre, and well worth seeking out for some admittedly quite low-brow but exciting entertainment.

Four years later I saw Hard-Boiled and since then I've been addicted to Hong-Kong cinema. I had seen a few Jackie Chan movies by now, (All the American ones, about 10 of the Hong Kong ones) and I thought it was about time I saw City Hunter again, since I now appreciated Chinese movies. I read a few reviews on this film before I spent my hard earned £5 on it. The reviews I read were very mixed. From people saying that it was "the worst film ever" to people saying, "it rules!".

Well, I bought it anyway, and I must admit I was quite pleased. It still had more corn than a Hillbillies foot, but I understood it this time! The action was quite frequent and at times funny. The girls in the film (and there's plenty) are gorgeous. And Jackie is as funny as ever. The film is quite boring at times and the famous "Street Fighter II" scene wasn't that impressive, but overall this flick was well worth the £5 I spent on it (except for the fact that half way through the film the tape went blank for about half a minute).

BTW did anyone else notice that the Clarinet tune from Hard-Boiled was playing in the posh clothes shop?

Based on a popular Japanese Manga comic, the film has a larger than life style and from the cartoonish opening you know that anything that follows is not to be taken seriously at all. Jackie plays Ryu Saeba, a womanising private detective given the job of tracking down the wayward daughter of a wealthy businessman. The trail leads to a luxury ocean liner which, once at sea, becomes set upon by a gang of international terrorists lead by Richard Norton.

In the original comic Ryu Saeba was supposed to be sex crazed almost to the point of perversity (I've never read it but this is what I've heard), however this is a Jackie Chan film so the content has been toned down. While there is a parade of gorgeous women where is no smut but plenty of bawdy humour instead. Joey Wong appears as Ryu's devoted assistant. While she is in love with Ryu he has made a vow to his dead partner never to try to seduce her. Instead Ryu finds himself drawn towards the girl he is tracking, played by Japanese gymnast Goto Kumiko, and another private detective played by Chingamy Yau. Aside from the beautiful women, the movie is filled with interesting characters; Leon Lai has a great cameo as the Prince of Gamblers who carries a deck of razor edged cards, Ken Lo appears as a very camp henchman and Gary Daniels is the villain's musclebound right hand man.

While the first half of the film is reasonably entertaining it only really contains one action piece, that being an exciting skateboard chase. The high point of this comes when Jackie bursts through a plate glass window followed by the gang of skateboarders chasing him.

Things don't really get going until the second half when the terrorists take over the cruise liner and the film turns very 'Die Hard' (albeit a very silly 'Die Hard'). Richard Norton leads the super slick criminals and is excellent as the master villain. Despite all of its daftness, 'City Hunter' does contain some well choreographed fight sequences. One of the most memorable scenes comes when Jackie faces two giant terrorists, who must be about seven foot tall each, in the ship's cinema. After being roughly thrown about for the first few minutes of the fight Jackie takes inspiration from the film currently being shown on the screen; its the Bruce Lee/Kareen Abdul Jabar fight from 'Game of Death'. Needless to say that Jackie is then able to defeat his attackers.

There's also an excellent sequence where Jackie and Chingamy Yau join forces to wipe out a group of terrorists. In a completely surreal scene the two perform a kind of dance routine while shooting their assailants. One of the silliest, yet most entertaining scenes comes where Jackie faces Gary Daniels for the second time as the two become characters from the 'Street Fighter 2' arcade game. While the special effects are somewhat basic the scene still works quite well.

The final showdown fight between Jackie and Richard Norton is excellent stuff with plenty of weaponry use. There's a cracking sequence where Jackie uses tonfas against Richard Norton's fighting sticks. While this scene is not without its surreal moments, in keeping with the rest of the film, its still an impressive display.

I can understand why some might not take to this movie as it does, at times, seem as if it is aimed at a much younger audience than usual but there is very little time to get bored and the steady flow of action and comedy keeps it entertaining.

Like most of Wong Jing's film's, City Hunter goes all over the map. Most of the film is played for laughs, and has a very cartoonish feel to it (complete with Warner Bros.-type sound effects). The last part, with Ryo taking on the terrorists, still has a high level of comedy to it (including a sequence where Chan transforms into characters from the Street Fighter II video game), but pumps up the action level, culminating in an excellent fight between Chan and Norton (one of the better gweilo actors/martial artists).

Turn off your brain and you should have fun with this one. Hey, any movie with Chingmy Yau in a black leather Lara Croft-style outfit can't be all that bad.

REVIEW:
Comics have an infamous history of making terrible live action films, at least in the U.S. While not terribly familiar with the City Hunter anime, I certainly had hopes that the HK film industry could pull a decent film out of such material. My hopes were, unfortunately, let down. There really is a point where elements of a comic or anime stop translating well to live action. City Hunter managed to find that point and blow right past it. With poor acting, cheesy comedy, and mediocre action, City Hunter holds no more than a few chuckles for the 90 minutes you'll spend on it.

City Hunter is all about going over the top. The acting, the effects, the comedy.... everything. It is all a little too over-the-top. Acting is universally poor, with everyone overacting everything. This may have been what Wong Jing wanted, but it sucks. After a few minutes it gets damn annoying. The comedy is straight out of a cartoon, including gags like hitting someone with an oversized hammer. The sound effects are even straight out of a cartoon: boink, bam, crash. It is an interesting approach to converting comic to live action, but it is just hard to buy as such. The absolute worst is during a scene where Ryo and his opponent take on the personalities of Street Fighter II characters. Not only is this very, very cheesy but it is out of place. It is obvious that Wong Jing wanted to stick it in there just because he had the rights to use the game in a movie, regardless of wether it fit. Sorry, man, we don't buy it.

The one thing that fans are always able to feel good about in a Jackie movie is that at least the action will be decent. Well, City Hunter manages to even take that away from us. Action is mediocre at best, with no sense of excitement or tension. Some action parts are completely off the wall, yet lacking any flair or excitement to back them up. Others are more reasonable, but are fairly dull. Even the best fight in this film is worse than most fights in other Jackie movies. The only impressive piece of choreography to be found was when Ryo takes on a guard in red with a machine gun and manages to get the machine gun strapped around his own shoulder, after a few crazy moves. Beyond that, the action is disappointing.

City Hunter is a hard recommendation for anybody. It has many weaknesses with few redeeming traits to make up for them. There are a few laughs throughout that prevent the movie from being too bad, but that's about it. Jackie is a great comedian, but this just isn't his type of comedy and the combination doesn't work. Jackie fans may wanna check this out just to see what this role is like for Jackie. City Hunter anime fans may want to see how the film translated. Both groups will likely be disappointed, but it is an experience. Everyone else should just stay away.

Filled with highly stylized and vibrantly colored visuals, and many of Hong Kong's most beautiful women, "City Hunter" has won the hearts of fans all over the world with its infectious humor and brilliantly conceived fight sequences, which include comic tributes to Bruce Lee's "Game Of Death" and arcade-hit "Street Fighter 2". Action-packed from beginning to end, the movie features an amazing skateboard chase, two great fight sequences with British kickboxking hero Gary Daniels, and a wonderful high-impact encounter with veteran Australian performer and all-round nice guy Richard Norton.

A guaranteed winner, "City Hunter" was a box-office sensation in Hong Kong upon its release and also scored big in the international theatrical circuit.