Film Review: Shanghai Knights (2003)
After decades of trying, Jackie Chan has succeeded in expanding his stardom from Asia into the West. He did it by recognising his limited command of English, which required him to match his atlethic and phyiscal comedy skills by verbal skills of his Western partners that made “buddy buddy” teams. Such formula, first used with Chris Tucker in Rush Hour, was later employed with Owen Wilson in western comedy Shanghai Noon. Three years later the pair returned for the sequel Shanghai Knights, directed by David Dobkin.
The plot, set in last late 1880s, begin with two protagonists of the previous begin being apart. Chon Wang a.k.a. John Wayne (played by Jackie Chan), former Chinese Imperial guard and martial arts expert, now works as sheriff in Nevada. His friend Roy O’Bannon (played by Owen Wilson) lives as playoboy on US East Coast. When Lord Nelson Rathbone (played by Aidan Gillen), evil English aristocrat, kills Chon’s father (played by Kim Chan) in order to steal Chinese Imperial seal, Chong Wang recruits his friend Roy for the mission to retrieve it. For Rathbone it is part scheme in which he would help Chinese emperor’s half-brother Wu Chow (played by Donnie Yen) to usurp his country’s throne and vice versa. Chon Wang wants to prevent this also because his sister Chon Lin (played by Fann Wong) also went after the seal. Trail leads to London where Chon Wang and Roy will be assisted by Artie Doyle (played by Tom Fisher), kind-hearted inspector of Scotland Yard. Wang and Roy discover Rathbone’s diabolical plan to use new invention – machine gun – to assassinate Queen Victoria (played by Gemma Jones) and the rest of royal family in order to take British throne. Situation, however, gets complicated when it turns out that Roy began to feel attracted to his friend’s sister.
Just like Shanghai Noon, this film asks viewer to use as little brain as possible and not ask any unnecessary questions, otherwise they would be deprived of entertainment. This could be applied to rather simple plot which serves as nothing but adhesive for number of spectacular action scenes. On the other hand, script by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar has somewhat schizophrenic attitude to the period. On one hand, authors are obviously fascinated with Victorian London, but, on the other hand that toss into the plot number of anachronistic details like Zeppelins, motor cars, machine guns, Jack the Ripper or moving pictures. Shanghai Knights also give homage to the masters of silent comedy films like Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and Charles Chaplin, with the latter anachronistically appearing as character (played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson) despite not being born or being an infant in a time when the plot takes place. Jackie Chan was obviously thrilled to pay explicit homage to the ancient cinema legends that had obviously inspired his own career. The audience is also going to enjoy this film, with humour being of slightly better quality and Owen Wilson working very hard not to be irritating. Even the famous end credit “bloopers” show that Jackie Chan was in better form than three years earlier. This is one of the reasons why ?Shanghai Knights should be recommended to his fans and fans of action comedy in general.
RATING: 6/10 (++)
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