I first saw Police Story back in 1989 on VHS. I loved it and thought it was a riot. The fight scenes were great and I just couldn't believe the things Jackie Chan would do to put action on the screen. That is what makes his movies so great. You see the action and amazing stunts and you KNOW that is Jackie doing it, not some stunt double and since he's doing it, it's not that unbelievable. Plus, he knows how to be funny on screen and it works so well with everything going on. His fighting style is not some fancy martial arts. Like Jackie says, it's street fighting and unlike other heroes, Jackie gets so beat up and yet he still gets up and makes you cheer for the good guy.
Now, with this DVD release, you get the movie the way it was. The VHS was at 90 minutes. This version is at 101 minutes which means there were some added scenes which I can't remember for the life of me. It's been so long since I saw the VHS version that I don't know what scenes were put back in.
You can watch it in the English dubbed voices in 5.1, in the original Cantonese in 5.1 or the original Cantonese in mono. Personally, I love it in the Cantonese language because when they dub to American, they try to change the dialog a bit to fit the lip movement. With the Cantonese track, you get to feel the real emotions that the actors used in the scene. Also, unlike his later films, Jackie did NOT dub his own voice in here on the English track.
You would think that is where it would end with this, but no. There is so much more here than the movie.
First off, you have commentary by Rush Hour director Brett Ratner and Asian Film Expert Bey Logan. It's too bad Jackie didn't lend his comments as well. I would have loved that. However, you do get a conversation with Jackie Chan that lasts about 10 minutes where he goes over the stunt work, how he likes to do his own stunts, etc. It is especially interesting to know that they didn't have the budget to rehearse various stunt scenes, so they did them usually in one take. This resulted in some serious injuries, especially with the bus scene. It's amazing to hear how some people came close to death making this film, but when you watch the film, you can see why.
There is also a 35-minute feature where they speak with the people of the Jackie Chan Stunt Team (Sing Ga Ban). Here, many members of this team talk about what everyone's role was, how great it was to work with Jackie, etc. A VERY interesting retrospective on Jackie and his work ethic.
There is also a 6 minute feature that is a tribute to Jackie Chan with Brett Ratner talking about how this movie is so great.
Along with all of this, you also get various deleted scenes, alternate opening and ending as well as a deleted scenes montage that shows some scenes wrapped in between the released scenes so you can see where they would have fit in.
If you've never seen a Jackie Chan film before (what rock have you been under if you haven't?), then see this one first. The stunt work and action is raw and in real time. No wires, no digital enhancements, just pure, raw stunt work caught on film in real time.
Excellent DVD release and it's about time!
Finally its on dvd, and long overdue one of the best Jackie Chan movies ever made. Police Story is classic Chan at its best, including terrific action and great Chan humor. Jackie Chan plays "Kevin Chan", and is a one man army in this action blast.
After capturing a criminal drug lord in an explosive action-packed beginning sequence, the movie only begins to take off, as Chan constantly fights off goon after goon wherever he goes to protect a witness to the criminal. The drug lord only frames Chan for killing another cop, result, Chan becomes one angry and determined man to take matters on his own hands to capture the guy once and for all, who had escaped his first capture swiftly thanks to his ridiculous lawyer at the hearing.
The action is constant from beginning to end, and where there isn't Chan fighting and action, there is the comedy and humor, resulting in great pacing overall. The real treat of Poilce Story is the final fight in the shopping mall, where fist fly, glass breaks everywhere, motorcycles run, and Chan performs an outrageous stunt that is shown 3 times from different angles during the movie sliding down a multi-story string of lights and crashing into a glass house. Simply amazing and one of his best known stunts ever.
Poilce Story is a must for the heart of any Jackie Chan collection, and now that its on dvd you can experience this much deserved movie in better than VHS quality. Thank God Poilce Story 2 is to be released soon too, another excellent Chan flick!
Buy Police Story (1985) Now
Jackie Chan worked on the violent action movie The Protector in 1985. The film was a critical and commercial flop. Chan did not get along with director James Glickenhaus. In Hong Kong, Chan re-edited and re-shot scenes for the Hong Kong version of The Protector, but the movie was still a failure. Chan took matters into his own hands by directing and starring in Police Story(1985). He plays Chan Ka Kui. In the English dubbed versions, he's known as "Kevin Chan" in the UK English dub and "Jackie Chan" in the US New Line Cinema version released on VHS. Chan plays a Hong Kong police officer who tries to put crooked businessman Tom Koo/Chu To(Chor Yuen) in jail. Chu To frames Officer Chan for murder and he must find a way to prove that he's innocent. A young Maggie Cheung plays Chan's on screen girlfriend May. In Hong Kong, Police Story is known as Ging Chat Goo Si. The HK version is longer than the US cut and the Japanese version has more key scenes.
After my high school graduation, I didn't go to sober grad or a party. I stayed at home, ate cake and pizza and watched Jackie Chan movies. Chan and his stunt team put some real elbow grease into their work. We get to see Jackie Chan kick and punch people and fly through glass! We see stuntmen fall three stories and crash into furniture. Brigette Lin plays a woman who tries to help Officer Chan prove his innocence. Bill Tung became a regular in Jackie Chan movies around this time.
Police Story isn't perfect. There's a gag in a court room that has a cheap payoff! Chan throws in some slapstick humor to take the edge off the story. May hits Chan in the face with a birthday cake after getting angry! The action scene where cars drive through a dumpy town was used again in Bad Boys II(2003). The scene where a bad guy flies through a windshield was referenced in Tango and Cash(1989). Police Story(1985) is still one of my favorite Jackie Chan movies.
Read Best Reviews of Police Story (1985) Here
I have to say that I vastly prefer Jackie Chan's work during the '70s and '80s, and I prefer his Asian movies to his Hollywood movies (although RUMBLE IN THE BRONX is pretty good). Jackie Chan has so many awesome action flicks under his belt I don't know that I can say for certain that POLICE STORY is his very best film. But if it isn't his best, it's absolutely right up there with the ARMOUR OF GOD and DRUNKEN MASTER thrillers and THE YOUNG MASTER (I don't know that THE YOUNG MASTER is actually considered among his best, but it's certainly one of my favorites). Directed and starred by Jackie, POLICE STORY is entirely his vision and one perfect instance in which all the elements that constitute a Jackie Chan picture combine to form this incredible synergy. After a bad experience in Hollywood (cough*theprotector*cough) Jackie went back to Hong Kong and decided to show the world something new in the genre of police drama. If I were to suggest a Jackie Chan film to someone who had never seen a Jackie Chan film, this is the one.
Jackie and gritty rarely go together, but there's a definite Dirty Harry vibe in POLICE STORY, what with Chan Ka Kui (Jackie) fighting not only drug kingpins but also police corruption. I had never seen a more edgy Jackie, and, yes, I understand the film is peppered with his trademark comedic bits. But he commits such intensity into the no-holds-barred action sequences that I'm blown away every time I see them. You can feel the impact whenever Jackie or his opponents absorb vicious blows or slam into unforgiving surfaces. This is Jackie Chan in his absolute prime, way back in 1985. I see his more recent efforts nowadays and I note how the guy has slowed down, and there's this bittersweet taste.
POLICE STORY, in my eyes, presents some of the most electrifying fight scenes and certainly the biggest stunts I've ever seen Jackie do. Plenty of jawdropping action set pieces, but there are two absolute standouts: that crazy insane car chase down thru the hillside shanty town and then the brutal extended fight sequence in the shopping mall in which Jackie uses anything and everything he can get his hands on to pummel a grip of goons. The mall sequence climaxes with Jackie's amazing slide down an electrified pole. The fast and furious nighttime skirmish with Jackie battling thugs in the street where he's hurtling in and out of vehicles that's not too shabby, either. Just another demonstration of precision and pinpoint timing between Jackie and his trusty stunt men. But, man, I wonder how many cars Jackie demolished in this one?
Humor is a constant in a Jackie Chan film, to the extent that sometimes I can't help but groan. But, here, the humor provides a stabilizing element against all the intense segments. POLICE STORY comes up with good gags, mostly involving the nonexistent romantic triangle of Jackie, Jackie's long-suffering girlfriend Maggie Cheung, and Brigitte Lin, the key witness whom Jackie is protecting. I always laugh when the film arrives at the courtroom scene. It starts out as this oh-so-dramatic event until, suddenly, it degenerates into an episode of Three's Company. For those who enjoy broad schtick, there are also moments in which pies and cakes are catapulted into people's faces.
What I gots is the Special Collector's Edition DVD and its special features are very solid, even though one deleted scene presents even more pies in the face:
Director Brett Ratner and Asian Film Expert Bey Logan's informative audio commentary
Five "Rare Deleted Scenes" (total running time 00:16:25 minutes): 1)an extended opening with new stuff including an office surprise birthday party and Chan Ka Kui apparently having just been newly assigned to this police department; 2)a brief press conference introduction; 3) an extended ending with alternate outtakes; 4) montage of very brief deleted shots shown in continuity within the official footage; and 5) outtakes without the closing credits which means that the blooper footage now fills up the screen
"A Conversation with Jackie Chan" (00:10:22 minutes) Jackie reveals fascinating behind-the-scenes stuff about the making of POLICE STORY. One tidbit we learn is that, at the end of that double-decker bus sequence, the two stunt men on the second tier of the bus were supposed to crash thru the window and land on the car instead of smashing onto the asphalt road. Also, we learn that one of the stunt men went missing somewhen during the crazy drive down thru the hillside shanty town. Jackie also talks about his concerns regarding that death-defying slide down that electrified seven-stories-high pole in the mall
"A Tribute to Jackie Chan by Brett Ratner and Bey Logan" (00:06:14 minutes) these two guys talk about Jackie and POLICE STORY and the film's impact
"Stunts Unlimited": A retrospective with interviews of members of the celebrated Jackie Chan stunt team, and they reflect on their stunts in POLICE STORY (00:34:07 minutes, with English sub-titles)
the original Hong Kong theatrical trailer and the U.S. promotional trailer for POLICE STORY, as well as the promotional trailer for KILL ZONE
Want Police Story (1985) Discount?
By general consensus, Jackie Chan has made two very great movies above others: The Legend of Drunken Master and "Police Story" here. "Drunken Master" is a straight kung fu film while "Police Story" is more of a balanced action movie, incorporating gunfights and car chases with the martial arts. On the whole, I like "Master" more because its story is easier to follow and it has fewer pauses between fight scenes, but "Police Story" is no slouch, either. While it does drag a bit in the middle, the film is a myriad of death-defying stunts and physical comedy, and its ability to almost perfectly balance the two is what has made it so unforgettable for a lot of folks.
The story: Ka Kaui (Chan) is a Hong Kong policeman-turned-hero after he single-handedly captures a notorious druglord (Chor Yuen, Twin Dragons), but in midst of protecting the key witness to the gangster's trial (Brigette Lin, Chungking Express) and trying to keep his girlfriend (Maggie Cheung, In the Mood for Love) from leaving him, he is framed for the murder of another cop and needs to clear his name without getting arrested or killed.
The plotline is one of the two major issues I have with the film: I suppose that someone well-versed in Hong Kong cinema or proficient in Cantonese/translated subtitles would have less of an issue understanding what's going on, but I needed to read a synopsis to clarify some of the things that happened in the complicated second half of the movie. My other beef lies with the amount of time that passes without any action scenes: rest assured, there is no shortage of thrills involved, overall, but since I find it difficult to appreciate the acting content, I felt myself losing attention more than once during the ongoing dialogue scenes. Of course, not all the performances baffle me: Chan speaks a universal language with physical comedy. As far as I'm concerned, he has surpassed his idol, Buster Keaton, in how to make people laugh via body language and has perfected the art of "funny face" and taking a fall. This is especially well on display when his on-screen girlfriend assaults him with his own birthday cake upon assuming infidelity. Gold.
Still, it's the film's award-winning action content that makes it stand out, and as much as I could go on about it, nothing I write can come close to expressing my amazement at how well it has been done. For starters, the martial arts scenes are not quite as technically-accurate as Chan would develop them in the future, but nonetheless amazingly choreographed and well within Chan's top-ten list. There are about three big ones of varying lengths, but the final one-against-many brawl in the shopping mall is as beautiful and brutal as one can hope for. Of course, no matter how very good these hand-to-hand encounters are, the definite highpoints of the picture are the stunt scenes. Since there are too many cool instances to name individually, let me highlight the most breathtaking ones: 1) Jackie and the villains drive three cars downhill through a shanty village, destroying literally dozens of scrap metal and straw shacks in their way, 2) Jackie uses an umbrella to haphazardly hang onto the side of a speeding bus, 3) the near-entirety of the shopping mall fight, culminating in Chan's legendary leap onto an electric lighting structure, down which he slides a legitimate seventy-five feet before crashing through a glass ceiling. In a word, astonishing.
So, is it my favorite Chan flick? no. Is it awesome anyway? without a doubt. Should you buy the Dragon Dynasty release with a host of cool and exclusive special features? of course, silly.
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I appear to be in the minority, but I couldn't stop laughing during this movie so I have to defend it against the other reviewers. I went to see it at the theater, and it reminded me a lot of "There's Something About Mary". Of course Ben Stiller's character is a heel, that's the whole point of the movie. He marries a girl that he barely knows, realizes that she's not the person he thought she was (she's very disturbed, in a Farrelly Brothers sort of way) , meets a normal (and I might add very hot) girl while on his honeymoon, and falls in love with her. Just by knowing that plot, that Ben Stiller is in it, and that the Farrelly Brothers directed it, you've really gotta see this movie for what it is. It's not Shakespeare. It's just a very funny, very ADULT summer comedy.
