Project A II (Taiwan version) VCD

Jackie Chan is at his inventive best in this period film. At the peak of his career he was given the time and money he needed to make some of the world's greatest action and comic setpieces, and Project A II has plenty of both. Take the now-classic bedroom scene. Two hitmen sent by the Dowager Empress take revolutionary (Rosamund Kwan) back to her cousin's apartment to search for a book of names. Her cousin (Maggie Cheung) returns and the hitmen hide in her closet with Kwan held at gunpoint. Suddenly Jackie Chan, freshly-framed and arrested, shows up for a visit, hiding his police escort from Maggie. Jackie's boss (Bill Tung) shows up, and Jackie hides from him. Finally, Chun shows up and Bill Tung, now handcuffed to a couch, hides from him. Three sets of people, three rooms, all of them hiding from one another while handcuffed to various objects (Jackie to his escort, Bill Tung to a sofa). The scheming breaks down and the players are revealed to one another. Choreographed as intricately as a minuet, this scene took ten days to plan and four weeks to shoot, the kind of freedom that only a star of Jackie Chan's calibre can command. Fortunately, he's talented enough to put the time and money bought by stardom to good use.

The action is equally impressive with high-impact fights peppered throughout the movie, building up to the final scene with revolutionaries fighting Imperial hitmen, pirates fighting corrupt cops, and Jackie Chan fighting everybody else. The scene ends with a cornered Jackie stuffing his mouth full of real (yes, real) hot peppers to turn his spit into homemade mace.

The strongest drug on the planet is watching Jackie Chan when he's inspired, and Project A II maintains a near-impossible level of inspiration from start to finish.

If you haven't seen the first Project A, don't worry about it. Project A II is the perfect place to start your worship of Jackie Chan.

by Grady Hendrix