Die grosse Keilerei

It's weird to think that there once was a time when the whole world didn't know about Jackie Chan. It's even weirder to realize that at one time, he was introduced to us but we didn't think to remember him. BATTLE CREEK BRAWL is odd for being a Hong Kong-inspired movie before Hollywood knew the value of the HK influence. But while director Robert Clouse may have been unable to capitalize on Jackie Chan like he did Bruce Lee, this is still an exciting adventure and an interesting study of one of the earlier chapters of one of the genre's top stars.

The story: A martial arts-practicing adventurer (Chan) runs afoul of a Chicago crime syndicate and is strong-armed into competing in an all-important toughman contest.

While there are plenty of criticisms to be leveled at this film, I don't accept its departure from the style of other JC movies as one of them. Director Clouse isn't Stanley Tong, and he doesn't need to be: his utilization of Jackie isn't the ideal standard, but someone as talented as Chan benefits from showing poise in alternative circumstances. Admittedly, one casualty of Clouse's style is Chan's comedy, which comes across as clumsy and childish, but his action scenes remain pretty swell. Almost none of his on screen opponents approach Chan's level of agility and they clearly aren't comfortable with the hero's rhythmic style, but Jackie's athletic abandon is matched by satisfying, stunt-heavy choreography. The filmmakers keep the camera pulled back, diminishing our boy's facial expressions but showing off the authenticity of his abilities. Given that this was the first time Chan was being captured as a lead outside of Hong Kong, I'm impressed with the results.

The production is on the modest side of respectable. Clouse works well in small, homey locations and pulls off the 1930s setting pretty smoothly. Disappointingly, the story and characters within the setting are not intriguing. The screenplay offers exactly one character and relationship that I found intriguing: dear old Mako in his surprisingly stern role as Jackie's mentor. Everyone else, from Chan's on screen girlfriend (Kristine DeBell) to the evil champion (H.B. Haggerty), are simply varying shades of boring. Even Oscar-winner Jose Ferrer is incredibly vanilla as the lead villain and doesn't enliven a story that's almost solely kept afloat by its lead star's infectious talent. Chan himself isn't at his best either, though this is mainly due to his discomfort with English at this point, and his physical expressiveness conveys a lot of what his dialogue doesn't.

BATTLE CREEK BRAWL teeters on a less enthusiastic rating, but eventually wins me over through its strengths. It's not surprising that this film didn't make Jackie Chan a household name, but it's good enough to qualify as a collector's item for the right viewer. The one thing all viewers needs to do when watching is not expect RUMBLE IN THE BRONX, and if you manage that, you'll probably have a good time.

Jackie plays Jerry Kwan, a Chinese living in 1930s America. His father is forced to pay the Mafia protection, and Jerry won't stand for it, picking a fight with some Mafia-goons. The Mafia see Jerry's potential as a fighter, and kidnap his brother's fiancé, forcing Jerry to fight for them in the Battle Creek Brawl: an anything goes, winner-takes-all, fighting competition.

That's pretty much it plot wise, but in a Jackie Chan movie, the faster we get the plot out of the way, the happier we are (although, another pointed out the depiction of openly racist, 1930s America, I did think that was somewhat interesting). The fights and stunts are decent, but not up to Jackie's usual standards - he was forced to work with pro-wrestlers, etc unworthy to work with the Chan-man, and the stunt-coordinator was only a first time stunt-director, and had only performed stunts in three other movies. The fights during the Battle Creek Brawl really highlight the difference between Jackie and his much-larger, slower opponents - while Jackie impresses us with his speed and skill, the other guys are trying impress with sheer-power, and it doesn't work very well.

As his first American movie, its not too bad, and definitely better than his second attempt in America with "The Protector", but I would expect a lot more from Jackie, and the director Robert Clouse (who also directed Enter the Dragon).

6/10

Jackie Chan's first American venture was the result of Golden Harvest keeping Jackie out of harm's way and to try to push Jackie internationally. When Chan broke contract with Lo Wei for Golden Harvest and five million HK dollars, Lo wanted to do everything he could to get Jackie back (or punish him) even deal with the Triad group Sun Yi On to do this. Jimmy Wang Yu, whom Jackie worked with in The Killer Meteors and had Triad influence, offered to broker a deal between the three parties. He would later require a few favors such as Jackie to appear in Island of Fire and Fantasy Mission Force. Jimmy was quite successful in his talks with the three parties early in Jackie's foreign journey, but Jackie would have to appear in two American films: star in The Big Brawl and have a small part in the horrific Cannonball Run while running the emotional gamut known as the American Press.

Battle Creek Brawl aka The Big Brawl is a mediocre attempt at trying to showcase Jackie's skills. While it is not as bad as the American version of his second attempt – The Protector – it was still only an OK film. It was directed by Robert Clouse (Enter the Dragon and the craptacular Game of Death) but he was relegated to B-movie fare at this point in his career though he would later direct Gymkata. Clouse's static style conflicted with the dynamic nature of Jackie. Though there were several other areas of annoyance for Chan including his working with a language that he did not understand at the time and a stunt coordinator who did not understand his style.

Jackie stars as Jerry Kwan, a prodigal martial art student studying under his uncle Herbert Kwan (played by the prolific Japanese actor Mako) in the late 20's or early 30's Chicago. Herbert is a chiropractor when he is not torturing Jackie or going after large women. He is a disappointment to his father, even when he breaks up extortionists of his father's restaurant, who wants him to be more like his brother Robert, the Doctor. Jerry's fighting ability gets the attention of Dominichi (Jose Ferrer) a local gangster and obtains the ire of his nephew David Leggetti. Dominichi needs a fighter to be able to beat his nemesis, Mr. Morgan, who has control of a beast of a man Billy Kiss who kisses his opponents, sometimes a bit long, after he wins (played by H.B. Haggerty who looks like a 19th century circus strong man.)

For Dominichi to control Jerry he kidnaps his brother's soon-to-be fiancé from China named Mae (Rosalind Chao who is forever known by Trekkers as Keiko O'Brien.) He then enters Jerry in a fighting contest called the Battle Creek Brawl which takes place in Texas. The purse is 15,000 dollars (which seems ridiculously low now.) The biggest problem with this contest is that all the fighters resemble professional wrestlers (yes the great Gene Le Bell is amongst them) and not fighters. This is especially evident in the beginning brawl-for-all where there is a camel clutch, body slams and plenty of large men in tights. The fighters are incredibly slow compared to Jackie, but they do add certain campyness to the film (or do the capes and tights make this point already evident.)

One of the more interesting scenes took place earlier in the film when Jackie is part of a relay roller derby contest. He would also use this new found skill of roller skating in an awesome stunt sequence in Winners and Sinners. But the rest of the film never quite captures my interest the way that scene does. The romance between Jerry and Nancy was handled in an interesting nonchalant manner though. I also did like some of the fight scenes, but not as much as most of Jackie's Hong Kong fight scenes. I am glad that he was able to add humor to several parts of the film. I would not recommend this film to most people, because there are so many better "Jackie" films to watch. I did find this a nice diversion and not as bad as many of the American fight films of that era. NOTES: stunt coordinator Pat E. Johnson has his name on the fighter's tournament chalk board. Some versions (especially early Hong Kong prints) of this film take out the relationship scenes between Nancy and Jerry.

Well, I finally got to see it...mmmm I thought, not too bad..seeing as he didnt know much english at the time, and was well restricted by the American Film industry machine!. His Fight scenes were watered down and slow by all normal 'Jackie' standards but that apart,there are some great comic moments and Jackie wins through. He Radiates innocent charm and even manages to Rollerscate with gusto, although Im not too sure about the historical acuracy of some of the costumes..this was supposed to have been 1930s USA and Im sure spandex wasnt invented then!One interresting note for real 'died in the wool' Jackie fans , is the continued theme of the Lazy but tallented boy being trained in wierd and some would say inhumane ways by a 'sifu','master','uncle!'...amazing how this sort of idea managed to cross the pacific with him!.All in all a pleasent movie, although I can understand why Jackie was both Disappointed and Angry at the outcome at least it spurred him on to make greater and greater movies in HK.

This Jackie Chan vehicle,his first attempt to break into the American market,generally has a bad reputation. Jackie himself hated myself the film,one of the reasons being that he had little to no control over the action. It was also a box office flop,despite it regrouping some of the team that made Enter The Dragon.

However,The Big Brawl is not all that bad. Indeed at first it seems that it does not at all deserve it's critics. Lalo Schifrin's main theme is exceptionally groovy,the 1030s Chicage setting is reasonably well evoked and there is one early fight scene,in which Jackie defeats three baddies seemingly by accident,that,although a little slow,does come across as being classic Jackie,combining fighting and slapstick typically well. As the film goes on it loses interest somewhat,especially as the final third is just Jackie fighting a bunch of wrestler types in the Big Brawl of the title. Nonetheless, if you don't expect much and/or have not seen many other of Chan's movie fights,they are fairly entertaining,as he defeats his opponents with his skill and agility, and despite the slow choreography,he does perform a few great moves and dangerous moments.

Elsewhere Mako is great fun as Jackie's uncle/teacher and his training scenes with Jackie are fun. It's also interesting to see Jackie in a supposedly sexual relationship with his girlfriend {something he normally shied away from}and here are also a few good laughs involving some inept gangsters. The Big Brawl is seriously flawed,but it really isn't bad. It's certainly better than The Protector!