Police Story 2

"Police Story 2" is a movie that mostly shows Jackie Chan's serious side. His performance is relatively mature and restrained, and he allows his character to be portrayed as not only brave, smart and determined, but flawed and selfish as well (his scene with Maggie Cheung after the fight in the playground is a key point). There is less slapstick and more plot than usual for a Chan movie; less emphasis on comedy and more on action. The action sequences are superb, and that deaf-mute guy with the incredible martial-arts skills is one of the most memorable villains Jackie ever had to face (literally: I had seen the film only once before in 1997 and I still remembered him clearly). (**1/2)

Police Story 1 was a masterpiece, Police Story 2 is good, its that simple. Its just not as good as the original, but how many sequels are?

The plot is simple, Mr.Ku is out for revenge and a series of bombs have been set off in Hong Kong, so its up to Jackie and his regulars to investigate. May played by Maggie Cheung is once again the damsel, who's in distress by the way.

The fights and stunts are up to form. The fight scene in the park is just magnificent. About a dozen henchman grasping various metal objects are after Jackie, who uses everything from climbing frames to see-saws to fend them all off.

What the film lacks is interesting dialogue, conversations are just boring and the Chinese jokes are untransaltable into English. Jackies character is depressed and all uptight, not as fun as in the original, but the guy did go through hell in the first movie, so I guess its understandable. The pace of film is also too erratic, one minute its a rollercoaster, the next minute its like watching a melodrama.

Anyway, the action is still top notch and this film paved the way for Police Story 3 SuperCop, which gained recognition in the U.S with a theatrical release.

In this sequel to POLICE STORY, everyone is back. Jackie Chan is getting a dressing-down for catching the bad guys.... so expensively. He's busted to traffic cop, but when the bad guys show up to threaten him and girl friend Maggie Cheung, he busts some glasses. This gets him more lecturing from fatuous squad chief Kwok-Hung Lam, so Jackie quits and heads off to Bali with Maggie.

However, some guys have planted a bomb, destroying a mall, and promise more unless the real estate company pays a huge ransom. The police don't know what to do about this, so they talk Jackie back onto the force.

In terms of story-telling, this is not a well-constructed story, since with three stories -- revenge story by the bad guys from the previous movie; rocky relationship with Miss Cheung; and bomber -- a lot winds up abandoned; even though Criterion has restored this to pretty much the original length, it's apparent that a lot was lost in editing somewhere. Still, one does not watch a Jackie Chan movie for its exquisite story-telling, but for funny stuff -- Bill Tung gets gassy at one point -- and the funny, chaotic, acrobatic gags that Jackie Chan provides to his fans. He offers them here, even though they are not as madly funny as they would become over the next five years.

It's important to note that, as director and co-writer, Chan is not a glory hog. The funniest sequence is the one where the young female officers are investigating a creep they want to turn. All in all, while Jackie Chan's movies would continue to improve because his popularity with audiences gave him greater scope, this is a lot of fun.

The first half hour or so of "Police Story II" is easily it's best and it seems as if the sequel to the original action masterpiece is going to be almost as good. Unfortunately once Jackie goes undercover it starts to drag, and the film struggles to recover.

It's still enjoyable stuff though, but it's so hard to live up to the original, particularly when you're making it in such a similar way, "Supercop" made the right move by making it much different to it's predecessors. It's great to see Maggie Cheung with a larger role though. I refuse to acknowledge "First Strike" as part of the Police Story series; it doesn't even have Maggie! By the way, never ever watch dubbed/P&S Jackie movies (e.g. video store copies). God-awful!

Jackie Chan in flight is such a joy to behold (especially during the end credits showing bloopers and the injuries from the mind-blowing stunts), as this particular series (five films so far and a spin off from the third feature) along with "Project A" and its sequel would come down as probably his most recognizable home-grown efforts to western audiences. I love Chan's early work, and the Police Story features (which did come across as epic crime joints) are some of his best latter stuff. As for "Police Story Part 2", it continues on from the excellent original to simply match the quality and go on to be a little larger in scale and excitingly explosive… literally.

The Hong Kong police force doesn't like individual heroes and that's what they see Ka Kui as. His effective, but it always comes at a cost which they are not willing to take. So for he extreme acts Kui is demoted to a traffic cop. However after some threats on his life and his girlfriend which causes more of a stir, he decides to quit for his well-being and that of his girlfriend. But it doesn't last long when he's conned back onto the force to help combat against a string of bomb threats involving a gang holding ransom a big corporation.

Jackie Chan flexibly directs astonishingly dangerous stunts-galore and inventively rapid, if elaborate martial arts choreography in what is an old-hat, but very busy and comic book pulp cops and robbers chase formula. It's customary investigation work, by trying to predict the next move and virtually racing against the clock to stop the bad guys… which has two lots for Chan to take on. The tough action is instinctive, uncanny and lethal making it amazing to watch (with an upbeat music tempo underlining it) and boy their's a destructive mess after nearly every ordeal. This goes for the electrifying and impulsive climatic showdown. Like most of these outings it doesn't forget the humour, which is quite broad and silly, but these comic elements can be fun and actually it's rather toned down than usual. It's more-so serious involving the pressure and dangers of the job with a multi-facet performance by Chan as there's an unhealthy obsession (boldly dogged, but self-centred) making his character truly blind of what really should be important to him. However I found to get in the way was the love interest angle (the factor of police work getting in the way of love), which was important for certain story developments and to squeeze out suspenseful situations, but still those awkward moments do slow down its momentum. The performances are immensely colourful (Maggie Cheung, Bill Tung, Kwok-Hung Lam, Charlie Cho and Benny Lai) and Jackie Chan under a heavy work load shows the stamina and agility with that glowing charisma, which makes him a favourite.