Jackie Chan: My Stunts

I just saw this on on my comp (yep ripped by that is the only way to get it here). I have to say that I went into it with a large dose of respect for Jacki, and after the feature was over, this respect had grown to even highr proportions. Jag must be one of the most skilled guys around a movieset. I love his movies, and this video didn't change that. Au Contrarire.

A clear 8+ in my book. A film for the fans - nonfans wont get much out of it other than if their curious

BW. Mixx

If you are, like me, a Jackie Chan fan (at least of his older films) and wanna know more about "how he has done his films" and so on. This is a great film to watch. Jackie explains how many of Asian movies are made (at least were made back in the days) and how they in "cheap" ways came up with ideas on camera work and lots of other things that makes a movie look good.

Also you get behind the scenes of various stunts, how he performed them and how he comes up with those action scenes we all love to see with Jackie.

All in all I really liked this Documentary. I will also point out that if you can find the HK release of this film you can watch the documentary with Chinese voices and eng. subtitles for some things jackie showcases that are NOT in the English talking version.

9/10

Extremely involved and informative behind the scenes look at Jackie Chan's filmmaking and stuntmaking. He is indeed a perfectionist, very reminiscent of Gene Kelley.

Make sure and watch the Cantonese version unless you absolutely cannot stand subtitles. Jackie is much more fluent and entertaining in his native language (As well as his explanations are much better)

I learned a lot about the film making techniques in this documentary. Jackie's use of props and camera angles is very clever. But Jackie does seem to pat himself on the back too much.

When he talks about the stuntmen who were seriously hurt in the bus sequence of POLICE STORY, he refers to it in a joking manner. I'm pretty sure those men didn't appreciate being crippled and made fun of.

The scene where Jackie is coreographing Ron Smoorenberg in WHO AM I is insulting. Somehow, it's a common practice in Hong Kong to double actors not because of saftey concerns or because an actor can't do a move, but because an actor can not perform the way the coreographer wants them to perform. Ron was very capable of doing his own action in WHO AM I, but when Jackie was directign his fight with him, he was getting mad at him for not following his rythym. People may say that Ron was the one not keeping up with Jackie, but the fact was that Jackie could not keep up with Ron. As a martial artist, it's a very bad thing if you can't keep up with an opponent's movements, and that reflects badly on Jackie. Rather than work with Ron's skills and limitations, Jackie had him doubled by Bradley James Allen. It seemed pointless to hire Ron for WHO AM I if he was just going ot be doubled for scenes he could easily pulled off, but Jackie showed off how selfish he is in this segment.

Yuen Biao, Jackie's longtime friend in Peking Opera and HK cinema is much more deserving of Jackie's success. He is a better actor, more charming, a better martial artist, and a better stuntman. If only he was willing to learn English, he could be much bigger in the US.

If you are at all into the "wow, how did they do that" aspect of filmmaking, this is great stuff. JC shows the technique, training and pure gumption that make these films work. In an increasingly CGI movie environment, JC remains fairly steadfast to what has worked in the past, and talks about it : "hey, we don't have the budget to fake this, so we just gotta do it".