A video on Chan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1PCtIaM_GQ
"Police Story" is simply one of the greatest action movies ever made. It has a plot that is constantly interesting and flows in a way that is quite different than American action movies made during its time period. The big action films of the 80s tended to feature giant Herculean Goliaths and the storylines were often times serious, where the comic relief would come from one liners. Jackie Chan made his action plots purposefully quirky, but it never feels silly in anyway. It is a great blend of comedy and action. And as per the action, it is a wonderful combination of classic Old Hollywood gunfights and East Asian martial arts cinema.
Under the current rules of the Academy, Jackie Chan's 1985 masterpiece would be not only be eligible, but I think it would have a pretty good chance at being nominated at the very least. As per the regulations for the award, it is completely in Cantonese and features a cast that is completely either from Hong or the Cantonese regions of China. I think part of the reason why there wasn't much attention given to it at the time was due to the overall focus of the Academy. I certainly don't mean to be cynical when I say this, but back in the day films considered to be of high brow tended by those made by the French and the Italians. It is no wonder why a martial arts cop movie would be overlooked.
Even though it was ignored by the Academy, it has wonderfully received a tremendous amount of international praise since then. Most critics seem to consider this to be Chan's best film and definitely his best action film. It won Best Picture in Hong Kong's Film Awards and was one of the films that gave Chan his big break internationally, although the films "Project A" and "Wheels on Meals" certainly helped alongside this film.
One of the many important influences of Jackie Chan in general in this period is how he was able to brand his own persona in the context of Hong Kong cinema. It was an uphill battle for Chan, but he was able to pull through and stick to his guns. He started his film career as a stunt double for Bruce Lee, starting with the film "Fist of Fury" in 1972.
When Lee died a year later, the Hong Kong industry tried several times to brand Jackie Chan as the new Bruce Lee. He hated that as Bruce Lee was in many ways a mentor for Chan. Out of respect for him, it would be a disservice to simply copy what Lee did. So Chan, overtime, started to use the tactics of old silent comedians and fuse those ideas with the ever popular martial arts genre. That was an innovative new idea. Whereas Lee's films were serious in tone and often times about the historical conflicts between the Chinese and Japanese, Chan's films were slapstick crime dramas which seem like a very weird combination, but he was always able to make it work.
And I think that's exactly what the Hong Kong film industry needed. This was something that could only be produced by Chan and his sensibilities, so on an international scale, it made Hong Kong specifically stand out over other major East Asian industries, most notably To Ho in Japan. If this film is saying anything about its country, it is simply showing the international world what its cinema is capable of, and giving it a new image distinct from the legacy of Bruce Lee. It also showed an authenticity for this type of filmmaking. Because Chan was originally a stunt man himself, always did how own crazy stunts. This gave him a certain security to do some death defying things that had more or less been dead ever since the films of Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd, two of Jackie Chan's biggest influences.
Where American films would have stunt doubles for actors and would use camera tricks to pull off daring feats, Chan would actually hang off of a moving car with only an umbrella and would propel himself into panes of real glass. He has said that a lot of the cuts on his face towards the end were real from the abuse his body took. The most serious was towards the end when he jumps from a ledge in the mall onto a pole that goes all the way to the main level. Because the pole was covered in lights and hanging wires, he electrocuted himself and burned the skin on his hands, and then dislocated his pelvis when he crashed through glass ceiling and hit the floor. It's this relentlessness that is partially so fun to watch with him. And I love perfectionist auteurs and the effort it takes to make the Chinese Opera on film really makes all the difference.
The Most Painful Stunt Ever: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KxPgMcvcMI
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