Forget about Rush Hour 3. Forget about The Tuxedo. Forget about The Spy Next Door and The Medallion and The Forbidden Kingdom. And whatever you do, please, for the love of all that is good and pure, forget about Around the World in 80 Days.
That is not the Jackie Chan that we should remember, and that is not the Jackie Chan that, in spite of such a laundry list of duds, still made the prestigious Top 5. No. The Jackie Chan that made this list is the one behind Project A, and Rumble in the Bronx, and Operation Condor and the Police Story movies. Heck, I even liked Shanghai Noon. But, most importantly, this is the man that made Drunken Master II (released as The Legend of Drunken Master stateside) which may very well be the greatest Kung Fu movie ever made.
I've already spent far too much time on this blog explaining how doing one's own stunts is a sure-fire path straight to my man heart, but I would be remiss if I didn't at least mention it in passing for Mr. Chan, as he pretty much set the standard for it during the course of his career.
But, I mean, great Kung Fu films in which he preformed the life threatening stunts himself are all well and good, but the reason Jackie Chan is here, ahead of the likes of Jet Li or Tony Jaa, is because he has a sense of humour. Jet Li has made some great movies, but he seems so damned serious. Even when he tries to inject some humour in his films it all just seems like a thinly veiled attempt to copy Jackie. And worse than that, it just feels like someone said 'Hey, let's add something funny here…' and even though Jet has no idea how to deliver the line, they make him do it anyways, telling him the whole time 'Trust me, this will be funny…'
And its not.
Don't get me wrong, Jackie's films don't have you rolling in the aisles, out of breath and clutching your sides from laughing so hard. Au contraire. You're far more likely to roll your eyes and go 'oh, brother…' during an obvious and played out comedic gag in a Jackie Chan movie than you are to genuinely laugh. The difference is that Jackie feels like a little kid telling a bad knock-knock joke, he's just looking to entertain. That goofy smile on his face is just so real. Jet Li feels like he's reading it off a cue card. And Tony Jaa just adds a comic relief character rather than ever having to break a smile himself. Jackie wants to be funny, Jet and Tony feel they have to be funny. None of them are, but only 2 of them feel disingenuous when they try to be.
There's a very distinct difference between being funny and having a sense of humour. Jackie may not make me laugh, but he always makes me smile. Even in Around the World in 80 Days...
Proof of Awesomeness:
I misspoke earlier in the blog when I didn't list him as one of the guys that has held the number 1 spot on this list during my lifetime. He was easily my biggest Man Crush from the mid to late 90's, highlighted by the fact that I own at least 30 of his movies on DVD and VHS.
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