When a Chinese rebel murders Chon's estranged father and escapes to England, Chon and Roy make their way to London with revenge on their minds. Chon's sister, Lin, has the same idea, and uncovers a worldwide conspiracy to murder the royal family but almost no one will believe her. In the 1880's, Chon Wang's father and keeper of the Imperial Seal has been murdered by Parliament and royal family member Rathbone, (who steals the Imperial Seal) with Chon Wang's sister, Chon Lin, witnessing the murder. Chon Lin follows Rathbone to London to kill him, while sending Chon a letter telling him of the murder. Chon then travels to New York for Roy O'Bannon. Together they travel to England and meet up with Chon Lin to kill Rathbone and get the Imperial Seal back. Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson first teamed up in the modestly budgeted comedy, Shanghai Noon. The movie had a moderate $15 million opening weekend but went on to gross $56 million by the end of its domestic run in theaters. After a good following on home video, Touchstone Pictures has decided to increase the sequel's budget to $50 million and see if the magic can work better the second time around. Both stars need a big hit as The Tuxedo and I Spy failed to become big hits at the box office recently. But will the reteaming of Chan and Wilson bring in the big bucks or will other films outshine this comedy sequel?<br/><br/>The story goes that the cowboy team of Chon Wang and Roy O'Bannon are back together again on a special mission. They must travel to London after Chon learns that his father, who is keeper of the royal seal, is killed and the seal of the emperor has been stolen. They must travel even more quickly as they learn that Chon's sister has gone after the killer herself. Things become even more complicated as Roy falls head over heels for Chon's sister. Both Chon and Roy must join forces with some strange London characters in order to catch the killer. The story of Shanghai Knights is okay for a comedy of this kind but it does seem slow in many parts. Less talking and more action would have been better then what was given to the audience.<br/><br/>The acting was what you would expect from a comedy of this kind, just okay. Jackie Chan has a field day with all the brand new action sequences he has in this film. His English makes it difficult for any scene in which he is speaking seems understandable but it works better then his earlier films. Owen Wilson does as good of a job as what is presented to him. He can't do more then what is presented in the script and that is what the audience expects. The performances by the other characters were moderate at best. There were not many who stood out within the film because their acting was what the audience expected.<br/><br/>Overall, Shanghai Knights is another good time at the movies during the slow season at the box office. The main thing that this film suffers from is predictability. The film performs at every level it is expected to and doesn't surprise the audience by doing something that had not been done in the first film or in other films of this kind of genre. The action sequences were the best that have ever been performed in a Jackie Chan film. Jackie Chan really out does himself in Shanghai Knights. The story, outside of predictability, suffers in that it slows down a lot in certain parts of the film before picking up again with an action sequence or two. Shanghai Knights is just another good popcorn films to catch during the slow season at the box office, so catch the film if you have the time during the weekend. If not, there is always Daredevil coming out Valentine's Day weekend.<br/><br/>My Rating: ***1/2 out of 5 After noticing that the movie starts off with Jackie Chan as a wild west sheriff back in the 1800's, there's no use in pointing out that this movie is dumb. I'm assuming people reading this have seen the movie, so I won't do to much summarizing. Besides, IMDb includes a synopsis for that reason.<br/><br/>To begin, I noticed that a lot of people who didn't like this film were not from the U.S. Perhaps slapstick American humor just doesn't do well abroad? shrug. Many thought that the historical fudges were supposed to be taken seriously. But because this is an action-comedy cut it some slack! They're just trying to make you laugh! Others wanted this to be a serious martial arts flick and probably thought it was too cutesy. How are people supposed to laugh if there's blood and guts? I don't think Drunken Master approach to the "fight scenes" would work in this film.<br/><br/>The fight scenes were brilliantly choreographed. I don't have that much blood lust and would much rather watch Jackie cleverly manipulate ordinary objects into nonlethal weapons. In the special features, Jackie said if it was just fighting, then not only would it be violent the scenes would get boring. I can relate to that- after 400th fight scene in Crouching Tiger I was pretty much bored of them.<br/><br/>I thought that the sequel was hella better than Shanghai Noon. Lucy Liu trying to sound like an aristocratic Chinese woman was grating on my nerves. There were just way too many cheesy moments in the last film. Not that the sequel was cheese free, but they cut down on it at least. All the relationships between the characters were believable and enjoyable to watch. I wish they had a little more of the Artful Dodger causing trouble and mouthing off- but I guess O'bannon did enough of that for both of them. And the scene where Chun tells his sister why O'bannon would make a lousy boyfriend was too funny. This is a movie where you can just sit back and revel in it, warts and all.
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346 weeks ago