Movies I love more than anyone else: Shanghai Knights (2003).

This is the start of what may be a reoccurring feature of sorts, spotlighting the movies that aren't just my favorites, but films that I probably hold in higher esteem than anyone else out there in the critical community.  First up is a film that celebrates its tenth-anniversary this very day.  I'm speaking not of How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days (which I don't loathe), but rather the wonderful period-set comedy adventure Shanghai Knights.  It is a movie that yes, I love probably more than any other critic on Earth.  It is one of the few movies that was so damn good and so bloody enjoyable that I intentionally saw it in a theater three times during its first month of theatrical play.  It is one of my favorite movies from the last fifteen years and I'd argue that it is a near-perfect version of what it's attempting to be.

Guest Essay: "The Part-Time Critic" Kyle Leaman pontificates on Jackie Chan's action-film retirement.

From time to time, I'm able to offer a guest essay to my readers.  Today's guest author is Kyle Leaman.  Those who have been reading this site since the very beginning may remember Mr. Leaman and his work at The Part-Time Critic.  He was one of my first regular readers and someone who I linked to from time-to-time as his work was often both insightful and insanely comprehensive.  A couple years back (just before he retired from writing) he compiled a list, complete with mini-essays and YouTube excerpts, of the 100 greatest fights in Jackie Chan's action career.  It's so exhaustive that you may need a stunt man to get through it all in one sitting.  So when I read that Jackie Chan had announced that he was officially retiring from action films, Mr. Leaman was the first person I thought of.  I asked him if he had anything to say about it and he thankfully obliged.  So here is, unabridged and unedited save for token formatting, Kyle Leaman's "The Punctuation of an Action Career".      

The Punctuation Point of an Action Career

by Kyle Leaman

In 1978, a film by the name Snake in the Eagle's Shadow became a breakout action hit in Hong Kong and the star of the film, a 24-year-old Jackie Chan, followed it up with the equally successful Drunken Master. Chan then went on to release a major action film in every single decade since, an unprecedented and unequaled 30-year run. To put that into perspective, Jason Statham would need to keep making action films until the year 2032 just to draw even with Chan's run. Even I don't think I could stomach that many Cranks and Transporters.

While promoting his newest film at the Cannes film festival, Jackie declared that Chinese Zodiac would be his last action film. The following day Jackie clarified the comments on his Facebook page, saying that the film would be his last "big action movie."  What exactly does Chan mean by "big action movie," and does this mean we should start writing eulogies for his action career? Is this the end of drunken boxing, super cops, and big stunts? Will everyday objects like ladders and clothes racks now cease to become props of mass destruction? If we are to understand what Chan means to do with Chinese Zodiac, the punctuation that he is trying to put on his career, we really have to understand the story he has been writing over the last four decades.