SHANGHAI NOON (a J!-ENT DVD Review)

October 1, 2002 by Dennis Amith

MOVIE COMPANY: Touchstone Pictures
CAST: Jackie Chan, Owen Wilson, Lucy Liu
DIRECTED BY: Tom Dey
WRITTEN BY: Miles Miller, Alfred Gough
RATING: PG-13
INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE URL: http://us.imdb.com/Title?0184894
TYPE OF MOVIE: Action, Western, Comedy
DURATION: 110 minutes

A 19th century Western directed by Tom Dey, Shanghai Noon stars Jackie Chan as Chon Wang, a clumsy Imperial Guard to the Emperor of China. When Princess Pei Pei (Lucy Liu) is kidnapped from the Forbidden City, Wang feels personally responsible and insists on joining the guards sent to rescue the Princess, who has been whisked away to the United States. In Nevada and hot on the trail of the kidnappers, Wang is separated from the group and soon finds himself an unlikely partner with Roy O’Bannon (Owen Wilson), a small time robber with delusions of grandeur. Together, the two forge onto one misadventure after another. (IMDB)

DVD EXTRAS:

• Region 1 encoding (US and Canada only)
• Color, Widescreen, Dolby, Surround Sound, Digital Sound, Closed-captioned
• Commentary by Jackie Chan
• Commentary by Owen Wilson
• Commentary by director Tom Dey
• Music Video
• Production Stills
• Deleted Footage
• 3 Making Ofs: “Making an Eastern Western,” “The Shanghai Kid,” “Western Stunts, Eastern Style”
• Full-screen and widescreen anamorphic formats

KNOWN DVD SECRET(S):

Mini-game bonuses:
Select the “Special Features” option at the main menu, then choose the “Shanghai Surprise” selection. Successfully complete the “Roy’s Revenge” mini-game to view a pre-production look of a train crash scene that was planned to be included in the film. Successfully complete the “Chon’s Challenge” mini-game to view a translated version of the drinking game scene from the movie.

DVD REVIEW:

I remember how I enjoyed this movie when it first came to the theaters. I could remember people debating if this movie or “Rush Hour” was better. Needless to say, it’s another good US movie from Jackie Chan and the more he is paired up with talented actors instead of English speaking bad actors, the movie is going to be a hit.

As for the DVD, this DVD is packed. You get the commentary from Chan, Wilson and the Director Tom Dey. 7 Deleted Scenes which include selectable commentary. Behind-the-scene featurettes, Shanghai Surprise game which leads to two goodies, a music video and more.

The DVD’s video quality was brilliant and colorful. The ratio is 2:35:1 Widescreen with Digital 5.1 surround for English and French language tracks.

If you love Jackie Chan films, this is one to have in your collection. The extra features are a definite bonus if you enjoyed the film.

THE MOVIE: B
THE DVD EXTRAS: A-
THE DVD OVERALL: B+