Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” was a really well-done movie off of the first book in the series. So it would come as no surprise that the 2002 sequel, “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets,” would be just as good. Chris Columbus did just as good of a job, maybe even better, on this one. Since the next book told the next story and expanded on the history of Hogwarts, Columbus made sure to keep that all in so the viewers that never read any of the books would know. All of the same actors returned, but we get a couple of new faces in this movie.

In the beginning, we get a house-elf named Dobby, voiced by Toby Jones, who is warning Harry that he must not return to Hogwarts because of a great evil. Now if you were in Harry’s shoes, would you listen? Harry obviously didn’t because he needed to escape and called Hogwarts his home. If he didn’t return, then he would have to put up with the same caged feeling he had to go through before he enrolled in Hogwarts. Even with Dobby putting obstacles in his path like dumping the cake on his uncle’s friend, sealing the gate to the Hogwarts Express train, making the rouge Bludger in the Quidditch game, he still stays at Hogwarts. We all know that Dobby was only trying to protect Harry from the new danger that was haunting Hogwarts, but Harry always stood up to the new challenge.

We also meet Ron’s parents, Arthur and Molly Weasley, played by Mark Williams and Julie Walters. We only briefly saw Walters in the first movie, but she is expanded here. Arthur shows how fascinated he is with Muggles (non-magic people) and when he isn’t strict with his children, Molly has to be the one to snap him to his strict side. Molly of course is showing the strictness because of being worried for her kids safety in breaking the Decree of showing magic in front of Muggles, but she doesn’t count Harry because he is the innocent bystander.

Every year there is a new professor for Defense against the Dark Arts, and this year we get the self-absorbed narcissistic brut, Gilderoy Lockhart, played by Shakespearean actor Kenneth Branagh. Radcliffe actually admitted that whenever he had a question regarding Shakespeare, he would go to Branagh since he had acted in a number of different modern-day adaptations of Shakespeare plays, including Hamlet, Henry V, Othello, and Much Ado About Nothing. Lockhart is just so full of himself that you would hate going to his class because he doesn’t know anything and is only there to go on about his fame. Professor Sprout, played by Miriam Margolyes, is seen in this one briefly when she is giving a Herbology lesson. After seeing that lesson, you would want to take that class because of the lesson about Mandrakes. I will also like to say this was sadly the last role Richard Harris did since he had passed away shortly after the movie was made. He was luckily able to finish working on the movie before he passed, but they would have to find a new actor to play Dumbledore.

Now we finally get to meet Draco’s father, Lucius Malfoy, played by Jason Isaacs. Because Lucius likes to belittle people and treats them like they are ants that he can just step on, we get where Draco gets that from. You just want to go up to the guy and punch him dead in his jaw and say to him, “Hey, not everyone is like you! Leave them alone you jerk!”

Believe me when I say that this film gets darker and scarier than the first one. When you see Harry speak Parseltoungue (snake language), you think that he is possessed by another being. Or how about when Harry and Ron are in the Forbidden Forest and they meet Aragog, voiced by Julian Glover, and his spiders? Those who have arachnophobia would be scared, like a friend of mine was and even Ron. There is even a duel with a dragon in this movie, and if you are afraid of snakes, then don’t watch this because there are a few snake scenes in this one.

Even Roger Ebert said, “What's developing here, it's clear, is one of the most important franchises in movie history, a series of films that consolidate all of the advances in computer-aided animation, linked to the extraordinary creative work of J.K. Rowling, who has created a mythological world as grand as "Star Wars," but filled with more wit and humanity.” He’s right though because we learn the history of Hogwarts. My 20-year-old cousin said this was the worst when he was 8, I believe, because it was too historical. In my opinion, he may not like history, but this was what made the book so great.

Stuart Craig returns as Production Designer, and boy did he deliver in this one. Like I had stated yesterday, there may be computer graphics used in this one, but they look so realistic that you don’t worry about it and instead look at the beautiful design of the movie. You just love the visual effects, and Judianna Makovsky and Lindy Hemming handled the costumes in this one.

Overall, Columbus really treated this one with care and did an amazing job with bringing the book to life. Like all novel adaptations, the novel is always going to be better because the novel just sucks you in to the detail they go into. The movie can’t fit that all in, or else you’ll be sitting in the theater for five hours, and you will get bored. Unless they start doing intermissions and you can take breaks, but still, it would be too much. So if you loved the first one, then definitely check this one out. It has great action sequences, especially at the end in the Chamber of Secrets, although they could have worked on Salazar Slytherin’s face more. He looked more like Zeus.

With the first two films in the Harry Potter series making a great start and promising the other sequels to be great, how will the third one be? At the time, everyone who read Harry Potter said the third book was their favorite, although I wasn’t one of them. Find out tomorrow when I continue my Harry Potter-a-thon.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Alright everyone, since the month of October has started; I will do something I have never done before. I will review a film every single day of this month. What will I review, you ask? With Halloween fast approaching, I think it would be appropriate to review films you should watch around the Halloween time period. Yes, I am doing exactly what James Rolfe has done for seven years straight now. Don’t think that I am copying from James, but think of it as I have been inspired by him. So let’s not waste any time, let’s get started.

How will I kick this month off? Well, let’s start by reviewing a series of films based off of one of my all-time favorite novel series, Harry Potter. For those of you who don’t know the story, I will give you a brief synopsis. Harry Potter is a wizard whose parents were killed by an evil wizard named Voldemort (which means “world of death” for those who are wondering). Apparently Harry can’t be killed, so Voldemort leaves a lightning bolt scar on his forehead. Harry is very popular amongst the wizard world because he is “the boy who lived.” The headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Dumbledore, leaves Harry with his nasty uncle Vernon, aunt Petunia, and porcine cousin, Dudley. Once Harry turns 11, he enrolls in Hogwarts, makes new friends and has daring challenges he has to undertake through a series of seven books. Read the series if you want to learn more.

My sister was the only person who had read all of the books that were out at the time before the first film, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” came out in 2001. After I saw that film, I wanted to read all of the books, and I did. How is the film? Here’s my review:

This is actually a very good novel adaptation. Director Chris Columbus really brought a lot of the book elements to life in this film. The writer to this series is J.K. Rowling, who didn’t make this series really scary for her readers, but just scary enough. Roger Ebert even commented, “Like an "Indiana Jones" for younger viewers, it tells a rip-roaring tale of supernatural adventure, where colorful and eccentric characters alternate with scary stuff like a three-headed dog, a pit of tendrils known as the Devil's Snare and a two-faced immortal who drinks unicorn blood.”

Now the actors who portray the children are the central force that drives the movie. In the role of Harry Potter, we get Daniel Radcliffe, who played David Copperfield on BBC. I can safely say that Radcliffe really embodied Harry as a role that he will forever be known for. Even the people who play his uncle, aunt, and cousin are believable as well. Richard Griffiths as Vernon really got the snot-nosed jerk that wants to be rid of Harry. Fiona Shaw as Petunia also showed how uninterested and caged she wants to make Harry, and both of them don’t want him out in the world. Harry Melling as Dudley, goodness, what can I say about him? He is a spoiled little brat that you just want to just punch his lights out. He even has a bully side when he picks on Harry all the time. These three get the roles of the book down when they show how much they loathe Harry and don’t want him living with them, but unfortunately they are stuck with him.

Even the teachers and people who work at Hogwarts are just perfect in their roles. You couldn’t pick anyone better. Robbie Coltran has Hagrid shows how much love he has for Harry and wants to help him out as best as possible. He wants the best from Harry and grows really close to him that you just love seeing Harry and Hagrid together. Maggie Smith as Minerva McGonagall is just pitch perfect. Maggie Smith really gets the strict side of McGonagall down, but also shows that she cares for her students and just wants them to be safe. She even shows the love she has for Harry and helps him out when she gets the chance. Alan Rickman as Snape, now that is a role you couldn’t give to anyone else. He is just so dastardly and cold towards Harry because of how Harry’s dad treated them when they went to Hogwarts together, that he and Harry just never get along. We all know Rickman from such great roles, that he is great in this one as well. Warwick Davis plays Flitwick, but he doesn’t really have so big of a role. Zoë Wanamaker plays Madam Hooch, the Quidditch referee who also plays the referee role down just great and really teaches the kids how to fly the broomsticks. Ian Hart as Quirrell really makes the viewer’s think that something is wrong with the guy. The man drinks unicorn’s blood for crying out loud. Now the late Richard Harris as the headmaster, Dumbledore, is just one of the sweetest and helpful people you will ever meet. He also shows how much he cares for Harry and wants to help him out as best as possible.

Harry’s friends and classmates are all well done as well. Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley shows that he really likes Harry and sticks with him through the very end. The very pretty Emma Watson as Hermoine Granger has the brains of the group down just perfect. At first, they don’t like her for being such a showoff, but they get use to her later on. Tom Felton has Draco Malfoy, what can I say? This kid is such a bully to Harry that you just want to strangle this kid badly. Even with Jamie Waylett and Joshua Herdman as Malfoy’s cronies, Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle, you want to hurt these kids for picking on people because Malfoy is a “pure blood,” so he belittles everyone else. Pure blood means both of their parents know magic. Matthew Lewis as Neville Longbottom shows the clumsy little guy that he is, but rises up when the time is right. Devon Murray as Seamus Finnigan also is clumsy boy that just messes up and never gets a spell down. James and Oliver Phelps as Ron’s older twin brothers, Fred and George, are just funny and you look forward to what ways they will break and bend the rules just to get a good laugh. Bonnie Wright as Ron’s younger sister, Ginny, also is a very strong character that really loves Harry. Chris Rankin as Ron’s other older brother, Percy, shows that he is a responsible person and looks after the kids so they can be safe.

What can I say about how they made this world? It’s just breathtaking. The school looks fantastic, the inside you just want to be in, and the effects are so well-done that you believe you aren’t even looking at computer graphics. Columbus really did a great job bringing the book to life when he made the school so great on screen. The Quidditch game is just mind-blowingly epic. You get into the game as if you are watching an actual sports game. Also, you are rooting for Gryffindor the entire time. When you see Ron and Harry play wizard’s chess, you want to play that version as opposed to the one that we have always played. Even the room of the flying keys would remind you of running from a swarm of bugs. The pit of tendrils called the Death Snare is like you getting strangled by Poison Ivy plants, which is something you never want happened. The Forbidden Forest looks so dark and scary that you would never want to enter it without an adult with you. Even with the creatures like wolves around and centaurs scaring them away, you never want to wander in there alone. You would even get scared from the dark corridors of Hogwarts’ library, cellars, hidden passages and dungeons. Luckily, Harry has an invisibility cloak that will help him along the way. Now the effects on the magic spells look just great and you look like you are watching real magic.

Overall, this film is great and will give you a scare, especially with the giant troll in the school. If you haven’t seen this film yet, you are missing out. It takes its time to get good and develops the story in a way that you love the characters and everything. But how do the sequels do? Stay tuned tomorrow where I continue my “Harry Potter-a-thon.”

Warriors of Virtue: Return to Tao

Ok, what is wrong with filmmakers nowadays? If a film was not well-received, and no one liked it, then why make a sequel? "Warriors of Virtue" was one of the most boring movies I had ever seen, and five years later, they made a direct-to-video sequel. This god-awful sequel, "Warriors of Virtue: Return to Tao," was not given a North American release until almost a decade later and was made under a very weak financial backing than the first one. At least that one was a minor fantasy epic, which had a lot of puppetry and special effects, which unfortunately will not be done again in this one.

The story follows Ryan, now sixteen, played by Nathan Phillips, who is in China for a martial arts tournament. And, surprisingly enough, his leg has been healed. Wait a minute! At the end of the first movie, he came back to the real world and his leg was still disabled. How did his leg get miraculously better? Did he get surgery in between films or what? Like all bad movies, they leave us in the dust with no explanation. His friend, Chucky, played by Shedrack Anderson, is with him telling him that Tao does not exist. Oh, and they still pronounce Tao with a T sound.

When he gets transported to Tao, it looks half of what it was in the first film. Surprisingly darker and not a lot of people in the world. It's like how they did with "The Neverending Story" movies, where less and less people were seen in Fantasia in every sequel. Now there is a new evil the Warriors of Virtue could not defeat, played by the late Kevin Smith. You might remember Kevin Smith as the God of War, Ares, in "Hercules: The Legendary Journey's" and "Xena: Warrior Princess." Kevin Smith actually died when he was shooting this movie, which the movie was dedicated to his memory. Besides, how good of a job he did as Ares isn't anywhere close to how enjoyable or good of a performance he does in this film compared to Angus MacFayden as Komodo.

Here's another disappointment: the Warriors of Virtue are no longer Kangaroos. They're human now, because the movie explains that they "reached a higher level." That is an excuse for the filmmakers to let their viewers know that they shot this film on a lower budget to not afford the costumes and animatronics Ronny Yu had. Seriously, I think someone took their camcorder with them on their study abroad program or vacation to China and decided to shoot their trip. They probably were trying to do another "Blair Witch Project," which they should have known would have failed.

Michael Vickerman, who handled the screenplay of the first movie, is the director of this one, and he created Tao under-populated with few returning characters, and the forests and the Life Spring village look a lot like how they did years ago. There are familiar musical tracks and a lot of character references that really make you cringe. People should know that all direct-to-video sequels will just spell disaster all over it. So don't make them!

The biggest slap in the face is that the Warriors are never seen in the movie until the last action sequence, leaving you with the terrible performances seen by Nathan Phillips, Sedrack Anderson, and Nina Liu as the queen of Tao.

With the action in this movie, the martial arts are god-awful. Nathan and Nina look very choppy, or maybe it's their stunt-doubles that are doing a better job then they are, and they rip off the great action that you saw in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." Also, like how in the first one the Kangaroos are rip-offs of The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, in this one they feel more like ripping-off The Power Rangers.

You want to know what I think? Avoid this movie as long as you live. It's a completely painful movie to sit through and you do not want to watch this "at all." Thank you God for helping me get through these two horrible movies.

Wait a minute...next month is October. You know what that means.....HALLOWEEN MONTH!!!! That's right folks, all of next month I will be reviewing a film that you should watch around Halloween. Stay tuned because it will be a fun month.

Warriors of Virtue

I remember when I was a kid; I saw commercials for a 1997 movie, “Warriors of Virtue.” It looked like a great film about a kid who travels to another world and meets kangaroos who know martial arts. I didn’t get to see it in theaters, but we did rent it from the library when it was released on VHS. When I saw it, I had liked it, but when I got older and saw parts of the movie again, I was admitting how much I loved it, and my brother said this ripped off Ninja Turtles. Granted, as a child, how was I supposed to know that? Even after seeing The Nostalgia Critic’s review of the movie and the clips that he had used, I was getting bored by seeing them. So what makes this film painfully dull, well, let’s find out. Hopefully you don’t fall asleep reading this.

First off, this film gets its viewers confused as to what kind of a movie it is. Is it a fantasy movie, a family movie, or a sports movie? Because the scenes change so fast that you don’t even know what kind of a movie you are watching. And the comics you see being read by the main character Ryan Jeffers, played by Mario Yedida, looks more like the storyboards for the movie. Seriously, this would be an insult to comic books, and fans could go on rants about that part. Apparently he has a disabled leg, which makes him the towel boy for his middle school’s football team. He can’t play football, but he does give the players advice on how to play. After the game, they invite him over to a sewer line, and he is so gullible that he decides to go there. Look kid, these kids are trying to trick you into becoming one of them. Can’t you see that? But then again, middle school kids do hang out with the wrong crowd, which I can say from personal experience. Even Ryan’s friend, Chucky, played by Ricky D'Shon Collins, can see that this is a trap.

Ryan is apparently friends with the owner of his favorite Chinese restaurant, played by Dennis Dun, who tells him to imagine a world where warriors use the elements to fight. Sounds like a cool place to be if the movie would hurry up and take us there. What’s with all this other stuff? Where are the martial arts kangaroos? Also, the manuscript that the owner gives Ryan is supposed to be of Tao. Oh, I forgot to mention, the T in Tao is pronounced with a D sound, NOT A T! If you are Chinese, you should know that! It’s alright if they mispronounce it maybe once or twice, but they keep mispronouncing it over and over and over again. Dimwits!

After about 20 minutes, we finally get the kid transported to the Land of Tao. How does he get there? Well, the football team’s quarterback, Brad, played by Michael Dubrow, tells Ryan to cross a steel beam in order to spray paint on the wall, but the sewer water comes in and drains him down a whirlpool. When he wakes up, he is in the Land of Tao and he finds that his leg is miraculously healed. He’s attacked, loses the manuscript, meets up with a dwarf named Mudlap (Michael J. Anderson), who takes him to Elysia (the beautiful Marley Shelton), who takes him to see Master Chung (Chao-Li Chi). You could say he is like Mr. Miyagi, but not anywhere close to being like him.

Master Chung then “finally” takes him to see the Warriors of Virtue who wield the elemental powers. Lai: Warrior of Wood (Virtue of Loyalty) (Don W. Lewis, voiced by Dale Wilson), Chi: Warrior of Fire (Virtue of Wisdom) (J. Todd Adams, voiced by Doug Parker), Tsun: Warrior of Earth (Virtue of Integrity) (Adrienne Corcoran, voiced by Kathleen Barr), and Yee: Warrior of Metal (Virtue of Righteousness) (Doug Jones, voiced by Doug Parker). One of them is no longer with the group, and that is Yun: Warrior of Water (Virtue of Benevolence) (Jake Tate, voiced by Scott McNeil) because he killed someone, but does return to the group. When you see these five together, you will instantly think Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rip-offs. Only they are Marsupials instead of Turtles.

Like all bad movies, all of the good parts were only put in the trailers. The rest of the movie has our heroes sitting around a fire talking about what they need to do. Where’s all of the action that you are promising us? This is what the movie is going to do? Just talk us to boredom until we fall asleep and wake up not knowing what happened? Seriously, give us some action! This film's running time is around the 90 minute mark, but a lot of it is boring us to death with all this camp fire talk. Oh we do have action, but they are all filmed in that blurry vision that you don’t even know what’s going on. Even the last fight has the best action, and that is shot in that darn annoying blurry vision.

The one enjoyable factor of this film is the over-the-top villain Komodo, played by Angus MacFayden. He’s just a joy to watch because of how much overacting he does. You might even remember MacFayden from such well-known roles in other films like “Titus” and “Braveheart.” I would say he was given bad direction than him having a bad acting coach for this film.

Also when Ryan reads the manuscript, it says, “Five is one, Positive Kung. To take a life, you lose a part of yourself.” What kind of a saying is that in a manuscript? They have to combine their medallions, and when they say their elements, I’m expecting Captain Planet to come out.

Bottom line: avoid this movie, unless you want to be bored to tears. It is that underwhelming. After rewatching it as an adult, I can safely say that this film is one of the most boring films ever made. You would think that they would have learned from this and not take this any further right? Well, much to their everlasting shame, they made a direct-to-video sequel in 2002. That one I will review this Friday, so stay tuned, even though I know everyone doesn’t want to. I know for a fact that I don’t.

Rush Hour 3

What in the world happened to Chris Tucker? After “Rush Hour 2,” he was nowhere to be seen for at least six years. Was it because people ranted and raved about a Chinese martial artist and a black comedian in a buddy cop movie? Listen here people, like I had stated in my “Lethal Weapon” review, Danny Glover said that the racial fear of people complaining about a black and white buddy cop duo never goes away. Come on now, if Danny Glover and Mel Gibson can work together as a buddy cop duo, as well as any other duo that has one white actor and one black actor, then why can’t an Asian man and a black man? The thing about buddy cops that make them partners is they are both polar opposites and learn to work with one another as the film goes on. And if that is successful enough, then guarantee a sequel or two or more.

Or was it because “Rush Hour 2” wasn’t very well received? I don’t see why that would bother him because a lot of people liked the movie and thought it was funnier than the first one. That’s what I thought. It expanded the story, Lee and Carter learned to grow as partners, and we learn more about the characters. Plus, the action was really good and the comedic timing from both of them was great. Maybe Tucker wasn't getting that many good roles, hence why we hadn't seen him for a while.

Anyway, after six years of not seeing Chris Tucker anywhere, he finally reappears on screen in 2007 in “Rush Hour 3.” When I first saw the trailer to this, I was thinking, “Seriously? They made a third one?” I first didn’t think there was any reason and thought that was just a joke when in one of the “Rush Hour 2” bloopers when John Lone fell onto the cab, Tucker said, “He ain’t going to be in ‘Rush Hour 3’.” Turns out they made it, but I didn’t see this until I got it from the local library.

“Rush Hour 3” was officially announced on May 7, 2006, and they started to film it on Independence Day of that year. It grossed about $258,022,233 worldwide. There are even a couple of familiar faces in this one. Tzi Ma is back as Ambassador Han and Zhang Jingchu plays an adult Soo Yung. Even Roselyn Sanchez shows up as Isabella in one of the deleted scenes and Phillip Baker Hall reprises his role as Captain Diel, but both of them were uncredited. Director Roman Polanski is in this film as Detective Revi, a French policeman who was involved in the case Lee and Carter are assigned to in this film. Yes, this film takes place first in Los Angeles and then it goes to Paris, France.

Even though this film was rated PG-13 here, it was rated M in Australia and did not even appear in theaters in China so that a larger amount of foreign films could screen. This has been told by a business representative. Either that or China did not like the fact that Jackie Chan was starring in a movie with Tucker. What do the Chinese have against blacks, are they racist?

Jeff Nathanson wrote the script, who is described as a combination of Francis Ford Coppola and Alfred Hitchcock. According to Carrie Rickey of the Inquirer Movie Critic, “Nathanson's best invention: a cabbie (Yvan Attal) who denounces America and its love of car chases, guns and violence. And who, after a few minutes in Carter and Lee's vehicle-chasing, gunplaying, butt-kicking company, is ready to apply for U.S. citizenship.”

Brett Ratner had hired J. Michael Muro as cinematographer and he had done a poor job of trying to join Muro’s radiant images with special effects. Try to imagine Muro building a great storyboard design then Ratner decides to rip it to shreds.

Unlike in “Rush Hour 2” where we saw two strong women, here they are used as eye-candy. Jingchu is a very attractive actress, but doesn’t really do much in the film. Noemie Lenoir plays Genevieve, who is basically like a model that is seen scantily-clad and has a secret. Youki Kudoh plays Jasmine the Dragon Lady who may look good but will turn around and act like Zhang Ziyi from “Rush Hour 2.”

The villain in this film is Kenji, played by Hiroyuki Sanada, who turns out to be Lee’s long lost brother. Now that is a sudden dark turn. He falls off the Eiffel Tower when a safety rope snaps. After realizing that he and Lee cannot survive, Kenji tells Lee to let him go.

If you’re wondering if the comedy in this film is there, it is. Chan can easily put a kung-fu whopping on anyone while Tucker talks his way out of situations, but also ends up doing some funny fight choreography as well. The part where the French Chinese man is being interrogated by Lee and Carter and Lee tells Carter that he’s speaking French, Carter slaps the Chinese man and says, “You Asian man, stop humiliating yourself.” When they get the nun, Sister Agnes, played by Dana Ivey, to translate for them, it’s a scene that gets funny one line after another. Especially with them using the first letter of a swear word just so they don’t curse in front of a nun, or they will go to Satan's home. Or how about when Lee and Carter go to the Dojo, Carter is asking people their names and it turns into a tribute to the famous Abbot and Costello's sketch, "Who's on first?" In my opinion, this film is the funniest of the three.

Since this is a buddy movie, Lee and Carter insult each other; give each other diet advice and jokes, while still being there for one another. Chan does not fail to impress with his own kung-fu stunts while Tucker tries to do some kung-fu, but does a fighting style of his own. That’s what makes the action in this movie so funny. Check this one out if you haven’t seen it yet, you are definitely missing out on some nice comedy in this one.

I have been hearing rumors of a “Rush Hour 4,” which would be great. Series producer Arthur Sarkissian said that they are working on a fourth film with Chan and Tucker signed on, and also admitted to bring back Brett Ratner if he will “do it the right way.” Sarkissian said he did not like the third movie and that he wants the fourth one to be grittier and have new ideas. Also he is looking at “four or five” screenwriters to choose from and work on the script.

Thank you for joining in on my review of the “Rush Hour trilogy.” I hope you liked them, stay tuned to what I will review before the month closes out. Speaking of which, I should start thinking about that before next week.

Rush Hour 2

Up next in this funny trilogy is “Rush Hour 2,” which was released in 2001. Worldwide, this film made $347,325,802, making this the most successful film in the “Rush Hour Trilogy.” When Brett Ratner was in an interview, he admitted that the beginning where Chris Tucker (who we hadn’t seen in film since the first Rush Hour) is singing Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough” originally wasn’t supposed to be filmed. The reason why was Tucker refused to act like Michael Jackson when the cameras were running since Chris Tucker was really good friends with Michael Jackson. However, Ratner was very sneaky and told the cameraman to film it without having Chris Tucker notice. When Tucker was being interviewed by the talk show host who only wants to talk about cars with his guest, Jay Leno, Tucker said that when they were filming the movie in Hong Kong, many of the people there thought he was NBA star Kobe Bryant. If you remember the part in the film where Tucker is running up the stairs to the ceiling when Chan is fighting the gang, a Chinese woman yells at Tucker saying, “Move out of the way, Kobe.” In the DVD commentary, Ratner confesses that writer Jeff Nathanson came up with that line shortly before they shot that part.

If you notice the mural on the wall in the Heaven on Earth Massage Parlor, it was a copy of the one from the 1983 classic, “Scarface,” both of which Harris Yulin and Ratner appeared in. If you remember when Chan and Tucker are picking girls at the massage parlor, that part came from Bruce Lee’s very famous movie, “Enter the Dragon,” which Chan appeared in, and I have yet to see that movie. Also, the scene where Chan and Tucker are running naked on the streets of Hong Kong was an actual shot. Production could not block the street for that shot. That scene was inspired from a part in Chan’s film, “The Accidental Spy,” which came out before this film. When Ratner saw the movie, he decided to have a similar scene like that in “Rush Hour 2.”

The part where Ricky Tan, played by John Lone, is having that boat party, the song playing in the background is “Tian Mi Mi,” which was also in “Year of the Dragon,” and that was a film John Lone co-starred in. Here’s a little tidbit that nobody probably knows: the hot Hispanic actress, Roselyn Sanchez, gets seasick, so that is shown when Tucker was trying to put the moves on her.

When Chan and Tucker are on the plane flying to Los Angeles, Tucker says that Asian people panic and run when Godzilla would appear. That was a reference. He shouts, “Hayaku! Hayaku!” That is Japanese, which means, “Quickly! Quickly!” When Tucker gets the kosher meal on the plane, originally Tucker turns to Chan and asks him, “Want some of my gefilte fish?” after the stewardess leaves. However, the scene had to be removed because Tucker could not pronounce gefilte, but you can see it in the outtakes when the credits are rolling.

“Rush Hour 2” had a couple of cameo appearances. The first was by Don Cheadle, who agreed to appear on two conditions: he gets to speak Chinese and pick a fight with Chan. When Tucker and Chan are in the business suite, Ernie Reyes Jr appeared as a worker who the two chases. Jeremy Piven also makes a cameo appearance as the gay Versace salesman. Piven and Cheadle were both in “The Family Man,” which was directed by Ratner.

Now the Red Dragon Casino in Las Vegas owned by Ricky Tan and Steven Reign, played by the great Alan King, was actually the Desert Inn hotel and casino. There were red lights that shined which made it a scarlet color. When the 50 year old Las Vegas Strip property was closed in August 2000 by Steve Wynn, the “Rush Hour 2” production moved in and redesigned certain areas of the place as a Chinese themed casino/hotel for the movie. When they had finished production, the Desert Inn was demolished in October 2001 for a new $2.7 billion Wynn Las Vegas resort. Notice how the casino was named “Red Dragon,” which is also a movie that Ratner would go on to direct a few months after “Rush Hour 2,” which is also the name of a real casino in Mountlake Terrace, Washington.

The fake cash in this movie was called, “In Dogs We Trust.” Some of it had “escaped” from the set and eventually went in a few casinos in Las Vegas.

Here’s a quick trivia: Chan’s favorite number is 32. If you remember that gangster’s car’s license plate of 32 when Chan had spit the grenade out of his mouth and landed on the roulette table, it landed on 32 when it exploded.

At the end fight, Tucker improvised many different speeches after he fought the dangerous Hu Li, played by the very lovely and beautiful Zhang Ziyi. Ratner felt that it would not work and told Tucker to call her the B word, but he refused, and it took hours for Ratner to convince Tucker before he finally agreed. When filming the stunt where Tucker and Chan slide down the wires of Chinese Lanterns, there was a real car chase happening. This is true. A car full of drunk tourists got into an argument with the Taxi Driver, and a car chase ensued down onto the set, narrowly missing crew members, extras, and a crane which had a camera and crew. The good thing is no one was injured. The police detained the driver and the passengers of the taxi.

In a deleted scene, Phillip Baker Hall reprised his role of Captain Diel from the first film. Carter speaks with Diel about what happened when him and Lee were in Hong Kong and how he got in the Triad case. The Triads were the Hong Kong gang that Lee and Carter fought in the beginning. On the DVD commentary, Ratner said that he would have loved to have that scene in the movie, but it did not further the plot, and was left out.

Zhang Ziyi only speaks three English words in the film, two was when she asked Roselyn Sanchez’s character, Isabella, “Some apple?” If you can read lips, than you can see that she is seen in the part where Lee and Carter are spying on Isabella in the next door hotel, Hu Li comes in and says, “Here’s your package. You’re welcome.” Chan was Zhang’s translator while they shot the movie. “Hu Li” actually means “fox.” Here’s a funny story: her role was originally written for a man.
 

Notice how the first two films start in Hong Kong and end in a USA airport. Now the time gap between these two films is approximately four days.

One recurring joke is when Lee says to Carter, “You are a civilian. In Hong Kong, *I* am Michael Jackson and *you* are Toto.” Carter then responds, “You mean Tito! Toto is what we ate for dinner last night!” Another is when Lee thought that Carter was dead in the bomb explosion at his office, and when he finds him on the boat, Carter goes, “Who died Lee?” Lee responds, “You!” Carter than asks, “Detective Yu?” Lee keeps trying to tell him “you” but gets agitated and asks, “Do you understand the words that are a-coming out of my mouth?” (If you remember, Carter asked Lee that when he went to pick him up from the airport.) Carter then responds, “Don't nobody understand the words that are comin' out of your mouth.” Another joke is when Carter throws Lee’s “Beach Boys” CD out of the window, and Lee says in anger, “That's my CD! Don't you ever touch a Chinese man's CD!”

We also find out in the movie that Ricky Tan was the partner of Lee’s father. Lee then tells Carter that Lee’s father was working on a big smuggling case, found out that Tan was working with the Triads, but was killed before he could prove anything. Every evidence disappeared, Tan resigned, and the case was never solved. This film shows Lee and Carter growing, as partners, and I would say that this film is funnier and more enjoyable than the first; so do check it out if you liked the first one.

But how does the third one rate in the trilogy? Find out next time when I look at the final film in the 

Rush Hour

It appears that buddy cop movies always seem to have a lot of comedy in them. That was definitely the case in the “Lethal Weapon” series, but that also had a lot of seriousness in them until the much later films. However, if you look at the “Rush Hour” trilogy, it has more funny and some seriousness. Let’s take a look at the first film, which came out in 1998.

Brett Ratner was chosen as the director for this movie, and he was a big fan of Jackie Chan’s movies from Hong Kong. I have seen both “Drunken Master” movies, and the second one, which in the USA is called “The Legend of Drunken Master,” was really action packed. As a result, I don’t blame Ratner for casting Chan, since he is a great actor who trained at the Peking Opera House. According to wikianswers, Chan has studied several forms of martial arts. He learned from his father, GrandMaster Leung Ting in Wing Chun, Tong Long, and Bak Mei. He knows Hapkido, Boxing, Judo, Taekwondo and Hei Long, but his personal style mixes Wing Chun, Hapkido and Judo. This is the reason why he performs his own stunts and doesn’t use a double. However, Ratner felt that American audiences were unfamiliar with the jokes from Chan’s other movies, so he used some of his jokes on purpose. This can be seen in the part when Chan accidentally grabs Elizabeth Peña’s chest, which a similar situation can be seen in Chan’s 1997 movie, “Mr. Nice Guy.”

For the part of Chan’s partner, Martin Lawrence and Dave Chappelle (who are also two of the funniest comedians out there) were originally considered for the role. However, another funny comedian who has become a serious Christian, Chris Tucker, won the part. On George Lopez’s talk show, Tucker said that Chan used to make him look bad by showing up to work on time. He would tell Chan, “Take it easy in your trailer,” but Chan would respond, “Get to set on time, you wasting money!” Chan is also well-known for messing up his lines. Tucker would say that he would have Chan’s lines on cardboards all over him and he would stand behind the camera. Tucker only messed up one time and Chan rubbed it in his face.

The film grossed a total of over $244 million worldwide, over $141 in the US, and over $103 million outside the US. It was well received amongst critics, giving it a 61% on Rotten Tomatoes and is given a 6.8 on IMDB. This is one of the funniest buddy movies you will see, and I highly recommend you go see it.

You’re probably wondering: What is the film about? Hong Kong is just a few days shy of being a part of the British colony. Chan’s character, Detective Lee, is a cop who busts a smuggling ring, but they escape to USA. Once they arrive there, the leader, Thomas Griffin aka Juntao (Tom Wilkinson) captures Consul Han’s (Tzi Ma) daughter, Soo Yung (Julia Hsu). Juntao tells the FBI that he wants Lee, who is a family friend, to come to Los Angeles to help with the investigation. However, the feds don’t want a cop from overseas to help with the investigation, and they don’t want to get the LAPD involved. In order to do that, the LAPD chief, played by Philip Baker Hall, decides to get a detective that gives him a headache to keep Lee out of the way and also to get him out of the picture. That would be Tucker, playing James Carter, who works in dangerous situations.

Now this pair up is just great because neither one of them like teamwork and prefer to work alone. However, Lee is new to the country and Carter needs to impress his chief. This gives the writers, Jim Kouf and Ross Lamanna, a very good opportunity to write down as many funny jokes and one-liners they can think of.

Chan, as always, performs all of his stunts. The part where he jumps from a double-decker bus onto an overhead traffic sign and lands on a truck, or when he falls from a beam and lands safely on a silk streamer, that’s all Chan. Soo Yung in this film is not your typical helpless child that tries to kick and scream her way out of trouble. She instead is treated like one of Chan’s martial arts students. When Juntao and his men try to kidnap her, she doesn’t give them trouble. Tucker is also great in the way he tries to talk his way out of situations. He does this by using an amusing line of dialogue while he figures out what to do next. Roger Ebert himself said, “’Rush Hour’ is lightweight and made out of familiar elements, but they're handled with humor and invention, and the Wunza formula can seem fresh if the characters are Botha couple of engaging performers.” This is what Ebert had called a buddy movie as a subgenre, which can describe the contrasts between two characters in a typical movie.

Throughout the movie, Lee and Carter grow to become partners and work well with one another. Both had fathers that were legends in the police department, and when they fight over what their father’s did when they were on the force, it all boils down to both of them threatening each other to not disrespect their father. Later on in one of the serious scenes, we find out that Carter’s father was killed in daylight “making a routine traffic stop by some punk who didn’t want no ticket.” The sad part about this is that the partner did not even back him up when he was supposed to. He even tells Lee to prove him wrong in believing his father wasted his life and died for nothing without any honor.

Some of the funny scenes include when Carter tries to teach Lee how to say “y’all” to the Edwin Starr song, “War.” Another is when Carter says to Lee, “This is the United States of James Carter. I'm the president, I'm the emperor, I'm the king. I'm Michael Jackson, you Tito.” One of the memorable funny scenes is when Carter yells at Lee for touching his car radio and warns him, “Don't you ever touch a black man's radio, boy!” How about when Lee hears Carter say the N word and decides to use it himself, and ends up in a fight? One of the funny Carter lines is when he asks Juntao over the phone, "Fifty million dollars? Man, who do you think you kidnapped? Chelsea Clinton?"

Ebert also said, “The movie teams up Jackie Chan, king of lighthearted action comedy, and Chris Tucker, who crosses Eddie Murphy with Chris Rock and comes up with a guy who, if you saw him a block away, you'd immediately start wondering how he was going to con you. There are comic possibilities even in their personal patterns. Chan is not known for his effortless command of English, and Tucker is a motormouth. Chan's persona is modest and self-effacing, and Tucker plays a shameless self-promoter.” That’s all more reason to see this movie. Also, stay tuned after the film to see the bloopers while the credits roll.

The film also had two sequels that were released in the following years, which I will get to later on in the month. Thanks for reading this review, and I hope you enjoyed it.