After entering 2000, Hong Kong film giant Jiahe Pictures faced serious losses due to the impact of the Asian financial turmoil. In order to stimulate the market, in 2001, Jackie Chan filmed "Secret Agent Maze" for Jiahe, trying to save the defeat.
Unfortunately, this sincere work with an investment of up to HK$200 million, the final global box office is only 20.5 million US dollars (equivalent to 159 million Hong Kong dollars), not only failed to save Jiahe, but also made Jiahe worse.
In the following two years, Jiahe withered, launching only 5 low-budget films, and finally in 2008, it was acquired by the mainland Orange Sky Entertainment Group and withdrew from the historical stage.
In the years when Jiahe's classic car gradually drove to the end, Jackie Chan, an old driver, jumped halfway and turned to Yang Shoucheng's Emperor Entertainment, turning a new page in his acting career.
Jackie Chan, who was nearly fifty years old at the time, was like O'Neill who left the Lakers, although the position of the jianghu was stable, but it had passed its peak.
However, Emperor Entertainment is still full of confidence in Jackie Chan's influence, in order to win Jackie Chan's heart, and show enough sincerity, spent 41 million US dollars (equivalent to 318 million Hong Kong dollars) to tailor the action film "Flying Dragon Regeneration" for him, breaking the investment record of the Hong Kong film industry at that time.
Jackie Chan is also full of confidence in this movie, and invited his brother Hong Jinbao to join as an action director.
Zhang Jianting and Chen Jiashang co-wrote the screenplay, Chen Jiashang directed, and the Emperor's Zhong Liti, Xie Tingfeng, Chen Guanxi and Twins all appeared.
Today, Pigo will talk to you about this movie and its behind-the-scenes story -
One
Let's start with the story
The story of the movie is quite magical, telling that there is a "regenerated dragon chapter" in the world, as long as you get the power of the dragon chapter, people can become immortal "immortals" after death. The leader of the International Human Snake Group, Blackfish (played by Julian Sanders), tries everything to get the Dragon Medal, and he sends his subordinate Leicester to abduct Jai, a young spirit boy who knows how to manipulate the Dragon Badge, and flee to Ireland.
Hong Kong SWAT officer Eddie Young (jackie Chan) also came to Ireland in order to hunt down Leicester, and under the recommendation of his ex-girlfriend Nicole James (Clare Frannie), he met British secret agent Arthur Watson (played by Lee Evans) and Arthur's wife Charlotte (played by Liti Chung).
Eddie and Arthur decide to work together to hunt down Leicester, and the two soon find Lester and his abducted boy Jai at the container terminal. After a fight, Eddie finds Jai, but is trapped with him in a container that has fallen into the sea.
Eddie drowns in the container to save Jai, but he is soon resurrected and granted superpowers. When Eddie wakes up to find that he has not only been resurrected, but also has superhuman physical strength and super self-healing ability, he remembers that he saw the light emitted by Jai's dragon chapter before he died, and suspects that Jai saved him.
Nicole takes Jai back to her home for jai's safety, but the snake demon's men still find and take jai. In order to destroy the "Snake Demon" and rescue Jai, Eddie decides to break into the castle where the "Snake Demon" is based, only to find that the "Snake Demon" has taken the Dragon Medal from Jai's hand and mastered the immortal regeneration power.
Eddie engages in a fierce battle with the Serpent Demon, and with Jai's help, he uses the Dragon Chapter to destroy the Serpent Demon. During the fight, Nicole is killed by the "Snake Demon", but she is blessed and resurrected by Eddie using the Dragon Chapter. And Nicole, who woke up, also has an immortal body, and has become a super-powered person who can go to heaven and earth and do everything, and has the ability to regenerate.
At the end of the film, when Eddie and Nicole both flew into the sky, I believe many people will be full of doubts when they watch it. Since the plot of Eddie's resurrection, the story of the film has slowly spiraled out of control, and the take-off of both the male and female protagonists has made the film almost a farce.
Two
This film, which everyone had high hopes for and invested more than 100 million Hong Kong dollars more than "Secret Agent Maze", eventually suffered the same fate as the latter, earning only $34.27 million at the global box office, and even the production costs were difficult to recover.
Why did Jackie Chan suffer such a failure in his first work when he switched to the British Queen?
Pigo has previously summarized several important labels that belong to "Jackie Chan movies", and almost all successful Jackie Chan works are inseparable from those characteristics that belong to "Jackie Chan movies".
The failure of this film from the overall arrangement to the storyline is precisely because it deviates from the characteristics of those "Jackie Chan movies", and Pigo summarizes the following failures.
1. The movie deviates from the convention of "Jackie Chan does not die", and before the release, it is to "Jackie Chan died in the movie for the first time" as the selling point, and this kind of publicity is obviously "not on the right board".
In fact, Jackie Chan has also "died" more than once in the early movies. The most "vigorous" death is Zhu Yanping's "Burning Island". The biggest difference between the "death" method in "Flying Dragon Regeneration" and previous movies is that Jackie Chan is really "dead" in previous films, and in this film, he is only "suspended animation" at best.
After Eddie dies in the middle of the film, he is quickly resurrected, and as a result, he gains the superpower of being invincible and invincible. Using the gimmick of "Jackie Chan died in the movie for the first time" to deceive the audience can only show that the publicity before the release of the movie is not powerful, and it is really impossible to come up with any decent publicity means.
2. The action scenes in the second half of the film completely abandon the consistent characteristics of Jackie Chan's action comedy, and the huge changes in style make it difficult for the audience to accept.
Jackie Chan once said that the biggest difference between his movements and Bruce Lee's movements is that when he punches out, his hands will hurt. This is the characteristic of Jackie Chan's action comedy, and it is also what distinguishes him from Bruce Lee and Jet Li's actions. Jackie Chan's action is a kind of comedic action that steals Buster Keaton and combines with traditional martial arts.
Jackie Chan found his brother Hong Jinbao as an action director, and the action design of the two originally had a lot in common, which should be a combination of one plus one is greater than two. However, in fact, the action scenes of the movie did not become very good, but became the "disaster scene", in order to serve the storyline of "Eddie becomes Superman", the second half of the movie completely became Superman fighting monsters.
We can't say that Jackie Chan also played Hanging Weah is his laziness, but "Hanging Weia" has never been what Jackie Chan's action comedies should be. From realistic stories, funny and funny action design, to based on unreal settings and exaggerated hanging Wea actions, this style change has really confused audiences accustomed to Jackie Chan movies.
3. The mediocrity of the film's story makes the efforts of all the actors in the film futile.
Wang Shuo once called Jackie Chan movies and Jin Yong novels, Qiong Yao TV series, and songs of the Four Heavenly Kings as the three major customs of Hong Kong and Taiwan, one is that the influence of Jackie Chan movies is amazing; the other is that Jackie Chan movies have specific styles and patterns. Jackie Chan is only suitable for fashion action movies, he can't act in costume films, nor can he act in magic films, and this film is just a magic film with a strong mysterious color.
Magic movies are not the better the story, the more you create a magic film, you must first build a worldview that can achieve logical self-healing, such as "The Lord of the Rings" and "Harry Potter". However, this film not only fails to construct such a world view, but there are still many inconsistencies in the setting of the film, which makes the audience very confused.
For example, the little spirit boy Jai does not seem to have a very powerful superpower in the early stage, and he is trapped in the container and cannot escape by himself. But at the end of the movie, he can suddenly easily open the door of time and space and run away, making people wonder what kind of weakness and helplessness he showed before is going to make trouble.
Three
The movie itself has such a big problem, as the main creator, Jackie Chan, Chen Jiashang, and Hong Jinbao will not be unaware. In fact, this huge change in the overall style of the film is exactly the intention of Jackie Chan, and it is also his new exploration and attempt.
Unlike "Secret Agent Maze", which cost 200 million yuan to create expensive action scenes, a large part of the film's HK$318 million investment was invested in CG special effects. In 2003, although computer special effects had gradually become the mainstream of Hollywood movies, they were still difficult to control for Hong Kong films.
Jackie Chan's decision to add a lot of CG special effects to his films is a new attempt on his part. After all, he was 49 years old at the time, old enough to play, and always hoped to replace the dangerous stunt shots that he had previously spelled out with his life, but the end result was that this change was not acceptable to the audience.
Not only that, in the more than 10 years since this film, Jackie Chan has tried various styles and genres of movies, such as science fiction films such as "Myth" and "Blood of the Machine"; crime films such as "Shinjuku Incident"; costume films such as "The Soldier And The Little General", "Detective Pu Songling"; chicken soup films such as "Relief Grocery Store".
There are even main theme movies "Railway Flying Tiger" and "Xinhai Revolution". He has tried almost all the movie genres he can make, but the real hits are still popcorn blockbusters such as "Baby Project", "Zodiac", and "Kung Fu Yoga", which return to the traditional style of Jackie Chan.
Therefore, the box office failure of "Wyvern Regeneration" lies in the film story itself, and the real reason is the failure of Jackie Chan's attempt to change the style of the film.
Four
The film's defeat also cast a shadow over Jackie Chan's Hollywood film path, but at that time he still threw all his enthusiasm into the filming of the movie "Around the World in 80 Days".
That classic remake of the work due to the magic of the character setting and the lack of power of the story, and later ended in a bigger fiasco, after which Jackie Chan could no longer receive a new film contract, and could only return home.
And "Flying Dragon Regeneration", as a turning point in Jackie Chan's Hollywood career, has also become an eternal pain in Jackie Chan's life.
After returning to Hong Kong, Jackie Chan was determined to make a film for the Emperor, first making a cameo appearance in "Thousand Chances to Change II. Flower Capital War", and then investing 80 million Hong Kong dollars to start filming "New Police Story".
Jackie Chan, now 66 years old, like he did in "Vanguard", can no longer jump off the building, but needs to climb stairs. But "the martyr is in his twilight years, and his heart is full of ambition", and his ambition can still be seen from his films, but this ambition has gradually become inadequate.
Text/Pippi Film Editorial Department: Bloody Dan Heart
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