L and I was dining out one night earlier this month and decided to catch a spontaneous movie before we head home. I was checking for movie schedules via my mobile and found Shinjuku Incident which starred Jackie Chan, so we both decided to watch the movie although we didn’t know what to expect from the movie.
I am surprised to find out that there was not much publicity for the movie and there hasn’t been many reviews of Shinjuku Incident.
Maybe it’s just L and myself, but Shinjuku Incident is without a doubt one of the better Jackie Chan films and possibly on par, if not better than the much-hyped Ip Man.
Shinjuku Incident is a drama about Steelhead (Jackie Chan) who entered Japan illegally in search of his girlfriend, Xiu Xiu. He gets into trouble with the Yakuza when he found out that Xiu Xiu has married a Yakuza leader. The whole movie mainly revolves around Steelhead and his friends’ lives and how they fight to survive in the dog eat dog world in Shinjuku.
With two hours of runtime for the movie, development of characters were done really well. However, towards the middle of the movie I noticed that the movie is somewhat rushed and there were parts that I wished was shown a little bit more instead of fast-forwarded. But other than that the individual characters managed to shine through the flaws of the movie.
Jackie Chan fans might be a little let down as this is probably his first serious movie for which he does not know martial arts and a sex scene was included. I was expecting a totally different movie but it came out surpassing my expectations. Apparently this movie is banned in China for its violence and portrayal of its illegal immigrants.
In conclusion, the whole movie was executed brilliantly, although there could be more scenes that should be left to progress at its own pace. Fans of the Young and Dangerous would be able to see the similarities in this movie. Shinjuku Incident is definitely a must watch movie for all Jackie Chan and Young and Dangerous fans. I give this movie a good 7/10 for its good storyline and twists in the middle of the movie.
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I have seen the promotional posters around but it wasn’t enough to pull me in because Jackie Chan movies have been on the light side of plot and character development so decided to wait until it hit DVD.
But I may go check it out after your review.
Magdelines last blog post..Absent Note
@Magdeline – Do watch it! You shouldn’t be disappointed