Rush Hour

Comedy, Adventure, Thriller, Crime, Action

Ken Leung	Sang
Jackie Chan	Detective Inspector Lee
Tom Wilkinson	Thomas Griffin/Juntao
Tzi Ma	Consul Han
Robert Littman
Chris Tucker	Detective James Carter
Chris Penn	Clive
Julia Hsu	Soo Yung
Elizabeth Pena	Demolition Specialist Tania Johnson

Director	Brett Ratner
Producer	Roger Birnbaum; Jonathan Glickman
Writer	Jim Kouf; Ross LaManna

After years pleasing fans on his home turf, Jackie Chan finally broke into American multiplexes with the 1998 hit Rush Hour. In one of many tips of his hat acknowledging the late great Bruce, Chan plays Hong Kong-based Detective Inspector Lee who finds himself on the streets of LA assisted by motor-mouthed Detective Carter (Chris Tucker). The baddy's identity, his motive and exactly how the good guys will win in the end is all rather secondary to seeing lots of goons dispatched by increasingly flamboyant and jaw-dropping stunts. The inevitable showdown with nasty henchman Sang fulfils all Chan fans' expectations nicely. What genuinely made this an international success was the pairing of Chan with Tucker, who won Blockbuster Entertainment and MTV Movie awards for Best On-screen Duo.

On the DVD: After a flawless anamorphic 16:9 presentation with a choice of 5.1 or 2.0 Stereo, the extras package is generous to say the least. Animated menus with excerpts from Lalo Schifrin's superb score link to the usual fare: trailer, cast and crew biographies in scrolling text, two music videos for Heavy D's "Nuttin But Love" and Dru Hill's "How Deep is Your Love", and six deleted scenes totalling three minutes. Additionally there's a highly enthusiastic commentary from director Brett Ratner and a very peculiar 40-minute short from Ratner's NYU Film School days (funded by Steven Spielberg) called Whatever Happened To Mason Reese. The real jewel is the documentary "A Piece of the Action" consisting of 17 featurettes and totalling 40 minutes. It includes a fascinating 10- minute segment of Chan choreographing a fight scene from scratch and some hilarious outtakes not already featured in the end titles. --Paul Tonks