When the lovely Princess Pei Pei (Lucy Liu) is kidnapped from China, the Emperor dispatches three of his most fierce and noble Imperial Guards to deliver the ransom in gold to her kidnappers in America's Wild West. Chon Wang (Jackie Chan) isn't among the chosen. However, he manages to tag along anyway by offering to carry the luggage for his uncle, the Interpreter.
Heading through the Nevada desert by train, the Imperial entourage is hijacked by a motley crew of would-be train robbers calling themselves the Roy O'Bannon gang. Its eponymous leader spends more time self-promoting than pulling the heist. Some quick martial arts moves by Chon mean the thieves lose the loot, but they also leave Chon alone in the desert. In the meantime, because of the bungled train robbery, Roy (Owen Wilson) has been abandoned by his former partners in crime and buried up to his neck in the desert sand. He's to be a feast for a flock of ravenous vultures, a gathering of which is already sampling the banquet.
Trekking through the wilderness, Chon serendipitously comes across the helpless Roy who begs to be extricated from his dire situation. Chon obliges by providing a set of chopsticks and suggests Roy dig himself out - no hands! Chong continues his journey and takes on a party of Crow warriors to save a small Native American boy and finds himself a hero with the boy's Sioux tribe. Fringe benefits include a peace pipe smoke-up, a horse with some bizarre habits and a beautiful wife named Falling Leaves. When Chon sets off again to rescue the princess, all but the peace pipe come with him.
An unexpected run-in with Roy in a saloon lands the two in jail. But, hearing that Chon's mission involves not only a beautiful princess but also a trunk of gold coins, Roy becomes his new best friend. Chon engineers a brilliant jail break and the unlikely partners head to Carson City where they face brawls, bordellos, treachery and plenty of what Roy calls "crazy, girlie, kick-fightin'" as East meets West in a battle for honor, royalty and a fortune in gold.
(71 votes)
2.
Story? What story? All a film like Shanghai Noon needs is the amazing stunt set pieces featuring kung fu superstar Jackie Chan and the ramblings of Owen Wilson (and to be sure, that's all it gets). It's a buddy comedy about Roy O'Bannon (Wilson), a minor, borderline incompetent desperado, and Chon Wang (Chan--Roy thinks he hears (and scoffs at) the name "John Wayne"--a member of the Chinese Imperial Guard searching for a kidnapped princess (Lucy Liu). They become reluctant partners in the Old West (Roy, who considers Chon his sidekick, is hurt to discover that the bounty on Wang's head is more than his own), brawling, drinking, bathing and bonding and in general having mildly amusing adventures together, while eluding a posse and other random enemies.
There's not a lot of focus to the plot or much motivation for characters to turn up where and when they do--just what was achieved by the much-discussed trek to Carson City, anyway?--but Chan's inventively staged battle sequences (particularly an early one in which he uses flexible, resilient trees to best some Crow Indians) are predictable highlights. You'll wish there were more to some of them, but as with his many other films, you'll want them on video to watch in slow-motion to see how he pulls them off. And in a potentially star-making role, Wilson's loquacious, hyper-self-conscious meanderings--he's funny even when his lines aren't--make him seem less like a character than a very amusing deconstruction of one. Chan and Wilson are entertaining together, even though they're both off in their own little worlds. Think of it as Butch Cassidy and the Shanghai Kid, and you won't be too far off. --David Kronke, Amazon.com
(61 votes)
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