Wonderful character development!

That was an excellent one.

Brilliant and touching

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

I forgot how much goddamn fun Shanghai Noon is. It's pretty much the quintessential east meets west buddy flick (sorry Rush Hour, love you too bbz), and upon rewatching it I realized that it's every bit as awesome, and more so, than I remember as a kid. You take Jackie Chan, a stoic, robotic Chinese fighting machine with the sense of humour god gave a sock, and pair him with Owen Wilson, a wishy washy surfer dude of a cowboy who can't take one second out of the day to stop talking or cracking jokes, and you've got gold. Of course, they need a film to run about in that's just as solid as they're team up, and that's just what we get. This is a bawdy, unapologetic roll in the hay, a genre bender that tosses the American western, the buddy cop flick and the Kung Fu picture into a big cauldron, fires a few bullets in and gives it a big old stir. It's ridiculously fun for its entire duration, an achievement which the sequel just couldn't keep up with. Chan is Chon Wang (say it fast), a Chinese imperial guard on the trail of runaway Princess Pei Pei (Lucy Liu), who has runoff to America. No sooner does he set foot on Yankee soil, he's bumped into peace pipe smoking Natives, and clashed with a band of train robbers led by Roy O Bannon (Owen Wilson), a fast talking soldier of fortune who doesn't seem to have much skill besides yapping his way out of a situation. The two are thrown into a mad dash across then west, Chon looking for the princess, and Roy after the missing gold from the train. It's what movies were made to be, a pure rush of gunfighting and chop socky, kick ass action sequences, all given the boost of Chan's insane talents. He's like a rabid squirrel monkey, and Wilson a drunk sloth, constantly mismatched yet always coming out on top, like the best comic duos always do. They're faced with taking dpwn a few baddies, including Walton Goggins as the dumbest outlaw this side of the Rockies, and a terrifying Xander Berkeley as a corrupt, homicidal marshal. The core of it rests on Chan and Wilson to entertain us though, and even in the down time between action, their energy is infectious, especially in a manic drinking game that just can't be described in writing. Like I said, the sequel, Shanghai Knights, just doesn't capture he magic quite like this one does, and seems to fall flat. You can't go wrong with this original outing though, and it just gets better with age.

Shanghai Noon is a great movie with a very well developed storyline and a terrific comedic cast. It's a very fun movie that contains many scenes that had me laughing out loud, as well as several surprisingly intense and very well choreographed action sequences, it's a clever mix of both westerns and martial arts films, and it is clear watching this from start to finish that it is a unique film. I only have two major problems with this movie, and that is that it takes itself too seriously at times, it gets fairly deep for something that should have only wanted to be a comedy, particularly the scenes with the princess and her capturers are quite dark and grim, and I also felt like it needed much more moments between Chan and Wilson's characters that conveyed a friendship is beginning, I would have liked to see a lot more scenes with the two of them together simply having fun and not worrying about the problem they must overcome. The highlight of the movie and the thing that certainly holds it all together would have to be Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson, they are an unlikely duo, but this works out perfectly, the chemistry between the two is outstanding and the drinking game is definitely my favourite scene in the whole movie. Funny, action packed and entertaining, I would recommend Shanghai Noon to anyone looking for a good adventure film. A Chinese imperial guard teams up with a train robber in order to rescue a kidnapped princess. Best Performance: Owen Wilson

I will preface this by saying that I'm really picky when it comes to comedies. That being said, this movie right here seems to think that it's enough to shove a funny stereotype in our faces and then expect us to laugh at it uproariously.I liked this film as an action/adventure film. Jackie Chan is a great martial art lead actor and his talents are showcased well in this film. It's not one of the best he has ever done, but the fight scenes are fun to follow, they're imaginative enough to keep up my interest and the settings have some promise and allow for some cool sequences. Furthermore, the West is filmed with care and all the various locations, while hardly original, look nice and feel genuine.Unfortunately the script is nonsensical, from oneshot characters that make no sense to plot motives and twists that come straight out of nowhere and steal all thunder out of the film. The plot itself is thin to begin with, but when every major conflict is resolved through either a deus ex machina or a cop-out, you get the idea that they really didn't give a damn as long as they could fill the screen with cheap gimmicks and laughs.The humour doesn't help either. There are some scenes that are honestly funny or at least amusing, most of the between Chan and Wilson, who have surprisingly good chemistry together, but most of the jokes are either mindless slapstick or racial stereotypes. Sure, a Chinaman can be funny if done correctly, but a Chinaman alone is not funny by default. Neither is a coward, a Mexican or an Indian. You need actual effort, which this film is unwilling to spend.If you're able to laugh at cheap jokes and clichés, this is not a bad action comedy. Chan and Wilson are talented comedic leads, who would have made this movie work had the script been any better. As it is, it's not to my liking, but I don't regret seeing it either.

I can't really rate or comment on this film negatively, even though it's a movie almost completely devoid of originality and ideas. Basically this is a formula buddy movie, typical of Jackie Chan's work both here and in China in that it involves elaborate stuntwork, kung-fu with props, and humorous characters and situations. I don't usually bother with Chan's American films since he already made better ones in China, but I wanted to see this one because I've always liked Owen Wilson and I wanted to see how they worked together. Happily I can report that I was pleased greatly with their chemistry, enough so that I might even bother to seek out the sequel at some point.The story is like a comedy variation on the old movie "Red Sun" with Charles Bronson and Toshiro Mifune, except that in this case the Asian hero is Chinese and the object they are seeking is not a precious ceremonial sword but rather the princess of China herself (Lucy Liu). Liu is the weak link in the film if there is one... she doesn't seem to have much talent for comedy, although the film didn't give her too many chances to show it off. Much more interesting is Native American model Brandon Merrill, who made her only film appearance here as the gorgeous and strong-willed woman who takes Chan's character (who her people refer to as "fights in a dress") as a husband.There are some fun moments that come at us, and the film's pace is breezy and light. I liked Wilson and Chan's drinking scene, and the ensuing fight gives Chan an opportunity to revive his much-admired "drunken master" technique. Wilson and Chan make a good pairing because Wilson is so incredibly low-key and Chan is so amazingly high-strung. They're the kind of opposites that always attract, and all the story and other characters are really just trappings for the chemistry they develop.For all that the film does have going for it, it simply lacks a few really outrageous laugh-out-loud moments that could have put it over the top.