So Jackie Chan is back again (films, Hollywood, action, actors)

[Bettafish]

I am from China but I am not really a fan of Hong Kong style kungfu movies, though I still watched a lot Jackie Chan and Jet Li.

His new film The Foreigner did not do very well in China. I went to see it yesterday and it seems it won't do well in America either.
The story line is a little too complicated for a normal action movie, and sometimes there is too much dialogue. Anyway, I felt that it is hard for such works to find a niche now. You either make it super gory or make it high-tech.

[Mattks]

Bettafish, I’m curious as to your opinion on how Chinese people feel about Chinese movies in English. The Foreigner is mostly in English (from what I read), but it is a Chinese movie, despite having a large foreign production crew as well. It was mostly directed toward the Chinese market where it was released first. I’d never heard of it and the reviews seem to be mixed.

Jackie Chan’s best movies are his atypical movies, I’m not a fan of his kung fu movies. The police story movies were very good though.

[Bettafish]

Originally Posted by Mattks

Bettafish, I’m curious as to your opinion on how Chinese people feel about Chinese movies in English. The Foreigner is mostly in English (from what I read), but it is a Chinese movie, despite having a large foreign production crew as well. It was mostly directed toward the Chinese market where it was released first. I’d never heard of it and the reviews seem to be mixed.

Jackie Chan’s best movies are his atypical movies, I’m not a fan of his kung fu movies. The police story movies were very good though.

All Hollywood movies are dubbed in Mandarin in China (or you have the option to watch the dubbed one), and I am sure this one has a Mandarin version too. Therefore the language per se would not be a problem.

Interestingly, foreigners in those translated/dubbed movies do have a special "accent" too. It is not a foreign accent (messy tones, inaccurate vowels etc.), but a different way of talking with a unique intonation and vocabulary. (resembling historical English films I guess.)

When Chinese actors speak English, I always feel they struggle to some extent, and that is distracting.

[loves2read]

I understand there was Chinese money invested and that Chan himself is Chinese (from Hong Kong--correct?) but the character in the movie is Vietnamese...
The book (published in the 90s) it is derived from was titled "The Chinaman"==which has good deal of irony as the storyline developes...
Those nuances are lost in the movie which are kind of a shame
And guess the title is changed for "political correctness" but if you are going to change the title then surely there was one better than "The Foreigner" which is such a poor choice...

I enjoyed it more than I anticipated--
I also thought it was a good transfer from book to movie as far as updating the IRA aspect of the plot line...
There are so many people going to movies now who have no clue what the IRA was all about, its power, nor its viciousness...