Shinjuku Incident

[GeneChing]

Still no word on an American release...

'Shinjuku Incident' to Open in Hong Kong
* February 17, 2009 18:39

The star-studded film 'The Shinjuku Incident' by Hong Kong director Derek Yee will soon open in Hong Kong on April 2.

Leading actors Jackie Chan has teamed up with co-star Fan Bingbing to shoot a spread in Cosmopolitan magazine to promote the film. The two appeared together on the magazine's cover in last September's issue.

The drama, originally set to hit screens by late September last year was postponed. According to media reports the film has not passed the censors on the mainland.

Reportedly, the production team had thought to tone down the violence in the film to meet the requirements of the mainland but finally scrapped the idea as it would destroy the film's integrity.

The drama, set in 1990s, portrays the lives of Chinese immigrants in Tokyo's bustling Shinjuku district.

A tractor mechanic from China nicknamed Steelhead (Jackie Chan) enters Japan illegally in search of his girlfriend Xiu Xiu (Xu Jinglei). Steelhead and his friend, Jie (Daniel Wu) meet in the busy Shinjuku district and take manual labouring jobs to earn money. When Steelhead finds out that Xiu Xiu has married a Japanese Yakuza leader named Eguchi (Ken Watanabe), he decides to remain in Japan. To obtain citizenship, he agrees to work for Eguchi as a killer, but quickly becomes used to the power. Soon he has become embroiled so deeply in the ways of the Yakuza that there is no turning back.

In this big-budget movie that costs $25 million, Jackie Chan breaks away from his typical image as an upright and unbeatable action star. At the end of movie, protagonist Steelhead is killed, marking Jackie Chan's first on-screen death.

The majority of the movie was shot in Japan.

Director: Jackie Chan film too violent for China
By MIN LEE – 1 day ago

HONG KONG (AP) — Jackie Chan, the comical kung fu king, is starring in a new movie so violent that its director decided not to release it in mainland China, which doesn't have a film ratings system.

Hong Kong director Derek Yee said Monday that he considered toning down the violence in "Shinjuku Incident" so it could pass censorship in China, but decided not to because he thought it would hurt the integrity of the movie.

Yee said the $25 million Chinese-language movie, in which Chan plays a refugee who escapes to Japan and becomes a killer for the mob, has scenes that show characters getting a hand chopped off and pierced with knives.

"We tried to cut the violent scenes to meet the requirements of the Chinese market, but producers I invited to watch that version thought it was incomplete," he said.

Yee said Chan, who invested in the movie, agreed with his decision.

Solon So, chief executive of Chan's company, JC Group, confirmed Yee's account.

China doesn't have a ratings system, so every movie is released for all audiences. Chinese censors are also wary of subject matter that is politically sensitive, like Tibet or the military crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Yee said he wasn't worried about the film's setting of Japan — another sensitive topic in China.

"For us, the problem was just the violence," he said.

Sino-Japanese relations remain tense because of Japan's brutal occupation of China during World War II. The 2005 Hollywood film "Memoirs of a Geisha" was not released on the mainland apparently because the sight of Chinese actresses Zhang Ziyi and Gong Li portraying Japanese entertainers would offend viewers.

Yee's decision also had financial implications because the film is expensive by Asian standards and China is an increasingly important market, where a hit movie can make millions of U.S. dollars.

"Shinjuku Incident" will be released in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia on April 2 and in Japan on May 1.

[Li Kao]

I'm glad to see Jackie doing some more "serious" kinds of movies. I have to admit that in around 2003 I had almost regretfully written Jackie off -- this was after the sequels to Rush Hour and Shanghai Noon and the back-to-back "Inspector Gadget- like" duds Tuxedo & Medallion (which unfortunately, even the respective hotties in those films did not salvage). But then New Police Story turned out decent and I happened to really like Forbidden Kingdom, so he seems to be back in the right direction again. It almost goes without saying, but what that guy can do in his 50's now is truly amazing.

[Jimbo]

Still no word on an American release...

Actually, this would not be Jackie Chan's first onscreen 'death'. I've seen his character(s) die in at least 3 films:

Hand of Death (aka, Countdown to Kung Fu) (1976).

New Fist of Fury (1976).

Plus another film where he was a young kid with a crew cut (title forgotten) where his character gets beaten to death.

I'd definitely be interested to see Shinjuku Incident.