SKIPTRACE
China/Hong Kong/US, 2016, 107 minutes, Colour.
Jackie Chan, Johnny Knoxville, Bingbing Fan, Eric Tsang, Winston Chao, Shi Shi.
Directed by Renny Harlin.
This is a film for Jackie Chan fans and those who enjoy films with a lot of action, martial arts and fights, always with a touch of the comic. When it was released, some of the fans expressed their disappointment, failing to take account of Jackie Chan inevitably getting older, somewhat slower. Yet, he is still full of action, a genial on-screen presence even when he is portraying a character who is rather serious. At the same time, he made the Britain and Northern Ireland based thriller with Pierce Brosnan, The Foreigner.
In the 1980s, there was a celebrated comedy-drama, Midnight Run, with Charles Grodin as a criminal who had to be brought in by a bail-bond officer, Robert De Niro. It was a cross-country journey movie. Skiptrace is in the same vein – although the journey incorporates Hong Kong, Siberia, Mongolia, China and back to Hong Kong.
Jackie Chan portrays a Hong Kong police officer. At the opening, he is trying to help his partner who has a timebomb attached. It is too late and the partner pushes Jackie Chan’s Benny to safety and dies. Audiences will find the twist at the end of the film a bit hard to comprehend, Benny’s years-long quest to unmask the criminal controlling crime and drug trafficking in Hong Kong – only for it to be his partner! The partner had asked Benny to care for his daughter, Samantha, who becomes involved in police work, infiltrating the crime company, working in a Macau casino.
The other central character is an American conman, played by Johnny Knoxville – not always the most persuasive, a kind of crooked smile, comedy touches, but reminiscent of his daredevil performances in the Jackass series.
The American is under threat in Siberia after taking a holiday in Macau and being a witness to the murder of a woman with an incriminating phone which the criminals are after. As she is killed, she gives him the phone. He is then tracked down by the Siberian Russians, owing money, but also seemingly having impregnated the daughter of the chief.
When Samantha is in trouble, Benny tracks down the American, goes to Siberia to get him and bring him back to testify. The journey is the rest of the film – with the Russians turning up at various stages, especially a rather fierce female fighter. At the end, they come in to save the day!
There is a lot of action, a lot of action. Some of the sequences, including an initial rescue, go on for 10 minutes or more. There is a long chase as the American avoids the criminal thugs in Macau, only to be taken by the Russians. There is a big fight when Benny turns up in Siberia. And, along the way, many, many occasions for Benny and his unwilling partner to go into action, at one stage complicated by Benny’s inability to swim and his having to be rescued. Their getting all kinds of vehicles for their journey including train, antique car, horses, tracking through the Gobi desert, fights at the Chinese border and, of course, slam bang for the finale at a Hong Kong wharf.
One of the great advantages of the film is the variety of locations and lots of very attractive colour photography. There is the beauty of the Siberian town as well is its drab industrial areas. There is the Russian countryside and the steppes. A lot of the film takes place in Mongolia, in the cities, out in the desert, and the two taken by a group to participate in a Mongolian Festival. There are mountains. There are rapids. And there is the beauty of quite a range of the Chinese countryside. And, as always, there is Macau and Hong Kong.
There is a cheerfulness underlying the seriousness, the tensions between the policeman and his associate, quoting of Chinese proverbs, taking opportunities of crises, lies and broken promises, partnership – with Benny finally being arrested and jailed and his friend posing as his lawyer, visiting him in prison, and then participating in the finale. The suspected syndicate leader is not the one expected and there is the revelation of who it actually is – and Samantha trapped in rising water on a boat and her father doing the right thing, unexpectedly, to save her and give his life for her.
And there is a touch of romance, even for Jackie Chan at 60, with one of the experts in the police force attracted to him and the American probably teaming up with Samantha.
The film was directed by Renny Harlin, an expert in all kinds of action films from Cliffhanger through The Long Kiss Goodnight to Hercules.
