Apparently, there's more to being a Jackie of-all-trades than simply doing all your own stunts.
Jackie Chan showed what it meant to work a press conference yesterday at the Sutton Place, answering questions in English, Mandarin and Cantonese for various Toronto media -- the better to plug the Festival gala The Myth, his foray with director Stanley Tong into the period-action genre of Hero and House Of Flying Daggers.
Add his two leading ladies, Kim Hee-seon, who answered questions in Korean for local Korean radio, and Bollywood star Mallika Sherawat, and you had a press event tailor-made for multicultural Toronto. "The world's going global and this movie is a great step towards that," said Sherawat.
Why two leading ladies? The Myth is two movies in one -- a feudal epic/love story circa 250 B.C. in which Chan plays a Chinese general who safeguards the emperor's Korean-born concubine (Kim). In the other, he's an archeologist who becomes involved in the scheme of a villain to find the ancient secrets of levitation and immortality. The two stories eventually entwine.
It's a two-fer of "firsts" for Chan -- his first love story and his first period piece. "It is first time for me wearing this kind of costume," he says in his rough and enthusiastic English. "I carry 1,500 army and 150 horse with me and I say, 'Sit down,' and everybody sit down. 'We rest,' everybody rest, 'we pee,' everybody go to pee. Being a general is a lot of fun."
It was also a lot of pain, though, with 22 people being sent to hospital from injuries sustained in action scenes. "You see empty horse go by and you look back and yell 'Ambulance! Ambulance!'" Chan said.
Tired of reprising fish-out-of-water Hollywood roles, Chan had been in Hong Kong for a while, filming another of the Police Story series of movies, when he got a call from Tong, director of some of his most famous films, including Rumble In The Bronx and Supercop. The Myth was a script Tong had shaped for two years.
"I was filming new Police Story, and suddenly it's 'What's next? I wanna change,'" Chan said. "And Staley show me script and I'm like, 'Yes, that is what I want.' I know the audience love to see Rush Hour. But I don't like to do Rush Hour 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. I'm tired.
"Script always present to me in Hollywood is Shanghai Noon, Shanghai Knights, Shanghai Dawn. I want drama. I want fantasy. Jackie is not an action star. Jackie is an actor who can fight. I know I can be an actor like Robert DeNiro or Dustin Hoffman or Clint Eastwood."
Says Tong: "A lot of people say, 'Can Jackie romance?' I say, 'Of course.' He is to me like my big brother, and I see him like a general, so he is perfect to play a general. I chose a big period piece because I love American movies like Ben Hur and Gladiator and Braveheart."
Even the leading ladies ended up doing the movie Jackie-style, sans stunt doubles. For Kim, it involved wirework "flying" and not landing in a heap. "First shot, she was landing 'Pow!'" Chan said. "She was willing to do anything even though she was weak. You do anything to her, she say, 'Ow!' But she do it anyway."
As for Sherawat, she and Chan even got to snapping at each other over why she didn't use her stunt double.
"She said, 'No, I don't want her, her body's so ugly, I will do my own stunts!'" Chan said.
"How could you substitute that double for me? She was this thin! How in the world would anyone believe I am her or she's me, impossible!" Sherawat said, making an O shape with her thumb and finger.
"You just don't understand action secrets!" he snapped back.
