Jackie Chan spit on me once.
This happened years ago when he was promoting Shanghai Noon, the Hollywood blockbuster movie in which he costarred with
Owen Wilson and Lucy Liu. I was part of a junket organized by the film distributor, and it happened one cloudy afternoon at the Peninsula in Hong Kong.
I was given five minutes with Jackie Chan, which included picture-taking and autograph-signing. Yes, he allowed that, unlike other big-name actors who’d decline having their photos with them, much more signing autographs.
But Jackie was gracious and gamely posed for pictures, with one “kicking” me in the head.
He also signed the folder I had, plus the Shangahi Noon tee provided by the film company. He also signed my copy of his autobiography I Am Jackie Chan, My Life in Action.
It was in this book where I learned Jackie Chan’s story is one of rags-to-riches. He was born to Chinese civil-war parents. He also failed his first year in school and that was when he was sent to the Central Academy of Drama, an opera school in Beijing where he rigorously trained for years. It was here where he excelled, and he then trained in martial arts, such as karate, judo and taekwando.
Jackie then made his foray into movies, starting out as a stuntman and progressing into a bit player. He persevered until he was given his break via Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow, where the director gave him the freedom to do his stuntwork.
Jackie mixed martial arts and comedy, and he then followed it up with Drunken Master, fully establishing Jackie Chan as a major force in Hong Kong cinema, and eventually the world.
Back to my interview: my first question was “From a school dropout to now one of the world’s biggest stars, how has the ride been?” Jackie proceeded to answer and it was then I noticed that there was a bubble of a saliva that flew from his mouth and landed on my arm. I wanted to die. Not from disgust but from excitement as one of the world’s biggest stars shared bodily fluids with me. I was a big fan of Jackie but after that, I even became a bigger one.
So much so that I always make it a point to watch all his movies, the ones he stars in and even those involving him only behind the scenes—and you can add to the list Reset, his latest, which opens in local theaters on June 30.
Produced by Jackie Chan, Reset is a sci-fi action thriller and stars Yang Mi, Wallace Huo, King Shih-Chieh, Liu Chang and Hummer Zhang. In the film, Xia Tian (Mi) is a physicist who risks her own life as she repeatedly goes one hour and 50 minutes back in time to save her son kidnapped by Tsui Hu (Huo). The movie features a lot of fight scenes in several extremely dangerous set pieces, including a car chase at high speed, the fierce close combat in an abandoned school and the crazy shootout in the lab. The tension and sense of danger should hit the audience straight from the screen.
When talking about his character, Wallace Huo says Tsui Hu is someone who always catches your attention, and it’s a very challenging role for him. Not only is Tsui Hu a character so different from all the roles Huo had played before, but the actor says he was attracted to the complicated emotions bubbling just beneath the surface of the character. “When I first read the script and my character, I could easily picture it in my mind, and that’s why I accepted it without hesitation. So I feel Tsui Hu and I were meant to be brought together,” Huo says.
Produced by Jackie Chan, with a script written by Cha Muchun, Reset is presented by New Clues Film Co. Ltd., Huoerguosi Jaywalk Film & Media Co. Ltd. and Beijing Sparkle Roll Media Corp., and it opens in China on June 30. No doubt, it’ll come to these shores soon enough.