In the late ’90s and early 2000s, Jackie Chan was making an impression on American audiences with films like Rumble In the Bronx, First Strike, Supercop, Operation Condor, the Rush Hour series, and several others. He’s still doing fine work with films like 2013’s Police Story: Lockdown that was released on Blu-ray earlier this year, but this week I have had the pleasure of reviewing Rumble In the Bronx and First Strike as they make their Blu-ray debut.
It’s worth noting at the top that these are $10 Blu-rays on Amazon, so if you’re expecting the steelbook deluxe treatment — well, that was simply never in the cards for these niche movies. Anyway, Rumble In the Bronx is a perfectly serviceable action flick starring Jackie as a humble yet wildly-capable-if-need-be martial artist who flies in from Hong Kong to spend some time with his uncle. His uncle, played by Bill Tung who makes appearances in a lot of Jackie’s movies, is getting married, and he’s also selling his grocery store to Elaine, played by Anita Mui. Jackie, named Keung in the film, is here to help out while his uncle goes on his honeymoon. Well, as he soon learns, the Bronx is a rough place, and he quickly finds himself going up against a local gang.
One of the gang’s members happens to be Nancy, played by Francoise Yip. She lives with her younger brother in an apartment across from Jackie’s uncle. Ever humble, Jackie’s clash with the gang was brought on by a chance encounter with Nancy, but rather than cause any undo stress to her or her younger brother Danny, Jackie takes the high road. Unfortunately, both Jackie and the gang soon have a new common enemy in the White Tiger’s mafia like organization, who are violently seeking diamonds that were stolen by a gang member. Eventually the police get involved and the action explodes in classic Jackie Chan fashion.
Rumble In the Bronx is a simple, fun movie. The fight scene where he goes into the gang’s hideout and uses all matter of items in his environment from refrigerators to pinball machines to kick ass is absolutely classic. Growing up, I probably rewound that scene a hundred times, it would send chills down my spine at how amazing it was. The choreography of that scene is epic, and you just don’t see that type of frantic, controlled marital arts chaos in movies anymore, or often enough anyways.
You know, Rumble might not make it into anyone’s top ten movie list, but it’s a solid film to watch every so often. The Blu-ray release is decidedly plain, but sufficient. There are no extra features except for the movie trailer and image quality is alright, but nothing special. The image quality is neither bad nor great — its apparent it’s HD, it’s a clean image (does not have a persistent grain), it’s just nothing really beyond that. Ultimately, that’s ok for a movie that probably won’t garner a lot of sales and is more than a decade overdue for a Blu-ray release anyway. Still, as a fan of the film and Jackie, I’m happy New Line released this and it’s more than earned a spot in my library.
To the summary…
