Supercop (1992)

A Hong Kong detective teams up with his female Red Chinese counterpart to stop a Chinese drug czar.

Director:

Stanley Tong

Writers:

Edward Tang (characters), Edward Tang

Stars:

Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, Maggie Cheung

2 wins & 4 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Jackie Chan	...	Insp. Chan Ka Kui
Michelle Yeoh	...	Insp. Jessica Yang - Director of INTERPOL (as Michelle Khan)
Maggie Cheung	...	May
Kenneth Tsang	...	Chaibat (as Ken Tsang)
Wah Yuen	...	Panther
Bill Tung	...	'Uncle' Bill Wong
Josephine Koo	...	Cheng Wen Shi - Chaibat's Wife
Kelvin Wong	...	Peter (as Wong Siu)
Philip Chan	...	Insp. Y.K. Chen
Ken Lo	...	Chaibat's Man (as Lowei Kwong)
Lieh Lo	...	The General (as Lit Law)
Wai Shum	...	Drug Lord #1 at Meeting
Yi-Sheng Han	...	(as Yee Sang Hon)
Sze Tsuen Wai
Wai-Lun Tuan

Storyline

A Hong Kong police officer, Ka Kui is sent undercover to mainland China to break up a drug smuggling ring. After breaking the brother of the drug lord out of prison, he and another agent (a beautiful communist policewoman) are taken to Hong Kong to work for the syndicate. The wife of the crime boss has been arrested in Malaysia for drug trafficking and is soon to be executed. However, she is the only person who knows the account number of a secret Swiss bank account containing millions in drug money. While the two officers are in Malaysia preparing for the jail break, Ka Kui accidentally runs into his girlfriend May, who has traveled there from Hong Kong. Soon his cover is blown, the criminals kidnap his girlfriend and he is forced to help them pull off the jail break.

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Taglines:

There's never a cop around when you need one, but when this cop's around, all you need is one.

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Genres:

Action | Comedy | Crime | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for some violence

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

Hong Kong

Language:

Cantonese English Mandarin Malay Thai

Release Date:

26 July 1996 (USA)

Also Known As:

Supercop

Filming Locations:

Shanghai, China

Box Office

Budget:

$900,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$5,503,176, 28 July 1996

Gross USA:

$16,270,600

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$16,270,600

Company Credits

Production Co:

Golden Harvest Company, Golden Way Films Ltd.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min 87 min (DVD edition) (US)

Sound Mix:

Mono (Original version) Dolby (US version)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The DVD of this movie can be seen making a brief appearance in Hot Fuzz (2007) where Nick Frost reads the tagline aloud" "Meet the cop that can't be stopped!"

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Goofs

(at around 45 mins) A character is holding a Sega Genesis controller and playing a video game with fighting sound effects. Later in the same scene, Tetris is visible on the screen. Tetris neither produces fighting sound effects nor is even available on the Genesis.

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Quotes

Chan Ka Kui: [after breaking Panther out of prison] Okay, now down that road is a small village that leads to a town.
Panther: Okay.
Chan Ka Kui: [prepares to leave] Good luck.
Panther: [puzzled] Where you going?
Chan Ka Kui: Huh? They payed me $2,000 to get you out of there. The rest doesn't interest me.
Panther: Listen, I like you. You're a good man, and I could use someone like you. I'll take you to Hong Kong for something big.
Chan Ka Kui: [shakes head] Hong Kong's too far, forget it. Just give me $500 more.
Panther: Here I haven't any money. But in Hong Kong, I've got millions - ...
[...]

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Alternate Versions

In 1996, Dimension released it in the US with a number of changes, including a new soundtrack (music; sound effects; English dubbing - with participation from Chan and Yeoh), new opening/closing credits and the removal of over 8 minutes of footage:

• Meeting between Hong Kong Police and the DEA
• Various shots of the meeting between Chan and his Hong Kong superiors
• Some shots of Chan and the sign he is observing as he arrives in China
• Chan and Yang talking across the yard
• Some shots of Chan upside-down on the tree
• Some shots before and after the escape from the prison camp
• Some shots of the scene at night in which Panther is reunited with friends
• Chan noticing a sign and directing the men to his family home
• Opening shots of the marketplace, including the endangered animals being sold
• Brief shot of a man with a taser at the marketplace
• Much of Chan and Yang's first encounter with Chaibat, including a girl being injected with heroin and her subsequent death from overdose
• Various shots at the resort and inside the hotel

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Connections

Referenced in Adjust Your Tracking (2013)

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Soundtracks

What's Love Got to Do with It
Written by Terry Britten and Graham Lyle
Performed by Warren G featuring Adina Howard
Produced by Warren G
Warren G appears courtesy of G-Funk/Rush Associated Labels Recordings
Adina Howard appears courtesy of Mecca Dawn Entertainment/Eastwest Records/Elektra Entertainment Group

User Reviews

Astonishing stuntwork and action set-pieces!!

POLICE STORY III - SUPER COP (Jing Cha Gu Shi III: Chao Ji Jing Cha)

(USA: Supercop)

Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Technovision)

Sound format: Mono

Police officer Chan Ka-kui (Jackie Chan) goes undercover within a criminal gang whose millionaire boss (Kenneth Tsang) plans to dominate the Asian heroin trade.

Though co-scripted by Chan regular Edward Tang (also responsible for the first two entries in the "Police Story" franchise), POLICE STORY III - SUPER COP is slightly darker in tone than its immediate predecessors and offers a much more streamlined combination of comedy, drama and action. This shift in focus was occasioned by the hiring of stuntman-turned-director Stanley Tong (RUMBLE IN THE BRONX, CHINA STRIKE FORCE, etc.), who keeps a tight rein on the film's narrative excesses whilst indulging some of the most spectacular action set-pieces ever filmed, *anywhere*.

Nothing in the first half of the movie - Chan's fight with gymnastic beauty Sam Wong at a mainland police training center; his initiation into Tsang's criminal gang by helping the villain's brother (Yuen Wah) escape from a prison work camp; a battle with police in a crowded marketplace, etc. - can prepare viewers for the *astonishing* climactic confrontation between Good and Evil, involving a series of hair-raising car stunts, Chan dangling (apparently unassisted) from a rope-ladder beneath a helicopter as it swings *high* above the streets of Kuala Lumpur (!), and the final hand-to-hand battle on top of a speeding train, upon which the aforementioned helicopter has become precariously entangled - and not a CGI shot in sight! Filmed with breathtaking gusto by artists working at the top of their game, this is commercial cinema at its most astounding (check the outtakes during the final credits, in which various participants come perilously close to serious injury or *death* during filming!).

Maggie Cheung makes another extended cameo appearance as Chan's beleaguered girlfriend, though the film is stolen clean away by Michelle Yeoh (billed as 'Michelle Khan' in some prints) as a mainland policewoman who assists Chan in his undercover operation, and who proves to be Chan's equal during the fast and furious combat sequences (the character proved popular enough to warrant her own spin-off feature, PROJECT S, in 1993!). Easily the best of the "Police Story" series to date, and one of the most memorable efforts to emerge from HK in the last fifty years, POLICE STORY III - SUPER COP is a winner. Followed by FIRST STRIKE (1996).

As usual, the movie was re-edited and rescored for its 1996 US debut under the title SUPERCOP. That version is missing only a few minutes of material, but should be avoided nonetheless.

(Cantonese and Mandarin dialogue)