Police Story 3: Super Cop (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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Plot Keywords:

hong kong | police detective | one man army | kung fu | third part | 

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Taglines:

Meet the cop that can't be stopped!

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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:

Police Story 3: Super Cop

Filming Locations:

Canton, China

Box Office

Budget:

$900,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$5,503,000, 28 July 1996, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$16,270,600

Company Credits

Production Co:

Golden Harvest Company, Golden Way Films Ltd.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

95 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

At a few points in the movie, most notably during the helicopter chase finale, parts of Danny Elfman's score for Batman (1989) appear on the soundtrack. Coincidentally, both movies featured a finale involving a helicopter and rope ladder.

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Goofs

When Inspector Yang lands on the red sports car driven by Kevin she breaks the windshield removing the top part of the windshield frame and rearview mirror. In the next shots the frame and rearview mirror are back in place. The windscreen frame that breaks is a clearly-visible dummy breakaway fitted in place of the Midget Mk II's normal frame; it is taller than the real windscreen. Also, the Midget Mk II was fitted with triplex-type safety glass which has a middle layer of clear sealant and would break but not fly into pieces, and the early Midgets were fitted with light-alloy windscreen pillars that would most likely snap near the base under that sort of impact.

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Quotes

Insp. Y.K. Chen: Are you unhappy?
Uncle Bill: I'd be happier if the Commissioner did it himself.
Insp. Y.K. Chen: Aren't we very mean?
Uncle Bill: A little bit, but you more than I.
Insp. Y.K. Chen: Why's that?
Uncle Bill: Because you're my superior.

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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

Followed by Police Story 4: First Strike (1996)

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Soundtracks

SUPERCOP
Written by Mark Mothersbaugh and Gerald V. Casale
Performed and Produced by Devo

User Reviews

One of the best Hong Kong Martial Arts Buddy films ever - Yeoh is terrific!

I've never really been a great fan of Jackie Chan, often feeling that he somewhat downgrades the true force & meaning of pure martial arts. Instead he turns it into a caricature mixed with lots of excessive special effects such as flying through plate glass windows or jumping over cars on a motorbike.

I prefer the more natural, aethetic Bruce Lee when it comes to studied martial arts. He took the art far more seriously and didn't take it to extremes just for the sake of another "gee whiz" effect.

HOWEVER.....

Jackie Chan DOES take his art just as seriously, (although not in a spiritual sense), this is proved by the number of near-death accidents he has received for the sake of his art over the years. He doesn't use stunt doubles very often and spends hours & hours going over potentially lethal special effects before finally performing them for us.

Police Story 3 is a superior Chan product, much better than his paper-thin stories as of late (although this could be down to the heavy Hollywood influence that perpetrates most of the latter films, and IMHO he is worse off for it).

PS3 is no different from his earlier films although on this occasion he has a more equally efficient lead in Michelle Yeoh, as his Chinese army partner.

Yeoh is a perfect foil for the extroverted yet dumb Chan. She screams screen presence, and her beautiful face belies her hidden deadly martial arts skills. And more significantly she, like Chan, very rarely uses stunt-doubles. (Best example is her jump onto a moving train while riding a motorcycle. Previously a stunt-double tried to do this but failed, ending up with a broken leg. But then Yeoh tried it and hey, perfect jump!)

Together they bring a more spirited edge to a rather humdrum story of drug traffiking. Chan isn't allowed to wallow in his ego because Yeoh is never far behind to push him out the way. The "buddy" chemistry works surprisingly well, perhaps because we have a woman who is truly independent and can definitely look after herself, thank you very much.

Chan does his usual stunts and his martial arts are good enough to get by with, although he is becoming just a tad predictable with more & more extravagant stunts for every new film. Which goes back to my earlier argument that he should really concentrate on the more natural side of his art and push all these boring pyrotechnics into the corner and let the character drive the story rather than the action sequences.

***/*****