| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An exotic, benevolent and touching success-story,
By
This review is from: I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action (Mass Market Paperback)
For many Americans, Jackie Chan made his screen debut in the late 1990s with such hits as *Rumble in the Bronx* or *Rush Hour*. But a privileged few have been enjoying his movies for more than two decades, from the cheap, non-stop-kung-fu flicks he first starred in to his more recent and more expensive cop movies and period pieces.*I Am Jackie Chan* is the story of the making of these movies and of the man who made them possible: a first-hand, first-person account of Jackie Chan's eventful life, from his training at a Peking Opera school, where we discover the overweight bully who was to become "big brother" Samo Hung, to his second and hugely successful attempt to conquer the American public. The book unravels the rather bumpy ride to stardom of this atypical martial artist who always preferred being beaten up by the bad guys to the other way around, who repeatedly risked his life to perform the most incredible stunts ever filmed (Jackie stop! We don't want to lose you!) and whose happy-go-lucky persona finally eclipsed that of Bruce Lee himself. I really loved this success-story, set in a world whose death warrant was signed in 1997 when the Communists took control of Hong Kong. Jackie has seen it all, from the Shaw Brothers to Golden Harvest; from the greatest of all Hong Kong directors, King Hu, to that smug, overbearing, cigar-smoking individual with a penchant for "bathroom humor and clumsy slapstick"- Lo Wei; from the evil Triads to the elitist clique of the movie stuntmen, who lived in the present because their future didn't even have a wire to hang on to. If for you the names of Cheng Pei Pei, Michelle Yeoh (pre-Tomorrow Never Dies) and Yuen Woo Ping (pre-Matrix) have more magic to them than the equivalent Hollywood names, then you will enjoy this unique, exotic auto-biography, which really begs for a screen version in the vein of *Dragon: The Story of Bruce Lee*. A good companion to this volume is the 75-minute video documentary entitled *Jackie Chan: My Own Story*, which shows rare footage from his films, bloopers and interviews with Jackie Chan, his closest associates and the American stars who count themselves his fans. At the end of this documentary, Chan says that he has fulfilled his three dreams of personal success, but that he now has a fourth one: world peace. I think we definitely ought to give him that. He deserves it.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Engaging and entertaining,
By
This review is from: I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action (Mass Market Paperback)
A fascinating insight into the mind and career of the world's biggest movie star. With exhaustive (and exhausting!) descriptions of Jackie's brutal Peking opera training and early days as a stuntman and actor, almost everything you want to know about Jackie is here.
Not that there aren't omissions - his illegitimate son Jaycee, now trying to make a name for himself as an actor, is never mentioned. Jackie is also quick to take credit (he claims 'Half a Loaf of Kung Fu' and 'Snake in the Eagle's Shadow' were the first kung fu comedies, which they weren't) and slow to give it out (he describes his opera brothers' film 'The Prodigal Son,' arguably the best kung fu movie ever made, as "solid"). But Jackie's charisma and determination shine through on every page, and you can't help but admire the guy. A must read for Jackie fans and aficionados of Hong Kong cinema.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Action Packed,
By A Customer
This review is from: I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action (Hardcover)
I am a huge Jackie Chan fan. I love all of his movies and thought that this book would be great to read. I was shocked at all that Jackie had been through in his life. Just reading this book made me feel for him, and since I have read this I am trying to see every movie that he has made. This book tells his life story and all of the stuff about his movies that you could not read anywhere else. It has a list of all of the movies that he has made, his top ten stunts, his top ten fights, and the injuries that he has received. I recomend this to anyone who likes Jackie Chan, or to anyone looking for a good book.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
See all 7 books this book cites
See all 6 books citing this book
|
|
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
|
|
