The Medallion is another Jackie Chan film made for English speaking audiences in the US. It’s seems to be primarily comedy but does offer a chunk of the action in the movie – but not quite to the standard of other Jackie Chan films.
The Medallion is about a Hong Kong police man named Eddie, who is working with Interpol on cleaning up the world and doing the whole police thing. Partnered up with Hollywood tough man comedian Lee Evans as Inspector Arthur, and a young attractive woman named Inspector Nicole James, played by Clare Forlani, they chase down a group who try to kidnap a young boy.
This young boy holds with him a Medallion (surprise!) which can grant super human powers and immortality – an in office Eddie’s case, life. When he rescues the boy, Eddie drowns and is pronounced dead. So noticing the resemblence between him and Jackie Chan (plus having saved his life) the boy brings Eddie back to life and he becomes somewhat superhuman.
Meanwhile the bad guy, named AJ “Snakehead” Staul, manages to get ahold of the boy and get the same treatment, by killing, ressurecting himself and chasing down the other half of the medallion, which was in the hands of Eddie.
So Eddie and his team must track down and fight Snakehead in a supernatural death match at the end of the movie.
Another Hollywood Jackie Chan film..
When Jackie hit Hollywood it seems his stunt work came second after comedy, and no Jackie Chan movie embodies this more than ‘The Medallion’. It seems that the goal was to create a fun adventurous comedy targeted at families and children, but they overshot it a bit.
The movie has a few funny jokes and deals with some pretty cool (if you’re 10) supernatural powers that give the main character every reason in the world to kick ass. But the story and the actors in this film just don’t cut it.
The comedy comes first, but it’s not even that funny and a little too ‘kiddy’. So at least you’ve got the usual and cool brand of Jackie Chan action right?
The Action & Martial Arts
Jackie Chan doe s a little bit of decent stunt work early in the film, but once those super powers come the physical performance goes down the drain to make way for special effects and some pretty crummy fights.
With Jackie’s strength being his stunt work combined with his comedy, the lack of action combined with ordinary jokes really rob this movie of the Jackie Chan standard we’ve come to know and love.
Scott Adkins in The Medallion
In saying that what you do see before the CGI isn’t bad, and for the Scott Adkins fans out there you’ll notice a couple of face offs between him and Jackie in this film – long before Scott Adkins was famous as Boyka.
The Verdict?
Disappointing but everybody has their bad eggs. Jackie Chan does a fantastic job in his career and has some of the best martial movies in history under his belt, but this isn’t one of them 🙁
On Blu Ray –
Region A (US & Canada)
The Medallion [Blu-ray]
On DVD –
Region 1 (US & Canada)
The Medallion
Region 2 (UK, Europe, etc)
The Medallion [DVD]
Region 4 (Australia, New Zealand, etc)
The Medallion on DVD
