Police Story 2 DVD Review

Beginning with highlight footage from the first film is a horrible way to begin a sequel, as Police Story 2 does, but the flaws in this follow up action film disappear when the action begins. It is obvious why Jackie Chan became such a phenomenon the way he uses action in a fun and creative way. Instead of the extreme violence that many action films have, Police Story 2 just uses a simple story and characters already established to feature more fun fighting. Chan’s ability to creatively use surroundings to choreograph his fights is near brilliant, especially the battle in the playground. Unfortunately there seems to be a longer wait for any good action in the sequel. There is far too much humor and set-up at the beginning of the film, and it isn’t nearly as good as the original in handling these areas.

This time around Chan steps away from the spotlight a bit more and creates a far more intricate and complex film. There are plenty of new characters to add to nearly all of the remaining ones from the first film. Detective Chan has himself an elite squad to help him find out who planted a bomb in a local mall and has plans to bomb more buildings if he isn’t paid a ransom. The elite squad even has a bevy of female officers who handle the interrogations. The problem is that even though there are a few great action scenes, part of the film turns more into a spy/detective film which is more suspenseful, but a bit too much of a change from the exciting action packed Police Story. There is, however, quite an explosive finish in a fireworks factory that almost makes up for the slow and lengthy film.

Police Story 2 picks up right after the first film and Chan is demoted to traffic officer for all the damage that was done in order to apprehend the criminals. To make matters worse they are released quickly due to health issues and Chan and his girlfriend are quickly harassed. To make matters worse someone is bombing the city as well and Chan is brought back in order to solve the mystery. At over two hours long this sequel tries to be too many things. It almost seems like there is an entirely separate script that was changed to fit plenty of Police Story gags into the film.

The DVD has rare alternate outtakes, which are mostly just the same as the ones at the end of the film, but from another cut of the film. There is also a location guide featurette in which Bey Logan takes the camera on a tour of spots used to shoot the film. Bey Logan is also involved in Celebrating the Sequel, which is a conversation with Logan and Brett Ratner about Police Story 2. These two also have a commentary track on the DVD.