Rumble in the Bronx (1995)

Jackie Chan arrives in a version of the Bronx shot largely in Vancouver, where mountains loom in the background and a helicopter bears Canadian registration, and proceeds to dismantle a street gang with the grace of a man who has never once considered the political implications of a folding chair. The plot concerns a supermarket, a diamond heist, and a hovercraft chase through city streets. It is a stunt reel wearing a screenplay like a borrowed coat. The film made Chan a star in North America and topped the domestic box office in its opening weekend, which tells us something about 1996 and perhaps nothing about the culture wars that would follow.

There are representational elements here, though none of them are asked to carry a message. Uncle Bill marries Whitney, an African-American woman, and the wedding proceeds without a single line of dialogue about it. Danny, a Chinese-American boy in a wheelchair, becomes Keung's young friend; his disability functions as a hiding place for stolen diamonds, which is an unusually literal use of a child's mobility aid. Elaine buys and runs the supermarket, and Nancy is granted a measure of resolve, but this is a martial arts vehicle, and its passengers are here to be punched.

The film lectures no one. It has no thesis on wealth, no environmental conscience, no interest in rewriting history, and no characters who exist to explain the audience to itself. It simply wants to show a man kick through a glass window and land on his feet. On that narrow promise it delivers completely, and on every broader one it abstains.