Shinjuku Incident

Product Description Action superstar Jackie Chan leads this tour-de-force as Steelhead, a Chinese laborer who comes to Japan hoping for a better life. Unable to find honest work and bullied into the shadows with his fellow Chinese illegal immigrants, he soon finds himself ascending as the boss of a black market mob. After providing a deadly service to a powerful Yakuza crime boss, Steelhead’s rise to mafia power spirals rapidly out of control as he’s given reign over the dangerous and lucrative Shinjuku district. Get set to root for the underdog as Jackie Chan battles Asia’s most ruthless underworld gangs in this action-packed crime drama. Amazon.com Unreleased in mainland China due to its excessive violence, Derek Yee's crime picture Shinjuku Incident is a rare attempt at serious drama for action star Jackie Chan. As Steelhead, a taciturn mechanic who endures the punishing life of illegal Chinese immigrants in Japan while looking for a missing sweetheart, Chan drops his trademark balletic martial arts and broad comic style, and for the most part he's successful at conveying the character's basic goodness and dismay (and finally, anger) at the situation faced by his compatriots. Daniel Wu is also fine as a hapless friend whose entanglement with gangsters forces Steelhead to team with the local yakuza for a gruesome showdown. Stateside audiences who've grown accustomed to Chan's Mr. Nice Guy persona may find his darker turn, as well as the jaw-dropping violence, off-putting; fans of Asian action cinema, however, will appreciate Yee's noirish aesthetic but may also be split over a Chan who displays neither his astonishing skills nor his considerable charm. --Paul Gaita