"Rush Hour 2" |
HOLLYWOOD - Hand Jackie Chan a pair of chopsticks and he could somehow find a way to vanquish an army of Triad assassins using the eating utensils as a makeshift weapon.Armed or not, Hong Kong's most popular export may find himself defenseless against an entire planet populated by smart and sadistic simians.
Under any other circumstances, Rush Hour 2 would crush any and all challengers during its opening weekend. After all, this is a sequel to an unexpected smash hit that earned $141 million in late 1998.
Now, Chan and costar Chris Tucker have the misfortune of doing battle with Tim Burton's reinterpretation of Planet of the Apes, which crushed everything in its wake last weekend and earned an astounding $68.5 million in the second best three-day opening ever.
Conquering the Planet will be a daunting task for Chan and Tucker, not that the duo won't go down without busting plenty of skulls. By employing their lightening-quick fists and mouths, Chan and Tucker should at least see Rush Hour 2 equal or exceed the original's $33 million opening. Whether Rush Hour 2 will top Planet of the Apes will depend on public acceptance of Burton's vision of the 1968 sci-fi classic, particularly his somewhat maligned final scene. If Apes loses half its audience this weekend--which has been the trend for most of this summer's blockbusters--then Chan and Tucker will emerge triumphant.
Rush Hour 2 also will test Tucker's popularity. He's kept his mighty mouth all but shut since the release of Rush Hour. He skipped Next Friday with Ice Cube, the sequel to their 1995 stoners-in-the-hood classic. His efforts to launch Guess Who's President? and the James Bond spoof Double O-Soul seem to have floundered. He walked away from his Rush Hour follow-up Black Knight, for which he was reportedly supposed to earn between $13.5 million and $15 million, so 20th Century Fox instead enlisted the services of Martin Lawrence for $16.5 million to headline the Thanksgiving Day holiday comedy fantasy.
Chan's U.S. box office track record is somewhat spotty. His reissued Hong Kong classics garner minimal interest--perhaps because of America's disdain for all things dubbed. Chan's biggest post-Rush Hour offering remains Shanghai Noon. The high-kickin' western had the misfortune to open last year against Mission: Impossible 2, which may explain its modest $56.9 million gross. Still, Chan's busy schedule includes a Shanghai Noon sequel, Shanghai Knight.