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Review: Chan's 'Operation Condor' nosedives
July 21, 1997
Web posted at: 5:38 p.m. EDT (2138 GMT)From Reviewer Paul Tatara
(CNN) -- One of my all-time favorite David Letterman jokes occurred several years ago, on his old NBC show, when he was listing the "Top Ten Things Overheard While Standing in Line to See the Movie 'Kickboxer II.'" The entry that set me howling was "I hear this is the best movie ever made about people kicking each other." I'm not what you would call a connoisseur of this kind of thing (I get my kicks elsewhere. Har-dee-har), so you'll have to forgive me if I don't properly assess the merits of Jackie Chan's latest American release, "Operation Condor."
If you've never seen a Jackie Chan movie (he's only recently become an American action film staple), some explanation is needed. Chan is a brilliant Hong Kong martial arts expert who does his own near-suicidal stunts, and is cursed/blessed with an overall persona that closely resembles that of a hyperactive 9-year-old whose parents have run out of Ritalin. Most people think of Bruce Lee when they see him, but I lean more towards Calvin from "Calvin and Hobbes."
The films that I've seen him in usually consist of Chan running really fast, and jumping over speeding vehicles. Then, a few minutes later, he runs really fast and kicks an entire herd of armed henchman in their collective guts. Then he makes a goofy face, jumps in the air, runs away, and either kicks an entire herd of armed henchman in their collective guts or jumps over a speeding vehicle. "All the President's Men" it ain't.
That's the m.o. for "Operation Condor," too. Don't ask me what the title means. There's not a condor in the entire movie, or even an operation for that matter, unless you count Jackie belting guys with such surgical precision that he separates their kidneys from their urethras. I guess they mean a military operation, but, if there's one of those, it's more poorly defined than Sebastian Cabot's abdominals.
I feel a little stupid doing this (What else is new?), but here's the plot -- Jackie is recruited by the United Nations to find 240 tons of gold bars that the Nazis somehow managed to hide under the desert floor in Africa during World War II. He will be teamed with a beautiful U.N. assistant named Ada (Carol Cheng) who is an expert on desert survival. Later, they're joined by a sexy-blonde-in-a-bath-towel named Elsa (Eva Cobo de Garcia.) Oh yeah, there's also Ding Ding the pet scorpion, which is not, as you may suspect, a Hell's Angels' nursery rhyme.
Then everybody starts a-kickin'-and-a-shootin', and a-whompin'-and-a-stompin'.
At first I was actually going to try to count how many guys Chan beats the snot out of during the movie, but I soon realized that my basic Communications degree wouldn't allow for such sophisticated math. This thing rolls along so fast, you'd think everyone involved has a dental appointment that they have to get to. It's honestly difficult to convey how quickly the action takes place. This is compounded by Chan (who also directed, and, believe me, Stanley Kubrick isn't hearing footsteps) actually speeding the film up! Everybody zips and zings around like God is playing pinball with them. I started praying for the table to tilt.
'Operation Condor' Partial movie trailer
791K/18 sec. QuickTime movie
Full movie trailer
1 min., 33 sec. VXtreme streaming video
Chan's stunts are (as always) phenomenal, but you have to wonder, short of an out-and-out death wish, what would motivate a guy do some of this stuff. The most amazing one comes when he's hanging from a beam in a warehouse with an automobile flying through the air and heading straight towards him. Instead of relieving himself in his pants, as I would, Chan has the wherewithal to swing his body around the beam, like an Olympic gymnast, and let the car pass beneath him! He performs stupendous feats like this in all his movies, and then walks away like he just got done shampooing a rug. It's all very exciting, but, let me tell you, too much of a good thing...
There are more than a few truly racist and sexist jokes. The women are idiots who keep losing their clothes, and there's also a couple of greasy, unshaven Arab villains who Chan torments as a matter of course. I was also alarmed to see that several gags center on women getting belted full-force in their mouths. Considering Chan's breezy style of "acting," these moments stick out like a sore thumb. Or a sore entire body, as the case may be.
This movie was filmed in 1991, and is only now getting its American release. I don't know what the delay was, but it couldn't have been the pathetic dubbing into English. I guess the producers passed on subtitles, since they would mainly consist of the word "AAAIIIEEERRRGGGHHH!!"
"Operation Condor" is cartoonishly violent, but, as I've already said, some of the characterizations and fistfight gags are of highly questionable taste. There are also a couple quick flashes of bare female behinds. I saw it in a theater full of kids who grooved on the whole thing. A better title would have been "Don't Try This at Home." 92 minutes. Rated PG-13.
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