It wasn't unexpected. Three years ago, folk deep in the heart of the HK film industry told me Jackie Chan had lost the plot; like Mohammed Ali had been hit in the head too often and was decidedly brain-damaged and consequently exercising truly poor judgment. They were saying also that he really wasn't up to making any more films but was going ahead anyway and they were dreading the results.
I found it all desperately sad and not just because I've been a fan since the earliest days, back when Jackie was still chasing chickens in all his films; back when he still was surrounded by "The Orphan Boys"; back when he was in the thrall of Golden Harvest; back when he was still an open-faced teenager.
I can't claim credit for discovering him so early. Keith was big into his films and I simply got sucked in. He first noticed him and became a fan after spotting Jackie's debut performance in "Enter the Dragon" where he plays a thug who registers pain when he gets kung-fued by Bruce Lee, and actually went to the trouble of finding out his name and was thrilled when he started making his own films and so, because they were never shown in Kiwi cinemas, went to considerable trouble hunting down and buying his own copies of every single film Jackie made.
And then Baby Jane saw those copies, got sucked in too and so also bought his films; good films, bad films, made no difference; as long as they were Jackie Chan films, she has them. She said what she found so attractive about them was that they all came from a position of love.
Mmmm, wonder if they buy "The Shinjuku Incident"?
And sliding completely off the topic to hand, I'm almost totally convinced that it was Jackie Chan's film "Danny" that, today, has us here in Hong Kong, with Keith teaching mentally handicapped children.
You most likely haven't seen "Danny" because this isn't the usual light-hearted J.C. fare and so failed at the box office and subsequently is very rarely copied and usually left off his filmography, but I highly recommend it because this is one hell'va powerful film. In it, Jackie wants to be a sailor so tries to find a school in Hong Kong to take in his mentally handicapped adult brother, Danny, hoping to save him from the triads. No regular school will have him and there simply aren't enough specialist schools in the entire city and the ones that do exist are full with achingly long waiting lists ... and so, yes, Jackie fails and the triads get their hands on Danny and he gets sucked into a life of crime and is killed. Heartbreaking stuff!
Knowing how much this film affected Keith, do you too find it rather "mmmm!" that when Keith had his huge mid-life crisis and decided he wanted to do something more meaningful with the rest of his life than teach English and Drama to increasingly hideous Australian teenagers, that he chose to come to Hong Kong to teach mentally-handicapped children? Definitely sus, right?
And, yes, "Danny" is very close to the truth because, in Hong Kong, with a population of nearly 7 million, there are only four specialist schools: one here in Wan Chai for the profoundly brain-damaged; Chi Lin Nunnery, which takes in 900; Keith's school which has 300 places; and one in Discovery Bay, which is for English speakers, with 5 students. And, yes, the triads hover around these schools recruiting for new members, and, yes, they get plenty: Keith says the moment a boy turns up with an expensive blond-tipped haircut, they know they've lost him. And they do indeed lose lots because the triads love them for their ability to do what they're told without asking questions, and the only other jobs, in all honestly, that these kids can get are dishwashers in restaurants and things of that ilk.
And if you want to know the the reason I was talking about J.C. with folks in the HK film industry is that I had written a film script about a mentally handicapped child in HK, set in the beautiful Chi Lin Nunnery, and, because of "Danny", knew J.C. was interested in the subject, and so was trying to discover if he'd like to executive produce it ... and that's how I got the insider whisper that I shouldn't even try.
All this is very sad, yes, but off the subject because you want to know what's happened to make Our Own Beloved Jackie into this week's Threatdown?
It was last weekend's tirade in Taiwan! Have you heard about that? How he gave a speech as Hong Kong's representative at some China Trade Fair?
If you haven't, boy, is it bad! Unbelievably, he told China that it gives Hong Kong and Taiwan too much freedom and that it should clamp down and exert more "control". Then he upped the offensiveness factor by saying Chinese needed "control" because they can't cope with freedom.
Like, say what?
Hong Kong is furious and there's much talk about axing him from his role on the HK Tourism Board, taking away his "Hong Kong Icon" status and shutting him down and other things of that ilk. Kinder folk are asking "What did they do to you in America, Jackie, to make you hate freedom?" Less kind folk are saying "We don't need someone of J.C.'s status undermining our Basic Law, our Rule of Law, and our Constitutional Freedoms."
I'm siding with the meaner folk. You have no idea how frightening China is to us here in HK. Folks say "We are a mouse in the paws of a tiger!" and fret that all we have will any moment be swept away. And, yes, things are hard. China does do mean things to us to try to exert its control and the struggle to maintain our Constitutional Freedoms is on-going and strenuous. And now Macau has instituted Article 23 it's on the brink of becoming worse.
So, now this? Jackie, Jackie, Jackie, how could you!!!
Although warned it was coming, I was still shocked and didn't want to believe it, hoping it was something taken out of context, so I found and read the speech and, yes, a lot of it is truly frightening, given the extent to which Heroic Hong Kong already is fighting off China's controlling machinations. So we desperately don't need Our Own Icon doing this to us.
He also said lots of good stuff about how China needs to develop greater moral authority, and to stop producing toxic food, and he cried when he talked about the melamine found in baby formula, but nonetheless it wasn't enough to mitigate for the rest of it.
So, for this week's ...
THREATDOWN
What can only be called Treachery
by Our Beloved HK Icon!
by Our Beloved HK Icon!
Please, please, please, Jackie, from a longtime fan, and from a city that loves you, PLEASE take it back!
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