April 7: Jackie Day — Celebrate Jackie Chan’s birthday!

While the world celebrates the man, the myth, and the jumping-off-buildings legend, there’s no better way to honor Jackie Chan than by revisiting the high-octane, bone-crunching sequel that defined his Golden Era: Police Story 2.

If the first film was a lightning bolt, the sequel is a sustained thunderstorm of choreography and pyrotechnics. Here is a deeper look into the chaos, the comedy, and the literal blood, sweat, and tears that went into this masterpiece.

Chan Ka-kui (Jackie) is back in a film directed and co-written by Jackie. After Police Story, he’s been demoted to highway patrol, a change that delights his girlfriend May (Maggie Cheung), who is thrilled. No more death-defying stunts, just speeding tickets. But peace is short-lived. The man he arrested, Chu Tu (Chor Yuen) and his henchman John Ko (Charlie Cho) have already been released from prison, as Chu Tu claims that he only has months to live. During that time, he plans to ruin Chan Ka-Kui’s life.

After they keep trying to get him to snap, he finally does once John Ko and some bad guys beat up May and her aunt (Lisa Chiao Chiao). He finds them in a restaurant and gets revenge, but is so embarrassed that he resigns from the police. He and May plan a vacation, but he can’t even go to a travel agency without a bomb threat calling him back to duty, just in time for the mall to blow up. At least he’s seen as a hero and welcomed back to the Royal Hong Kong police.

Now he has four new enemies —  Tall Pau Hung (Ben Lam), Ken (Yun-Kin Chow) and two bomb experts, one who is both deaf and mute (Benny Lai) — and by the end of the movie, they’ve kidnapped May and forced Jackie to wear a vest covered with explosives. 

Jackie learned to put bloopers at the end of the movie after making Cannonball Run. He didn’t really understand that these bloopers shouldn’t be life-threatening. In a terrifying sequence involving falling metal frames, a stunt went sideways. Maggie Cheung suffered a massive scalp laceration. The injury was so severe that she couldn’t finish filming her close-ups, which is why, in the final act, May is often seen from behind or with her face obscured. That’s actually Crystal Kwok filling in.

Jackie himself didn’t escape unscathed. During a stunt in which he was supposed to jump through a pane of glass, he accidentally aimed for the wrong one. Unlike the sugar glass used in Hollywood, this was real, thick glass, resulting in severe cuts across his body.

While Jackie is the face of the franchise, the Jackie Chan Stunt Team is the backbone. Mars (Cheung Wing-fat), Jackie’s long-time friend and stunt double, is the MVP here. Not only does he play a fellow officer, but he also stepped in for some of the most dangerous physical impacts. That iconic, wince-inducing moment where a character is kicked through a bus windshield? That’s all Mars.

Man, they could have made twenty of these movies and I would have seen every one of them. Police Story 2 perfectly balances Jackie’s signature slapstick with stakes humor and some of the most intricate playground-style fighting ever put to film (the playground fight itself is a masterclass in using the environment as a weapon).

It’s a reminder that back in the late 80s, Jackie Chan wasn’t just making movies. He was barely surviving them. Happy birthday, Jackie!