Film

Police Story

Name: Police Story
Genre: Action, Crime, Comedy
Released: 1985
Cast: Jackie Chan, Brigitte Lin, Maggie Cheung, Bill Tung Biu, Chor Yuen

Police Story is Jackie Chan at his most gloriously reckless: a cop thriller built entirely around stunts he performs himself, including a slide down a pole through exploding glass that reportedly landed him in hospital. It fuses slapstick with real, visible danger — funny one second, alarming the next. Best for anyone who wants to watch a human body do what stunt doubles are supposed to.

TMDb rating

3.8

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you love hands-on action where the stunts are staged with real physical commitment and the comedy comes straight out of the fight choreography, the way Jackie Chan's Hong Kong films were built.

Skip it if you want a tight, grounded plot, since the story is mostly a frame for the set pieces and the jokes land mid-danger.

What it asks of you: Expect a brisk ninety-nine minutes that rarely sits still, with the lightness of a comedy wrapped around stunts that look hard on the body to perform.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Police Story 3: Super Cop1992

Chan handed the stunt-comedy crown to Michelle Yeoh here, and she runs off with it — motorcycle onto a moving train, helicopter dangling over Kuala Lumpur, all real, all her. It's the sequel that out-does the original's ambition.

But The plot sprawls into globe-trotting spy territory and loses some of the tight, personal stakes that made the first film click.

Drunken Master1978

This is the film that made Chan a star before he ever touched a real stunt set — pure comic kung fu, drunken boxing, and a young performer figuring out the physical language he'd later weaponise.

But The wire-work and pacing feel distinctly 1970s, and it's a straighter martial arts film with less death-defying spectacle.

Project A1983

Chan, Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao together at their stunt-team peak, capped by a clock-tower fall Chan actually performed twice because the first take didn't look painful enough.

But The colonial-era pirate plot ambles along between set-pieces and never quite grips the way Police Story's chase-driven urgency does.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Police Story

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Steamboat Bill, Jr.1928

Chan has named Keaton as a direct hero — the falling-house-front gag here is the silent-era ancestor of every stunt in Police Story, the same insistence that danger has to be real for the laugh to land.

Keaton stands utterly still as an entire building's façade falls around him, missing him by inches, in a single unbroken shot with no trick photography — the purest ancestor of everything Chan does on that mall pole.

But It's silent, black-and-white, ninety-plus years old, and the pacing is gentler than modern audiences expect from an action film.

Rumble in the Bronx1995

Chan's Hollywood breakout still runs on the same philosophy — real stunts, real glass, a real hovercraft chase down a city street — just transplanted to a very fake-looking New York.

But The geography is nonsense — it's Vancouver standing in for New York — and the plot is thinner than the stunt reel demands.

Enter the Dragon1973

Go back to the source: Bruce Lee's star-making vehicle is the foundation stone Hong Kong action cinema, and by extension Chan's career, was built on.

But It's slower, more solemn, and entirely without Chan's slapstick — a serious martial arts film, not an action comedy.

Hard Boiled1992

Same city, same studio-era hunger for insane practical action, but John Woo trades Chan's fists for guns and turns every set-piece into an operatic, unbroken bloodbath of a shootout.

But It's much darker and bloodier, with none of Chan's comic relief to cut the tension.

Die Hard1988

The closest Hollywood cousin: a wisecracking, increasingly battered cop improvising his way through a building full of armed professionals, played for real tension with real wit.

But Bruce Willis has stunt doubles where Chan wouldn't — the effort on screen is choreographed, not visibly, genuinely dangerous.

The Raid2012

The modern heir to Chan's stunt ethos — Indonesian pencak silat performed at brutal speed, corridor-by-corridor fights shot so every hit looks like it actually landed on someone's body.

But It's relentlessly grim and violent, with none of the charm or comedy that makes Chan's films rewatchable.

Ong-Bak2003

Tony Jaa's breakout takes Chan's no-wires, no-doubles philosophy to its logical extreme — every jump, fall and knee strike is exactly what it looks like.

But The story is thin and the fights grow repetitive by the final act, running on spectacle alone.

Free Solo2018

Same wager Chan makes with every stunt — no net, no double, no second take if it goes wrong — except here there's no choreography and no comedy to release the tension, just a man on a cliff face.

Alex Honnold climbing El Capitan without ropes is the least fictional version of the thing Police Story sells as entertainment: a body risking everything, filmed for real, with nowhere to cut away.

But It's a serious, at times genuinely stressful documentary with zero jokes — the opposite mood of Chan's film entirely.

Singin' in the Rain1952

Different genre, same engine: bodies performing physically extraordinary things for real, cut for maximum joy rather than maximum realism — Chan choreographs fights like Kelly choreographs dance numbers, both selling effortless mastery of something punishing to actually do.

Gene Kelly's title number is one continuous take of pure physical joy, splashing through real rain and real puddles — watch it and you'll see exactly what Chan is doing with his fists instead of his feet.

But It's a sunny Hollywood musical with no fights, no danger and no crime plot whatsoever — a genuine tonal 180.