Back in the not-so distant past when I was a mere 8-year-old kid trying to figure out which movie to watch in order to pass the time, I was introduced to a little American action movie called Rush Hour. It had cops, action, and Jackie Chan, all of the things that young me absolutely loved.
Unsurprisingly, the movie absolutely rocked.
And now 20 years to the day of its initial release, Rush Hour has proved itself to be more than just a great action-comedy: it is a seminal entry into the buddy cop genre.
The 1980s and early 1990s saw the release of a number of well-received buddy cop films, such as 48 Hrs., Lethal Weapon, and Bad Boys. Sure innovation was a little hard to come by in a genre that essentially built itself on the basic premise of “two mis-matched cops solve a crime and gradually become friends” but audiences absolutely lapped it up, and Rush Hour was something of a revelation when it was released in 1998.
The movie certainly had its faults (and the less said about Brett Ratner as director the better), but it did try to do something new with certain tropes, such as the villain actually having a plausible motivation (a colonist Brit who is mad he has to give back stolen artifacts after Britain handed back sovereignty of Hong Kong to China) instead of just being “evil”.
But the real reason why Rush Hour stands the test of time two decades on is because of Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker.
Chan’s star was on the rise in America prior to Rush Hour and audiences were itching for more of his crazy blend of action and comedy, so it made perfect sense for Hollywood to sign him up to do his thing in a buddy cop film.
It definitely was a smart move because Chan brought a spark of life to the genre with his martial arts and physical comedy talents. But a buddy cop movie only works if the lead is paired with someone who they really gel with, and Chris Tucker fit the bill to an absolute T.
The chemistry between was off the charts, with Chan’s rare portrayal of a straight man character being the perfect foil for Tucker’s endless stream of uncontrollable manic energy. It was also obvious as day that the pair just enjoyed working with each other and they defined bromance before JD and Turk came along.
But beyond their undeniable chemistry, Chan and Tucker were a groundbreaking non-white leading duo whom audiences have never seen in a major Hollywood movie before.
Now the pairing certainly weren’t the first non-white actors to headline a big buddy cop film. There was Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon, Bad Boys starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, and 1989’s Collision Course starring Pat Morita and … Jay Leno. One of these is not like the rest, but you get the idea.
However, Rush Hour was the first – and still the only – time that a black cop was teamed up with an Asian cop in a high profile Hollywood action film.
While there are the usual slate of cultural misunderstanding jokes between Chan and Tucker in Rush Hour, all of them are handled in a relatively non-offensive – albeit cringy – way. In fact, Tucker’s character starts off the film as a buffoon who is ignorant of all things Asian culture and ends it on a plane to Hong Kong.
By building on the legacy of its spiritual predecessors like Lethal Weapon and by piggybacking in Jackie Chan’s then-growing fame in America, Rush Hour unintentionally Trojan horsed a diverse film into the mainstream, something that surely wasn’t part of the studio’s original plan.
At a time when the spotlight is firmly on the lack of diversity and representation in Hollywood, Rush Hour represents a moment in film history where some daring casting choices ultimately paid off and it is just as relevant in 2018 as it was in 1998.
Plus, it’s just a dumb, fun action movie that’s still great for passing the time regardless whether you’re a 10 year old child or a 28 year old man child.