The Heroine (1973)

From reading about the edits, and people's complaints, I think I've seen a much better cut. Certainly the physical quality is that of a 70s low budget Hong Kong film, but that's understandable. The story I watched made perfect sense. It had a logical ending, and overall I enjoyed it. I suppose if you're watching this purely for Jackie Chan, you will be disappointed. And I agree it is dishonest retro marketing to label it a Jackie movie. I saw a copy of Cannon Ball Run in Hong Kong that had Jackie Chan on the cover and said "Starring Jackie Chan" obviously Hong Kong loves their boy, get used to it. Purely as a film I though it had decent action, a good story and I enjoyed the overall tone. I've seen a lot (probably not even half) of Chan's films, I think this did more to showcase his skills than everything he's done in America from Rush Hour on. He does some serious stunts here, he hit hard, he's quick. He even gets to fight the final showdown with the protagonist. There are some problems. 1. Apparently the original name was Police Woman, there is a female cop protagonist, but she's given a supporting role, only appearing at the very beginning, and towards the end. 2. The dubbing is bad, the voice acting is very good, but the dialog is often off timed, which is a minor annoyance, the dubbing audio quality is as bad as it can get without being inaudible. 3. Some scenes are choppy, but there is one big screwed up edit that comes in right before the climax, it's so bad you have to pretend you didn't see it or nothing makes sense. 4. It might be a casualty of aspect crossovers, but many of the scenes seem to have the camera off to the side, missing the action. As with the editing and dubbing, your experience may vary based on which cut you have. I enjoyed this simple city story about a taxi driver crossing paths with a street gang, I enjoyed that the "good citizens" and friends backed him up (going against the cliché' 'go it alone' story) I enjoyed the action, with Charlie Chin and Qiu Yuen as the unstoppable good guys, and the antagonists led by Jackie Chan actually being able to fight. My votes are usually similar to the IMDb score, altogether, I think if everyone saw the copy I did this film would be rated much higher, at least a 6, I give it a 7/10 because I can overlook the dubbing issues and scratchy film quality which certainly didn't exist when it premiered.

I should have read the reviews before watching this movie: now I am another victim who has wasted his time. I totally agree with all remarks about the bad quality (such as the awful action: martial arts for beginners - of course, no one shall get hurt, but it is boring to see the safety-distance of the actors when they try to "hit" each other and clearly never get close to a touch... Even the cars in that movie should not get "harmed", you could "smell" the low budget... The embarrassing mole on Jackie Chan's face...), so I don't need to repeat all of that. I just want to add that the German dubbing which I watched is also one of the worst I have ever seen - obviously similar to the English dubbing. And yes, the director seems to be an upholder of moral standards, and that leads to some awkward scenes!

This is a very bad Jackie Chan movie. He plays a villain with only a handful of scenes in the movie. The police woman does not have a prominent role either. The movie was renamed Rumble in Hong Kong for obvious misleading marketing purposes. This movie is not included in The Essential Jackie Chan Sourcebook in his list of films. After seeing it, one can can understand why. Chan is not a main character and walks around with an eight ball sized hairy mole on the left side of his jaw. It looks like a mouse attached to his faced. The plot concerns a bunch of people after a purse or the contents thereof. The fight scenes are unspectacular, but dig those 70's clothes and the TV show-like soundtrack from the 70's. The movie ends rather abruptly, as if the producer ran out of money to either develop the remaining footage or to actually shoot more footage. The dubbing is laughable also. This is perhaps the worst example of an early Chan movie. 0 of 4 stars.

Jackie Chan is incidental in this blurry golddigger (i.e., cash in on his fame) re-release. A tedious use of 80 minutes, very little action. Better action in five-minute sequences in 'Martial Law' repeats. I bought an expensive CD box for five dollars, which is the only redeeming aspect of buying that thing.