Skiptrace (2016)

Skiptrace (2016)

6/10

Starring

Jackie Chan

Fan Bingbing

Johnny Knoxville

Directed by Renny Harlin

Skiptrace have been tagged by critics as ignorable and you cannot blame them, because the movie plot is full of holes and everything the movie is based on is not worth making a movie on at all. The secret ingredient that made me like this movie is the comedy.

After dealing with the boring introduction of all the characters involved in the movie, I found myself laughing all the way through. Jackie Chan was in form with his comedy and so was Johnny Knoxville.

That said, the movie lacked enough of the Jackie Chan magic stunts that you would have expected and in the end of the movie we see how much of his life was placed on the line for our entertainment.

I guess his age may be a factor in the reduction of stunts and daring scenes. His career of wowing us on screen has spanned over 40 years. The last movie that I saw him in before this one was CZ (2012) and there he pulled out enough stunts to earn a Guinness World Record, for most stunts by a living actor.

The pair of Jackie Chan and Knoxville, will give you mixed feelings, there were times they didn’t fit in as a comic duo, then there were times both will have you engrossed on the happenings concerning them.

I haven’t seen much of Knoxville’s movies, except Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (2013) so seeing him here got my interest on how he will handle himself with the veteran actor. Knoxville held his own, but many a times you can feel the distance in professionalism between him and Jackie Chan.

The movie starts with an introduction of Chan’s partner who had a bomb strapped on him and jumped into a river to blow up and die leaving Jackie to raise his daughter.

On the other side of the world Knoxville’s character Connor Watts was getting himself into different trouble, from escaping a Russian Mob Boss to fleeing a murder scene which he was a witness to.

Chan’s god daughter Samantha was working in the casino that Watts saw the murder. She was working there undercover to get some dirt on the man who she and Chan believes is responsible for her father’s death. Samantha and Watts path crossed and after the incident of the murder, she contacted Chan to help tracked down Watts.

The fun in the movie was their journey back and the many ways Watts got on Chan’s nerves.

I enjoyed this movie and I believe you will too, if you suspend your reasoning and focus on laughing.