“The Shadow’s Edge” Theatrical Poster
Director: Larry Yang
Cast: Jackie Chan, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Zhang Zifeng, Ci Sha, Lin Qiu-Nan, Wen Jun-Hui, Yuen Qiu
Running Time: 143 min.
By Paul Bramhall
Being a Jackie Chan fan in 2025 can be a divisive affair to say the least. There are those fans who still see the appeal in what he does, whether it be bumbling around with CGI panda cubs, or passing himself off as a digitally de-aged Han Dynasty soldier. Then there are those who wish he’d thrown in the towel a long time ago, depressed at the sight of a 70+ year old star trying to capture the magic of his heyday, just with added propagandistic undertones. However both groups still manage to share one thing in common – regardless, they keep coming back to check out Chan’s latest endeavour. In recent years I’ve found myself increasingly falling into the latter category, and after gritting my teeth through the Larry Yang directed Ride On barely 2 years ago, when I heard Chan was going to collaborate with Yang again, enough was enough. I promised myself there and then that I’d be steering well clear.
The movie would become The Shadow’s Edge, and in the lead up to its release details started filtering through, details that I did my best to ignore. It was going to see Chan return to a grittier style of action, the type he’d hinted at heading towards in 2017’s The Foreigner. It was a modern action movie set in Macau, with no CGI animals in sight. However what ultimately made me break my own promise was down to 2 factors – firstly it was going to be a remake of the 2007 Milkyway classic Eye In the Sky (notably making it the 2nd time for it to be remade, with the first being the 2013 Korean production Cold Eyes), and the second was that Tony Leung Ka-Fai would be returning to play the villain role, making it only the 2nd time to star alongside Chan this century after 2005’s The Myth (not counting their cameos in 2020’s All U Need is Love and 2009’s The Founding of a Republic, in which they never appeared onscreen together).
The original centred around a young policewoman’s initiation as a member of the Hong Kong police’s Surveillance Unit, set against the story of a veteran surveillance specialist tracking a master criminal that specialises in jewellery heists. For the remake Yang, who also wrote the script, sticks closely to the many of the key plot points, while at the same time adapting them for current times. Relocating to Macau, while in the original Leung is a jewellery thief, here his gang go after cryptocurrency, stealing a stash that’s worth millions but left without the passcodes to access it. After the police find themselves at a loss due to Leung and his gang’s ability to hack the city’s CCTV systems and manipulate footage, they realise they can’t completely rely on technology. “To catch a cunning fox, we need an experienced hunter” one of the team muses, a reference to a now retired surveillance expert who was unmatched at what he does.
Enter Jackie Chan, stepping into the shoes of Simon Yam from the original, who’s enjoying his retirement as a dog walker, brandishing a small army of them at the same time – and best of all, none of them are CGI. Chan soon realises he’s being tracked by a rookie, played by Zhang Zifeng (High Forces, Chinese Doctors), and it’s not long before he’s brough back into the fold and tasked with putting together an old-school surveillance team – the “Adorable Unit” as he names them. So far, so cute. It’s fair to say that in the first third of The Shadow’s Edge it feels as if Yang isn’t quite ready to let go of his fondness for ill-advised melodrama and scenes that lack any real dramatic tension. It’s revealed that Zifeng’s father used to be Chan’s partner, and was killed while on a mission together that Chan blames himself for, resulting in Chan occasionally falling into the same awkward father figure role that we saw in Ride On.
However after a market scene stakeout the script and the pacing seem to find their rhythm, forming part of an extended surveillance sequence that ends up with Chan, Zifeng, and Leung having dinner together. Wisely keeping both the characters and the audience in the dark to if Leung has sussed out they’re police, or has fallen for their father-daughter roleplay, there’s a genuine tension to the scene that’s been missing so far (only mired ever so slightly by an out of place father figure moment by Chan that gave me flashbacks to Bleeding Steel). There’s even a blink and you’ll miss it Yuen Qiu (Kung Fu Hustle, Dragon, The Young Master) cameo thrown in that comes so left of field it can’t help but raise a smile. However for the most part The Shadow’s Edge plays it straight, with Yang deserving credit for casting Chan in a more poker-faced role that avoids the dourness the same approach resulted in for Stanley Tong’s Vanguard in 2020.
The action is also the best seen in a Chan movie arguably since 2017’s The Foreigner, and I say that not only referring to the action scenes that involve Chan himself. The initial heist lets the younger cast do their thing, with a group of orphans Leung has raised that includes Ci Sha (Creation of the Gods I: Kingdom of Storms, Creation of the Gods II: Demon Force), Lin Qiu-Nan (Big Brother, Enter the Fat Dragon), and Wen Jun-Hui (The Pye-Dog, Ip Man: The Legend Is Born) tasked with the heavy lifting. Incorporating parkour with kicks to the face and acrobatic flourishes, it’s a gratuitous scene from an action standpoint, culminating in a skydive from Macau Tower (last seen in Fruit Chan’s Invincible Dragon) that includes pre-landing flying kicks. I’m not sure it makes sense from a gravity standpoint, but it definitely looks cool, and the whole extreme sports angle from the villains can’t help but recall 2004’s New Police Story.
The Shadow’s Edge marks the first time for stuntman Su Hang to step into the role of action director, having last worked as assistant action director on Panda Plan, and previously handled the action choreography for the China shot parts of Japan’s Kingdom sequels. Similarly JC Stunt Team member Lee Huang is credited as the fight choreographer (having worked in the same capacity on productions like Den of Thieves: Pantera and Lift), and I daresay Chan may have found a choreographer in Huang who finally understands how to apply his distinctive action style in a way that’s appropriate to his age. There’s a lot of hapkido in the mix when Chan throws down, and the occasional comedic flourish that’s thrown in actually works (with the exception of one scene where Chan nearly does his infamous ‘shaky hands’ routine but stops just before, almost as if Huang yelled off-camera “Don’t do it! DON’T YOU DO IT!”).
I wouldn’t be surprised if comparisons are made to Sammo Hung’s The Bodyguard due to the reliance on locks and throws as an economical way to disarm an opponent, and it completely works. Matching Chan on the physicality front is Leung himself who, much like in Tsui Hark’s Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants from earlier in the year, completely steals the show whenever he’s onscreen in a scenery chewing performance. He even gets a one versus a small army fight scene, armed only with a knife, which serves as a brutal masterclass in throat stabling, a clear indication that the Chinese censors have loosened up their views on onscreen violence compared to the 2010’s.
The best is saved for last though, with the final face off between Chan and Leung probably being the most violent of both of their long careers. Those looking for intricate choreography or long uninterrupted takes are in the wrong place, but what we get in place of them is something completely different from anything we’ve seen before in a Jackie Chan movie. Both desperately trying to kill the other, it’s a scrappy and guttural brawl that takes place within the confines of a cramped teahouse, with collateral damage being the order of the day and plenty of blood spilled. Funnily enough the scene that came to mind the most while I watched it playout was Jean Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren’s fight in 2009’s Universal Soldier: Regeneration. There’s even an ever so brief moment when Chan wipes the blood off his face in closeup, that I swear I recognised the same fiery Chan from his classics, and that alone made it worth it.
How much audiences enjoy The Shadow’s Edge will likely depend on their perspective – whether they’re watching it as a remake of a 2000’s Hong Kong classic. Whether they’re clocking in for the latest Jackie Chan movie. Whether they’re a Wen Jun-Hui fan girl (or boy!) and want to see him on the big screen. Will all of them walk away equally satisfied? I’d like to think so, and with 8 years having passed since The Foreigner, which is Chan’s most comparable tonally, hopefully we don’t have to wait as long for another similar effort (not least because he’d be almost 80!). With a post-credits scene hinting at the strong possibility of a sequel, the odds might just be in our favour.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10
Great review!!
That was a solid review. I really appreciated the paragraph where you discussed what to expect in terms of the fight choreography.
It sounds like I will likely enjoy watching this movie in my local theater if/when I get a chance.
With the movie performing rather well at the Chinese box office, hopefully JC gets the message that this is the type of movie project that he should be making more often 🤲
About time Jackie has made a good movie!!!
“Zifeng’s father used to be Chan’s partner, and was killed while on a mission together that Chan blames himself for, resulting in Chan occasionally falling into the same awkward father figure role that we saw in Ride On”
Oh my, the originality…
Still don’t think it’s as good as a lot of people say, so I’m waiting patiently.
A sequel? Well, it’s Chan’s biggest success in China since the atrocious Yoga thing, it’ll finish with more money made in China than what The foreigner did worldwide. So yeah, a sequel, why trying something “new”?
This is how it’s doing in China. https://variety.com/2025/film/box-office/jackie-chan-the-shadows-edge-china-box-office-1236497388/
https://variety.com/2025/film/box-office/jackie-chan-the-shadows-edge-china-box-office-i-swear-1236503662/
Nice try.
I forgot that The Shadow’s Edge came to my town. There was zero advertisement, but I managed to check it at my local theatre and I was extremely pleased.
I appreciated how different it was from Eye in The Sky, but still kept key scenes like Zhang Zifeng almost blowing her cover to save a civilian just like Kate Tsui and Han Hyo-Joo did in their own films and the way the police pieced together clues from the thieves’ trash.
Zhang Zifeng needed to look convincing, and in the end, she did. For her fight scene against her co-worker, when she tried to hip toss him, she quickly realized that wouldn’t work, and instead locked his leg up with her own before using her momentum to knock him down. It was realistic in that regard since that’s the proper way to take down a larger opponent.
I love it when Asian films employ grappling and submission moves, and Zhang Zifeng’s use of those techniques really worked in her favor. Jackie Chan clearly has a lot of grappling knowledge, and I can imagine that we rarely see it on film because he thinks people would rather see kung fu. (Remember the deleted grappling scene from Project A)
The action was a great combination of everything. We got a great combination of martial arts, gun fights, explosions, and vehicular mayhem. I am also glad that Jackie Chan did not rely on excessive stunt doubles and stuck to the kind of action that he doesn’t need to be doubled for.
That worked out well since even though the thieves have flashier moves and are more athletic, Jackie was able to handle them because he’s more experienced and not showing off.
With the film pointing out that the police can’t solely rely on technology to catch criminals, I hope that can be applied to the film business where studios and film makers realize that they can’t solely rely on it either.
Maybe my imagination was running away, but I can’t help but think that The Shadow’s Edge referenced Police Story with the way Jackie utilized the rolling clothing rack and Drunken Master II when Jackie and Tony fought under a low overhead space. (And I never knew that Jackie Chan vs Tony Leung KF was the fight scene that I’ve always wanted!)
Jackie Chan’s full of awesomeness! Non-stop riveting action with new kids’ showing off their karate moves & a woman power your shy lady (who’s dad passed away). The story’s full of suspense, you need to pay attention to the fast karate, the ‘secret’ evil guy; sooo sad also. I’m so happy to see Jackie & all the new kids in the block! Congrats to all the team of this movie! Now, you all go out and watch it, sooo worth it!
This is a convoluted and completely over-cooked movie resulting in a garbage re-adaptation of the original HK action thriller, “Eye in the Sky”. In the first movie, actors made their finest acting while chewing their food. Koreans then re-made it with tighter acting and storyline with “Cold Eyes” which made it a worthy police spy-thriller. This last re-iteration feels like the writer was high making it and was just dumping random plot lines like sprinkles without a congruent story. First, they are chasing down a known, armed and truly-skilled professional killer – but they keep on sending unarmed officers to apprehend him. Not even with an armed back-up team to protect undercover officers. You get stereotypical hacker with multiple screens and some Marvel superhero-style fight scenes. When the killer was cornered, the police officers and SWAT stand awkwardly close to the suspect. Of course, they all surround the very well-skilled, ultra-violent suspect within arms reach (typical Chinese action movie), aiming their guns not thinking of cross-fire. Second, the whole premise of the movie is surveillance tactics and not being recognized by your target – and yet, among a team of undercover officers, they sent the ONE person the target has actually met and been close to, to follow him in the end. What?! It’s obvious the actors gave 100% on the acting and performance. If only somebody gave 100% in reading the script and telling the writer that it doesn’t really makes sense – then this would have been a worthy Jackie Chan movie. You will walk-out scratching your head on this one.
Finally got to watch the movie this Sunday. Despite its lengthy runtime, I thought the movie had good pacing and kept me engaged all the way through. Tony Leung, Jackie Chan, and Zhang Zifeng were very good as the main leads.
Although, not the most original, I enjoyed the overall story. However, I did feel that the subplot regarding Shadow and his orphaned children got muddled up a bit in the latter half of the movie.
As for the fight scenes, iif you are looking for uninterrupted long takes of choreography, unfortunately this is not the movie for that. Having said that, I thought the actual action was solid and edited well enough to accommodate for the older performers. I was pleasantly surprised with the fight scene between JC and Tong Leung.
“There’s even an ever so brief moment when Chan wipes the blood off his face in closeup, that I swear I recognised the same fiery Chan from his classics, and that alone made it worth it.” – I know the moment you are referring to and it did bring a smile out of me.
IMHO, as an overall movie, this is arguably JC’s best since Little Big Soldier, if not better.
As much as I love long uninterrupted camera shots in fight scenes, I can handle quicker cuts as long as the action is comprehensible, which it certainly was here. I would have been really upset if there was constant shaky camerawork, extreme close-ups and editing that looks like it was done by a blender.
Agreed – you can definitely follow the action here
On that note, I thought the apartment fight scene was my favourite (outside of the shanty restaurant fight scene). Maybe it was the setting, but it reminded me of the climatic fight scene in the Foreigner. IMO, it might be better than the Foreigner’s fight scene.
Man, I can’t wait to rewatch this movie again. Haven’t had that feeling for a JC movie in a long time.
Still a hit. https://variety.com/2025/film/box-office/jackie-chan-the-shadows-edge-china-box-office-shenzhou-13-1236511503/
Still a hit now, too. https://variety.com/2025/film/box-office/jackie-chan-the-shadows-edge-china-box-office-final-destination-1236518937/
I watched it, and it was so close to being the best crime drama in modern years from China. But man was it overstuffed with cute robots and twin brother bs.
Very engaging film with many well choreographed fight scenes.
I saw The Shadow’s Edge last August and it was alright. But compared to its original source material (director Yau Nai-Hoi’s “Eye in the Sky”), this movie was too loud by comparison. Too many car chases and over the top stunts. It’s a movie about surveillance. Keep it subtle! Also, do note that Tony Leung Ka-Fai also played the main antagonist in “Eye in the Sky”. Those who’ve seen The Shadow’s Edge may want to immediately rewatch Eye in the Sky.