Jackie Chan Says Brett Ratner Can't Shoot Action Scenes

Still wondering why X-Men: The Last Stand sucked so much? It could be because Brett Ratner can't direct action scenes. You may already have come to that conclusion on your own, but now it has been confirmed by Jackie Chan, who is currently working with Ratner on Rush Hour 3. He was quoted by The Canadian Press as saying, "Even though Brett doesn't know much about directing action, he does notice details that help us improve the scene. I appreciate his attentiveness when we shoot action scenes and his feedback."

Of course, Chan's statement could be lost in translation, and I don't mean that the quote was translated from the Chinese. What the martial arts-trained actor probably meant is that Ratner doesn't know about choreographing action, especially the kind of playful fight sequences Chan is famous for. I figure most of the directors Chan has worked with have had difficulty directing Chan in these types of scenes and probably just let him do his thing, just as most directors couldn't direct Chaplin, Keaton or many of the other great silent comedians or great martial arts action stars -- at least, not when their main talents were being filmed.

I don't mean to defend Ratner, who I think is in fact awful at directing action scenes, as well as all other types of scenes for that matter. But Chan could not have meant to put down the talents of a filmmaker he's working with for a third time. Still, in the same article Chan is quoted as praising the directing talents of Ang Lee and Zhang Yimou, two directors he didn't expect would be so great at shooting action scenes but who, in his opinion, are. Since Chan has never worked with either of these filmmakers and since both employed choreographers for their fight scenes, it could be that Chan did literally mean what he said.