Armour of
God 2: Operation Condor; or, Jackie Chan and the Raiders of the Lost Nazi Gold
Jackie returns once again as a fearless treasure hunter Asian
Hawk in this great, action-packed sequel so as to beat up a bunch of baddies in
the Sahara Desert.
Release Info
Directed by: Jackie Chan Starring: Jackie Chan, Eva Cobo de Garcia, Carol Dodo Cheng, Shoko Ikeda
Language: Cantonese Original Title: Fei ying gai wak Movie Industry: Hong Kong Runtime: 106 min
Plot
After another unsuccessful expedition, much in Indiana Jones
style, Jackie is sent on his next mission again by the employer from the first
movie, eccentric Count Bannon (Bozidar Smiljanic). Namely, the hunter is to
find 240 tons of gold hidden in the Sahara by the Nazi regiment at the end of World War
II. During his journey to Africa, Jackie is accompanied by Elsa (Eva Cobo de
Garcia), granddaughter of the regiment’s leader; Ada (Carol Dodo Cheng), an
expert in African geography; and Momoko (Shoko Ikeda), Japanese travelling
girl. Needless to say, the group faces lots of dangers from the side of Arabs, African locals, and ruthless mercenaries
who are after the gold too. Will Jackie find the hidden the base in the middle
of the desert and retrieve the gold before anyone else does?
Operation Condor > Armour of God
That’s basically it what can be said about this movie
compared to its 1986 predecessor. Everything that didn’t work in the original
was thwarted of fixed here, whereas the things which worked flawlessly were
made bigger and better. First of all, the story is more engaging in comparison
to the highly ambiguous artefact and over-the-top villains from the first part, because
here we get tangible stuff in form of gold and a bunch of mercenaries chasing
after it. Secondly, unlike horrible May (Lola Forner), Eva Cobo de Garcia is
okay as European damsel in distress and Carol Cheng only improves the picture
in the supporting role (providing in one of the scenes a full display of her
natural resources). Hell, even the baddies do great job and at times are
genuinely hilarious. On top of that, action sequences are simply amazing,
starting from Jackie’s fight bombastic fight with the Arabs and finishing on
the epic showdown with the mercenaries at the Nazi base.
Thankfully, this particular movie is more accessible in its
original, uncut Cantonese version so I didn’t have to put up with crappy English
dub, which always takes away (in my opinion) half of the enjoyment from
watching a film. Why the dubs are being made anyway? Is it so hard to read the
subtitles? Anyway, Operation Condor does not have that problem. What we get is
Jackie Chan at his best.
Recommendations
I safely recommend this film to anyone who liked the first
part as well as those who like Jackie Chan flicks but would like to see some of
his old stuff. This is definitely a must-see classic and generally a great
addition to the adventure genre.
Overall score: 9/10
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