Cinema: 1989

Even as he played a major role in revitalising the Hong Kong film industry and giving it a filmic identity, Jackie Chan was always a great admirer of the Golden Age of Hollywood in particular. Miracles is his greatest directorial triumph and an artefact of the threshold between two styles, a film that lovingly takes the tone and syntax of Hollywood films and brushing it with the vibrance and energy of the Hong Kong action style. The most expensive HK film at the time, it was lovingly detailed and exquisitely filmed, Peter Pau's moving camera capturing detail and staging in the cross-genre movements. It also presents his most hilarious and often daring slapstick stuntwork, the street battles and the textile factory showdown are some of the most side-splitting and jaw-dropping choreography he has committed to film.