Detective Chinatown Movies: Why so Popular?

Detective Chinatown Movies

So intrigued with the popularity of the Detective Chinatown movie series, so yesterday I made a movie marathon watching the first and second installments. And now understood why this is a wildly popular movie franchise in mainland China. It's sooo good! It has a balance of comedy, suspense, and thrill.

Two detectives with contrasting personalities, one is genius and one is dumb so the result is a balance of fun, thrill, and adventure. The screenplay is excellent and the direction is impressive! 

I'm still searching where to watch the third installment and the latest, Detective Chinatown 1900.

Detective Chinatown Movies

Detective Chinatown is a comedy-mystery buddy film, it reminds us of the classic Hong Kong movies popularized by Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung but without martial arts.

I love the screenplay and how the plot develops. The team up of veteran actor Wang Baoqiang and young actor Liu Haoran is both funny and smart. You will love their rapport. And the twist of the story in the end is so mind blowing you'll never see it coming!

It is directed and written by Chen Sicheng, and starring Wang Baoqiang and Liu Haoran in all four installments.

1. Detective Chinatown 1 was released in December 2015, it has a production budget of $15 million but the actual box office sales reached $120.6 million, making it one of the most profitable movies of all time. This is the first installment of the franchise so it's important to watch it first to understand the two main characters better and how everything started.

Detective Chinatown Movies

Detective Chinatown Movies

The story began with Qin Feng (Liu Haoran) arriving in Bangkok, Thailand for a vacation. He is a smart and talented teenager who has an astonishing perception and memory, yet got rejected from the police college.

He plans to spend time with his "uncle" Tang Ren (Wang Baoqiang), who is reputed to be the number one detective of Chinatown in Bangkok. But he turns out to be a swindler. 😄

Tang Ren has the love of his life in Bangkok, Ah Xiang (Tong Liya). But one day, he was accused of murdering Sompat, the main suspect in a gold robbery case.

It started the hilarious and yet suspenseful chase of who is the real suspect, forcing Qin Feng and Tang Ren to make use of their detective skills to survive.

2. Detective Chinatown 2 was released in the spring festival of  2018 and has grossed over US$544 million worldwide, making it the 13th-highest-grossing film of all time in China currently. The story is set in New York City so most cast members are American actors and 30% of the film used English language.

Detective Chinatown Movies

The story began when Qin Feng (Liu Haoran) arrived in New York at the invitation of his uncle Tang Ren (Wang Baoqiang) for his wedding to Ah Xiang (Tong Liya). But turned out to be a hoax. Tang Ren had deceived Qin Feng to come to New York for another purpose.

Detective Chinatown Movies
Natasha Liu Bordizzo

The godfather of Chinatown, Uncle Qi (Kenneth Tsang), gathered the world's best detectives from an app called Crimaster and sets up a competition to locate his grandson's killer within one week for a reward of five million dollars. Australian actress Natasha Liu Bordizzo, known for her role of Snow Vase in Netflix's 2016 wuxia film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny, played Officer Chen.

3. Detective Chinatown 3

The film set several box office records, including the biggest opening weekend ever in a single territory, and grossed over US$699 million, becoming the highest-grossing non-American R-rated film of all time. It is also the sixth-highest-grossing film of 2021 and the sixth-highest-grossing non-English film of all time.

Detective Chinatown Movies

Detective Chinatown Movies

After the events in Bangkok and New York, Tang Ren and Qin Feng are invited to Tokyo to investigate another crime that has occurred there by Noda Hiroshi regarding a murder of a Southeast Asian gang boss, Su Chaiwat, leading to a battle between the strongest detectives in Asia.

Update: 

Just finished watching Detective Chinatown 3! But I like the story in Detective Chinatown 2, the way the murder case was setup and the way they solved it.

Liu Haoran and Japanese actress Masami Nagasawa 

Wang Baoqiang and Japanese actor Satoshi Tsumabuki

Japanese actor Tadanobu Asano and Liu Haoran 

However, Detective Chinatown 3 shows3a lot of improvement in cinematography and film editing. The visual effects are also more vivid than the previous two installments.

Moreover, the third installment, which is set in  Japan, has lots of popular support stars such as Japanese stars Tadanobu Asano, who starred in Shogun as Yabushige, as Naoki Tanaka, Masami Nagasawa as Kobayashi, Tomokazu Miura as Watanabe, and Satoshi Tsumabuki as Noda Hiroshi. C-Drama stars Cheng Xiao and Chen Zheyuan had cameo roles.

Zhang Zifeng, who appeared in the first installment, reprised her role as Snow.

4. Detective Chinatown 1900. 

Released on January 29, 2025, this is currently the second top grosser film in the spring festival box office in mainland China. The film is the fourth installment in the Detective Chinatown franchise. But the story is a stand-alone plot and not a sequel to three previous installments. Liu Haoran and Wang Baoqiang also played different characters.

Detective Chinatown Movies

Detective Chinatown Movies

The story is set in San Francisco, California in 1900 and follows the story of Qin Fu (Liu Haoran) and Ah Gui (Wang Baoqiang). In 1900, Fei Yanggu, an official of the Qing Dynasty, on the orders of Empress Dowager Cixi, led two bodyguards to San Francisco to capture the revolutionaries Sun Wen and Zheng Shiliang. 

However, the daughter of a U.S. Congressman was murdered in San Francisco's Chinatown, at the same time an elderly Native American man was also murd3red. The suspect was Bai Zhenbang, the son of Bai Xuanling, the leader of Chinatown’s Xiesheng Hall. To save his son and prevent the Chinese from suffering large-scale persecution, Bai Xuanling invited Qin Fu (Liu Haoran), a young reasoning master, to help solve the case.

On the other hand, Ah Gui (Wang Baoqiang), a Chinese-Native American hunter, came to San Francisco to avenge his adoptive father. In the process, he met Qin Fu. The two began to work together to uncover the truth.

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