Detective Chinatown 2 (Chinese: 唐人街探案2) is a 2018 Chinese comedy-mystery buddy film directed and written by Chen Sicheng, starring Wang Baoqiang and Liu Haoran. A sequel to 2015's Detective Chinatown, the film was released in China on 16 February 2018. It has grossed over US$544 million worldwide, making it the fifth-highest-grossing film of all time in China.[5][6]
| Detective Chinatown 2 | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Chinese | 唐人街探案2 |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Tángrénjiē tàn àn |
| Directed by | Chen Sicheng |
| Written by | Chen Sicheng |
| Produced by | Chen Sengoi Eileen Ling Gong Sun Tao Wang Haipeng Ling Hong Shawn Xiang Yue John Zheng[1] |
| Starring |
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| Cinematography | Jie Du |
| Music by | Nathan Wang |
Production |
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| Distributed by |
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Release date |
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Running time | 121 minutes |
| Country | China |
| Language | Mandarin |
| Budget | RMB 400 million ($63 million)[3] |
| Box office | $544.2 million[4] |
Asequel, was released on February 12, 2021.
Qin Feng (Liu Haoran) thought he was going to attend his distant uncle Tang Ren's (Wang Baoqiang) wedding, which turned out to be a hoax. Tang Ren had deceived Qin Feng to come to New York for another purpose.
The godfather of Chinatown, Uncle Qi (Kenneth Tsang), gathered the world's best detectives from an app called Crimaster (which allows real detectives to upload their cases for the online community to solve them) and sets up a competition to locate his grandson's killer within one week for a reward of five million dollars. His grandson Jason was found in a temple with his heart torn out and an unknown symbol on a table near him.
Unexpectedly, Qin Feng, the world's second-top detective and the world's third-top detective noticed another similar murder in the Hudson River one week before the investigation began. A white woman was also killed but lost her kidney. The two men pulled out surveillance videos of the two crime scenes and found that a man appeared at both crime scenes. They identify the man as Song Yi (Xiao Yang). However, after observing that Song Yi is right-handed, Qin Feng concludes that he could not be the killer since evidence suggests that the killer is left-handed. While Qin Feng and Tang Ren knew that Song Yi was not the killer, this was not everyone else's consensus, and so the duo had to clear Song Yi's name and find the real killer.
Eventually, with the help of Tang Ren's knowledge of Feng shui and Wu Xing, Qin Feng discovered the killer's motive. Due to the unique location of the murders, the time of the crimes, the eight characters of the victims' birthdays and the organs, he concluded the whole of New York was being used as an altar.(the elements fire, water, wood, metal, and earth were used to determine the locations, date, and the respective organ to be removed)
Finally, they find out that the doctor who was battling cancer believed that doing ancient Taoist rituals could grant him immortality, and was behind the murders. The doctor kills himself after being found out.
Qin Feng deduces that Song Yi is actually the mysterious man "Q", the top-ranked detective of Crimaster. Song Yi solved the case very early on and used the doctor's patterns to cover up his own murder of a sex trafficking ringleader who abducted his sister. Qin Feng lets him go, but later KIKO reveals that "Q"'s IP address does not locate him in America, making Song Yi as "Q" unlikely. "Q" is therefore still at large.
Filming lasted for 40 days in New York City.[3]
Detective Chinatown 2 earned $541.1 million in China, and $3 million in other countries, for a worldwide total of $544.1 million.[4][7]
Onreview aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 54% based on 13 reviews, and an average rating of 5.1/10.[8]OnMetacritic, which assigns a normalized rating, the film has a weighted average score of 48 out of 100, based on five critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[9] Users on the Chinese site Douban gave the film an average rating of 6.7/10,[10] while those at Tianjin Maoyan Culture Media gave it a 9.0 rating.[11]
| Award ceremony | Category | Recipient(s) | Result | Ref |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25th Beijing College Student Film Festival | Students' Choice Award for Favorite Film | Detective Chinatown 2 | Won | [12] |
| 34th Hundred Flowers Awards | Best Picture | Nominated | [13] | |
| Best Director | Chen Sicheng | Nominated | ||
| Best Writing | Nominated | |||
| Best Actor | Liu Haoran | Nominated | ||
| Best Newcomer | Shang Yuxian | Nominated | ||
| 4th Jackie Chan Action Movie Awards | Best Action Stuntman | Long Cuilong | Won | [14] |
| Best Action Choreographer | Wu Gang | Won |
A sequel, Detective Chinatown 3, also written and directed by Chen Sicheng and set in Tokyo's Chinatown, was scheduled to be released during the Chinese New Year holiday season in 2020, however due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic on the eve of the Spring Festival, the film was withdrawn from the schedule. It was finally released on February 12, 2021 the first day of the Lunar New Year in 2021. In addition of the two leads of Wang Baoqiang and Liu Haoran reprising their roles, new supporting cast members in Detective Chinatown 3 include Satoshi Tsumabuki, Tony Jaa, Tadanobu Asano, Masami Nagasawa, and Tomokazu Miura.
Premiering in January 2020, a web series starring Lin Mo (Roy Chiu) and Sa Sha (Zhang Yishang) expanded the Detective Chinatown universe. Following the events of the first Detective Chinatown film this series introduces new detectives and delves deeper into the intricate mysteries and cases that run concurrently with the events of the Detective Chinatown films. In February 2024 a second season was also produced, featuring the return of Kiko (Yuxian Shang) from Detective Chinatown 2, who reprises her role as one of the main protagonists of the show. Both seasons were made available exclusively on the subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service iQIYI.
