The Popcorn King

Like many people I talk to about Ratner over the following weeks and months, my own first impression of the 38-year-old director is one of boyish enthusiasm mixed with intractable persistence. Following a short break for lunch, Chan's line has been changed. "You will always be my homie," he now says. But Ratner still insists on take after take as Tucker tries out a series of increasingly inspired riffs on his own dialogue. Ratner likes what he hears and, in between takes, he bounds across the set in his faded T-shirt, baggy jeans (made more so by the absence of a belt) and worn sneakers to praise Tucker and further egg him on. Only now, hours after shooting began, is the scene really starting to catch fire, and Ratner seems determined to keep at it until Tucker and Chan are in perfect comic harmony. It is, Rush Hour 3 screenwriter Jeff Nathanson will later tell me, typical of Ratner's approach.

"What Brett does is work his crew to the point where everyone has pretty much hit the wall — where the actors, the grips, everyone is ready to call it a day," Nathanson says. "And that's when Brett is able to kick things into a whole other gear. Just when you think you're almost out the door, that's when he'll go for another two hours and, in almost every case, what he gets in those two hours is what ends up in the film. He just knows, intuitively, when he hasn't gotten that exact spark he needs. In comedy, it's so important to have that kind of patience, to see that something can be a little bit better, or in some cases a lot better."

"He has the energy of a dozen athletes," adds Rush Hour series producer Arthur Sarkissian. "The guy is unbelievable. He will not quit. He can be exhausted and not have slept, but on the set he's completely there. Nothing escapes his eyes. He sees every fucking thing."

Still, even Ratner can not roll back the clouds that have begun to obscure the afternoon sky. The cinematographer, J. Michael Muro, is worried about losing the light and has joined Ratner at the monitor, where Dudevoir repeatedly eyes his watch. One of the film's other producers, Andrew Z. Davis, urges Ratner to move on.

Finally, the pressure builds to a head, and Ratner snaps: "If Bob Shaye wants to come down here and direct Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan himself, let him do it!" he shouts.

Dudevoir cracks a smile — something that heretofore seemed impossible — and says that he actually thought Ratner was making pretty good time.

Such are the stressful, workaday realities of Hollywood filmmaking as you might observe them on any number of sets, but especially on those belonging to summer tentpole movies that have the fortunes of entire studios wrapped up in them. Budgeted at an estimated $120 million — roughly four times what the original film cost to make — Rush Hour 3, which will be released on August 10, is one of the biggest investments ever undertaken by the fiscally conservative New Line, save for another highly successful in-house franchise: Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. There, the cost was special effects. Here, the stars are the special effects — namely Tucker, who now receives a $20 million payday (officially, though some reports have pegged the figure as high as $25 million) plus 20 percent of the film's back end, and Chan, who gets $15 million, 15 percent of the gross and distribution rights to the film in key Asian territories. (As for Ratner, fret not; he's well taken care of too.) In addition, Rush Hour 3 stands as New Line's surest bet for a major hit after a long dry spell — more than two years during which none of the studio's movies have grossed more than $60 million at the domestic box office.

"We have three movies this year that are really important, that have to perform, which are Hairspray, Rush Hour 3 and The Golden Compass," says New Line president of production Toby Emmerich. "So, there's a lot of pressure on Rush Hour 3, though in a way, it's the one I feel the most comfortable about because it has a three in the title. At least a lot of people have seen and liked a Rush Hour movie."