Year of the Dragon (1985) on Netflix
A Vietnam War veteran, Stanley White is given command of Chinatown and takes on Chinese organized crime. Joey Tai, a young man rising to lead the Triads, stands in his way.
- Netflix3.1/5
- IMDb6.8/1019,988 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes55%
Trailer
Plot summary
A Vietnam War veteran, Stanley White is the most decorated captain in the New York City police and is assigned to Chinatown, where his personal war on Chinese organized crime pulls him away from his wife, Connie. He clashes with Joey Tai, a young man who rises through violence to become head of the Triads, raising the profile of the organization. The uneasy truce between the Triads and the precinct breaks down. Both White and Tai are also at odds with the Italian Mob and the Thai gangsters who supply their heroin, and White's superiors and Connie beg him to weigh the consequences of his methods.
Cast
- Way Dong Wooas Elder
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Year of the Dragon (1985)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Director Michael Cimino and co-writer Oliver Stone originally considered Nick Nolte or Jeff Bridges for the lead role of Stanley White, but Cimino changed his mind after seeing Mickey Rourke in The Pope of Greenwich Village and having already worked with him on Heaven's Gate.
- When Mickey Rourke did not take his physical training seriously enough for the boxer-like role of Stanley White, Cimino hired Hells Angels member Chuck Zito to whip him into shape as his personal instructor.
- The rebuilt Chinatown set looked so convincing that at the film's premiere, director Michael Cimino had to persuade Stanley Kubrick, who assumed the exteriors were shot on location, that they were actually filmed on the studio backlot.
- Oliver Stone agreed to write the screenplay for a lower-than-normal wage as part of a quid pro quo: producer Dino De Laurentiis would in turn help Stone secure funding to finally get his long-unproduced script Platoon made.
- Chinese American and Asian American groups protested the film on release over its racial stereotyping, xenophobia and slurs, and over fears it would make Chinatown unsafe and hurt the local economy, forcing the studio to attach a disclaimer to the opening credits.
- The Desert Eagle pistol, carried by Mickey Rourke's character Stanley White, made its first-ever appearance in a motion picture in this film.
