General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Miracles (奇迹)

Miracles (奇蹟; also released as Mr. Canton and Lady Rose, The Canton Godfather, and Black Dragon) is a 1989 Hong Kong action-comedy directed by, co-written by, and starring Jackie Chan, in which a naive country boy accidentally becomes head of a 1930s Hong Kong crime syndicate while helping a poor flower seller maintain a society deception.¹^•² It is a reworking of a Damon Runyon story that Frank Capra had already filmed twice, as Lady for a Day (1933) and Pocketful of Miracles (1961).²

Key fact	Detail
Original title	奇蹟 (Miracles); alternate titles Mr. Canton and Lady Rose, The Canton Godfather, Black Dragon³
Release	Hong Kong 15 June 1989; Japan 12 August 1989; South Korea 13 September 1989¹
Director and star	Jackie Chan, who also co-wrote the script with Edward Tang and the Golden Way writers group and led the action choreography¹
Box office	HK$34,036,029 in Hong Kong, second highest-grossing film of the year there; about 600 million yen in Japan¹
Budget	Reported as the highest in Hong Kong film history at 1.4 billion yen, with an alternative figure of US$8.2 million (HK$64 million) also cited¹
Award	Best Action Design at the 9th Hong Kong Film Awards, won by Jackie Chan's Stuntmen Association⁴
Running time	Hong Kong cut 127 minutes, international cut 107 minutes; Japanese sources list 139 minutes⁵^•¹

Spoilers

Story and source material

The plot follows Kuo (Chan), a penniless young man newly arrived in Hong Kong who buys a rose from an elderly street vendor, Madame Rose (Gua Ah-leh), and later stumbles into a gang war in which a dying boss mistakenly names him as his successor.⁶ An honest man at the head of a criminal organization, Kuo tries to steer his underlings toward legitimate business, converting their hangout into a fashionable nightclub called The Ritz and hiring the singer Yang Yu-ming (Anita Mui) as its star attraction.⁴

The melodramatic core comes from Madame Rose, who has been sending her daughter money while pretending to be a wealthy society doyenne. When the daughter arrives with her fiancé and his rich father, Kuo and Yu-ming stage an elaborate hoax to keep the deception intact, all while Kuo negotiates with the rival Tiger gang to avoid open warfare.⁶ The story derives from Damon Runyon's tale of a poor flower seller, previously adapted by Frank Capra as Lady for a Day and Pocketful of Miracles.²^•⁷

Production

Scale and intent. Chan conceived the film as an answer to criticism that Hong Kong cinema could do nothing beyond low-budget genre action.⁶ Preparation began in autumn 1987, roughly alongside Police Story 2, but that film took priority when Miracles' script needed reworking, giving Miracles a production period of about a year and a half.¹ Shooting itself took nine months, with enormous and detailed sets, elaborate costumes, and extensive tracking shots and complicated camerawork.⁶ The film was produced by Leonard Ho for Golden Way, Golden Harvest, and related companies.¹

Cast. Anita Mui plays the nightclub singer Yang Yu-ming, and Gua Ah-leh plays Madame Rose; the supporting cast includes Wu Ma as Kuo's consigliere, Richard Ng as the comic Inspector Ho, Bill Tung, Gloria Yip, Lo Lieh as a gang lieutenant, and Ko Chun-hsiung.⁴^•³ Several action stars were cast in non-fighting roles, and the film is filled with cameos from Hong Kong industry figures including Yuen Biao, Jacky Cheung, Simon Yam, and Amy Yip.⁶

Action and style

Miracles contains fewer fights than a typical Jackie Chan film and gives more weight to story and comedy, which reviewers have linked to its lighter, more comfortable pace.⁶ The fights that remain use the large sets to full advantage; the fight in a rope factory is repeatedly singled out as the standout sequence.³ The film's action design won Best Action Design at the 9th Hong Kong Film Awards for Jackie Chan's Stuntmen Association, and the film itself earned nominations for Best Actor (Chan), Best Editing (Cheung Yiu-chung), and Best Art Direction (Eddie Ma Poon-chiu).⁴

Reception

In Hong Kong the film earned HK$34,036,029, ranking second for the year, and took about 600 million yen in Japan.¹ On Rotten Tomatoes it holds a 60% Tomatometer from 5 critics and a 74% Popcornmeter score from more than 5,000 audience ratings.⁸ Critical responses have divided over the balance Chan struck: some reviewers call it one of his finest films, praising the direction, cast performances, and the rope factory fight,³^•⁴ while others find the script rambling and argue that the reduced action leaves the story carrying more than it can support.⁹

Standing in Chan's career

Miracles was the last film directed by and starring Jackie Chan to be released in the 1980s.¹⁰ Chan has repeatedly cited it as a personal favorite among his own films,² and commentators have read the character, an accidental boss who credits roses bought from a street vendor with his good fortune, as a reflection of Chan's own unlikely rise from stuntman to pillar of the Hong Kong industry.¹⁰ The film circulated under several titles internationally, and 88 Films issued both the 127-minute Hong Kong cut (Mr. Canton & Lady Rose) and the 107-minute international cut (Miracles, also known as Black Dragon) on 4K UHD and Blu-ray in April 2025.⁵

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Action and adventure films (individual works) › Action comedies › Action comedies, 1970s to 1990s

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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