Around the World in 80 Days is a 2004 comedy adventure film based on Jules Verne's novel, Around the World in 80 Days.
The film' is set in 19th century England and centers on Phileas Fogg (Steve Coogan), here reimagined as an eccentric inventor, and his efforts to circumnavigate the globe in 80 days. During the trip he is accompanied by his Chinese valet Passepartout (Jackie Chan).
The film boasted several big stars and contained many celebrity cameos. However the film was a box office bomb and ended up generating a huge loss for the studio.
Tagline: Let your imagination soar.
Around the World in 80 Days was not very well received by film critics, with Rotten Tomatoes giving it a 32% "Rotten" rating . It was criticised for having little to no resemblance to the novel it is based on and for its laboured attempts at comedy. With production costs of about US$ 110 million, and estimated marketing costs of $30 million, it earned US$ 24 million at the US box office, and US$ 72 million world wide. .
Frank Coraci, who directed this film, makes a brief cameo appearance.
In true Jackie Chan tradition the film includes a cameo by Sammo Hung. In this film, he briefly appears in the role of Wong Fei Hung, a real-life Chinese martial arts master of the period, who leads an equally legendary group of martial artists known as the Ten Tigers of Canton (Jackie's character being one of the ten).
Many of Fogg's discoveries were from people such as Thomas Henry Huxley (dinosaurs), Charles Robert Darwin (evolution), Nicholas-Joseph Cugnot (automobiles), James Clerk Maxwell (radio waves) and Orville and Wilbur Wright (flying machines).
This is the first live-action Walt Disney Pictures movie Chan has ever been in.
Featured the first and only time Jackie Chan and Arnold Schwarzenegger appear in a motion picture together. They would later appear in a 2005 advertisement against movie piracy.
It was also the second film to feature Chan and Owen Wilson together with an appearance of Queen Victoria after Shanghai Knights.
Many of the gaps between the different scenes (usually animations of the world) are very different and virtually impossible, such as a trip over the Himalayas and across the whole China in less than a month. This trip would have taken place on horse or on foot on poor roads and lasted much longer than 80 days alone. The route was changed from that described in the book. The entire nation of Japan is omitted.
Particularly the last parts of the film contain an almost Monty Python style of humour. Not at all surprisingly John Cleese also appears near the end of the film as a London bobby.
Around the World in 80 Days was produced in Super 35 mm film cinematographic format.Wikipedia
