Rush Hour On Air Force One As Melania Director Brett Ratner Joins Trump China Trip

Brett Ratner, the director behind the Rush Hour motion pictures and a documentary on Melania Trumpis accompanying Donald Trump to China for his summit with Xi Jinping.

Trump is because of maintain talks with the Chinese leader on Thursday and Friday over urgent financial and geopolitical points, together with Iran and Taiwan. The US president was accompanied on Air Force One by CEOs and high executives from main US tech and finance companies, together with Apple’s Tim Cook, Tesla’s Elon Musk and BlackRock’s Larry Fink. Ratner was among the many teams as properly.

The president is reportedly an enormous fan of Rush Hour, which revolves round detectives James Carter and Yan Naing Lee – performed by Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan respectively – as they navigate their cultural variations and examine crimes in Hong Kong, Paris and Los Angeles.

His spokesperson, Victoria Palmer-Moore, mentioned he would use the trip to scout for filming areas for the newest set up of the Rush Hour franchise. She added that Ratner plans to shoot “a lot” of Rush Hour 4 in China.

Last November, Trump inspired billionaire Larry Ellison, the first monetary drive behind Paramount Skydance, to carry again the franchise as soon as Paramount went via with its controversial buy of Warner Bros, in response to US information outlet Semafor.

Despite Trump’s backing, that deal is but to be confirmed, as lots of of Hollywood actors and administrators have known as for regulators to dam Paramount’s acquisition over fears of job cuts and a drastically scaled again film slate.

Trump’s help has allowed Ratner to make a comeback in Hollywood after being sidelined following accusations of sexual misconduct throughout the #MeToo motion in 2017. Ratner denies the entire allegations.

In 2026, Ratner launched Amazon-backed documentary Melania, which adopted the primary woman throughout the 20 days earlier than Trump’s second inauguration. A crucial and industrial flop, the documentary drew $16.7m on the field workplace in opposition to a manufacturing price range of $40m. It was the primary film directed by Ratner in additional than a decade.

The authentic Rush Hour was an instantaneous hit in 1998, topping the US field workplace charts upon its launch. Its sequel Rush Hour 2 was additionally an enormous industrial success in 2001, earlier than Ratner’s critically and commercially disappointing Rush Hour 3 was launched in 2007.

Despite rumors of a fourth movie circulating for nearly 20 years, with Chan suggesting in 2017 that he and Tucker had agreed upon a brand new script, growth had stalled till Trump intervened in late 2025.