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In Rush Hour Jackie Chan's character is called Yan Naing Lee:

Rush Hour Wiki:Yan Naing Lee

Chief Inspector Lee is one of two main protagonists of the Rush Hour series. He is a Chief Inspector with the Hong Kong Police Force (H.K.P.F). Lee appears in all three of the films. He is partnered with Detective James Carter, who at first doesn't get along with, but later befriends. Lee is portrayed by Jackie Chan.

He's often called Lee in the film, so most likely that means his surname is Lee or 李 (can't imagine it'd be anything else).

As for NAING, it seems to be a romanization of a Burmese name - if anything.

Chinese searches bring up names like:

YAN NAING OO陈馨丰

where NAING would, assumably, be 馨, based on allignment. This, though, seems to be made-up Chinese name - rather than a translation or a transliteration - what have you.

The only other thing I can find with Naing (and even Yan together!) is this translation:

博杨莱-德钦通盛(Bo Yan Naing-Tun Shein)

I'm not sure what this romanization system is either. If it was a true translation then that would make the characters name something like: 李杨莱.

Not finding much online - as the Chinese just refers to him as Officer Lee (李警官).

Any ideas?

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Edit: saw 有道 also lists:

n. (Naing)人名;(缅)乃;(柬)宁

Why would a movie character from HK have Burmese or Cambodian romanization in his name? Bizarre.

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  • 博杨莱-德钦通盛(Bo Yan Naing-Tun Shein) looks like Minnan or Teochew.
    – dda
    Oct 11, 2017 at 6:30
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    I think this is a better fit on Movies & TV, since it's about movie trivia. Oct 11, 2017 at 6:46
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    @congusbongus it would probably just get migrated back here tho tbh
    – Mou某
    Oct 11, 2017 at 7:33

2 Answers 2

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Jackie Chan's character only has one name, Lee.

Neither the script, original screenplay, credits, of all three movies give any other name for Lee.

"Yan Naing Lee" is a piece of Wikipedia vandalism that sadly hasn't been caught, until now. See this revision: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rush_Hour_(film_series)&diff=prev&oldid=598230485

And related Movies & TV question: https://movies.stackexchange.com/q/81411/11183

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嚴宁李 - Yan Naing Lee

Yan = ("strict") Naing = ("rather") Lee = ("smooth; clever; sharp")

I guess this Hong Kong Chief Inspector's full name is saying he is "Strict but rather smooth, clever and sharp," which is accurate. Lol It kinda of a disappointement that the TV show version of Rush Hour blantly whitewashed this character 50% and called him "Jonathan Lee". smh

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