Chow hospitalized for 2 days shooting Chinese film

In a self-deprecating joke about his age, the 54-year-old Chow said he had to receive medical treatment after filming scenes with younger male Chinese actors. "I couldn't take it any more," Chow said, adding the younger actors were "simply too brilliant."

Hong Kong's Emperor Motion Pictures publicist Yip Kin-ping later said Chow was put on an intravenous drip after catching a cold from shooting in and near Beijing.

In the film, Jiang plays a bandit chief who tries to take over a remote provincial town in 1920s China, only to meet resistance from a tyrannical local businessman played by Chow.

Chow made his name with stylish Hong Kong gangster thrillers like A Better Tomorrow before making his Hollywood debut with the 1998 action movie The Replacement Killers. His other American credits include Anna and the King, Bulletproof Monk, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and Dragonball Evolution.

Jiang, who is one of China's biggest stars, has also turned to directing. His most recent film was the 2007 comedy The Sun Also Rises. He also shot a segment in the recently released anthology New York, I Love You.

Associated Press