Jean-Pierre Richard

"He wants to go to heaven."

- Richard before he murders Mr. Big

Inspector Jean-Pierre Richard, more commonly referred to as Richard, is the main antagonist in the 2001 film Kiss of the Dragon.

He is portrayed by Tchéky Karyo.

Biography
Richard is a corrupt and violent French police detective whom a Chinese intelligence agent named Liu Siu-jian meets in a hotel in Paris. Liu is led to believe that he is providing reconnaissance of a meeting involving a Chinese mobster named Mr. Big, but while Mr. Big is in a room with two prostitutes, one of them tries to murder him. As Liu rushes to stop her, Richard appears and shoots both Mr. Big and the prostitute dead with Liu's handgun. Richard reveals his intentions to frame Liu for the murders, but Liu manages to obtain the surveillance footage proving that Richard is the true killer. Richard and his henchmen pursue Liu throughout the hotel, attempting to kill him, but he just manages to escape.

Later, Richard tries to convince Chinese liaisons who have arrived in France that Liu is the primary suspect, though they are unconvinced. Liu later meets up with the liaison and gives him the tape, but one of Richard's men kills him and recovers the tape. Afterwards, Liu meets a prostitute named Jessica who tells him that Richard had previously kidnapped her daughter, Isabel, in order to force her into the job. When Liu realizes that she had been the second prostitute present in Mr. Big's room when he was murdered, he sends her to Richard's office to get the tape back. Richard has her tied up in his office while he's gone, but she manages to break free and escape with the tape. The pair then travel to the orphanage where Isabel is but are ambushed by Richard's men, as he had guessed where they would be heading next. Jessica gets shot and Liu is forced to take her to the hospital, promising to rescue Isabel from Richard and reunite her with her mother.

Liu goes to the police station and phones Richard, telling him to come to the window. As he does so, Liu pinpoints his location and fights his way through swarms of henchmen using his superior martial arts skills. Liu finally confronts Richard, who is holding Isabel hostage, and Richard goes to shoot him. Liu dives at him and, despite sustaining a bullet wound, manages to stick an acupuncture needle into the back of Richard's neck. A puzzled Richard asks Liu what he has just done to him, and Liu reveals that the needle has punctured a forbidden location of the body known as the 'kiss of the dragon', which stimulates all the body's blood to travel to the head. Richard starts shivering uncontrollably as blood begins to seep out of all the orifices in his head, including his eyes, ears, mouth and nostrils. Finally, Richard collapses on the floor and dies painfully of a brain aneurysm.