Ip Man 2 : Donnie Yen fights Sammo Hung!

It is holiday weekend in Hong Kong (Chinese Labour Day on 01 May) and quite a few films are capitalizing on this – debuts include Iron Man 2, Toy Story 3 and Ip Man 2. All sequels mind you. The first one I saw was Ip Man 2 tonight at Cityplaza.

Ip Man 2 葉問 2 is probably one of the most talked about Hong Kong films of the year and rightly so as the first film was indeed quite a thrill to watch. Donnie Yen 甄子丹 reprises his role as the calm Wing Chun 詠春 master and reluctant hero; like the previous film, he is forced into action against the oppressive “rulers”, now corrupt British colonial officers instead of the invading Japanese military. But plot is really beside the point here – we are already way used to the clichéd formula whereby the protagonist first fights with the local lads / masters and then challenges the evil foreigner and teaches him a thing or two about humility. This was basically the plot in Fearless 霍元甲 (Jet Li’s 李連杰 Huo Yuanjia vs the Japanese), True Legend 蘇乞兒 (Vincent Zhao’s 趙文卓 Beggar So vs the Russians), and countless classics including Bruce Lee’s epic Fist of Fury (Lee’s Chen Zhen 陳真 vs the Japanese). This cliché has plague the kung fu movie (particularly those set in the late Qing and 20th century) and is probably offensive to non-Chinese viewers and stale even for Chinese viewers. Ip Man 2 doesn’t really bother to deviate from this.

But then most viewers of the film are probably just looking for awesome fights, which this film does deliver. Key to the films best fight is Sammo Hung 洪金寶 as Hung Jan Nam, master of Hung Kuen 洪拳. There are 3 extended and 2 short action set pieces.

The 3 extended scenes include:

1. Ip Man vs Hung’s protégés at the fish market. This is a classic one vs many fight and Ip Man even uses his fish market choppers as well.
2. Ip Man vs several kung fu masters including – the highlight of the film for me was the fight here against Sammo Hung’s character although Ip Man does trade with 2 others including one played by Shaw veteran Lo Meng 羅莽. All these fights take place on top of a table thus emphasizing balance, style as well as power. Hung is very impressive and the two exchange some very fast punches. Excellent scene!
3. Ip Man vs The Twister, a western boxer. The fight is decent but can’t compete with early fights. Initially Ip Man finds it hard to parry the Twister’s hard punches but eventually prevails of course.

The 2 shorter scenes are:

1. Leung (played by rising mainland Chinese star Huang Xiaoming 黃曉明) vs Hung’s protégés. Short scene that shows the Leung character perform some Wing Chun.
2. Hung vs The Twister. Hung challenges the Twister and gets his ass kicked as he runs out of gas.

Most of the other actors apart from Yen and Hung really have minor roles and little to no character development. The film takes place in 1950s Hong Kong and while I have no issue with the production quality of the sets and art design, I can’t say it works for me either. The overall look seems to be just another generic Chinese mid-20th century set; take out the Englishmen and it could be early 20th century Canton for all I care.

Overall, I did find Ip Man 2 more entertaining than True Legend while not quite measuring up to the original Ip Man from 2008. I still prefer Donnie Yen’s contemporary actioners Kill Zone and Flash Point as I feel they represent progression in terms of action choreography. Still, Ip Man 2 earns a recommended viewing!

Ip Man 2 review @ Twitch

Official Ip Man 2 website

14 Blades Vs True Legend : Beggar So wins this fight!

14 Blades 錦衣衛 and True Legend 蘇乞兒 started showing simultaneously in Hong Kong yesterday and I managed to see both films today.  So which one is a better martial arts film? First a brief summary of the key selling points of the 2 movies.

14 Blades – stars Donnie Yen, currently the hottest Chinese action star, with action designed by Sammo Hung. Set in Ming Dynasty China, 14 Blades features action revolving around weapons especially the titular 14 blades that belongs to Yen’s character. The fights comes across as more fantastical. Other notable kung fu stars to make an appearance include Chen Kuan Tei (who has a nice fight with Yen) while Wu Ma and Sammo Hung have smaller roles and surprisingly both see little action. Production values are top notch.

True Legend – stars Vincent Zhao, a veteran action star who has not been in such a high profile film for a long time. Action choreography by Yuen Woo Ping is the primary sell here – fights are more “realistic” hand to hand, claw and fist styled duels. The story centers on Beggar So, the legendary inventor of the drunken fist style; former stars who have played the character include Chow Yun Fat (in a popular TVB drama) and Stephan Chow in an action packed comedy version of the story. Here, Zhao plays it straight. The fights don’t disappoint and Andy On is particularly impressive – I sincerely hope that this will be his breakthrough hit as he has been playing strong support in these types of pictures for some time. True Legends also purports to be the first kung fu film to incorporate 3D action – the results are disappointing. The 3D experience is not immersive, adds nothing to the fights and in fact makes it more muddled. Coming after James Cameron’s eye-popping Avatar, the 3D fails on all levels. (Twitch has a good review)

So which is the better film?  I was looking forward more to 14 Blades than True Legend, as I sort of knew what I would get with another Yuen Woo Ping movie. 14 Blades never manages to surprise though, and while the fights are solid, they aren’t as breathtaking as Yen’s contemporary actioners like SPL or Flash Point. True Legend, despite the flaws of the 3D scenes and being exposed to months of trailers and teasers, was much more of a rush to watch. Both are good, but I think I would rate True Legend more enjoyable, especially if you watch it in 2D.

Flash Point : Donnie Yen does MMA

Make no mistake, the primary reason most people go to see Flash Point will be for Donnie Yen’s action choreography and on-screen execution of those scenes. And on both counts Flash Point delivers.

Yen has been trying to re-vitalize Hong Kong action films with more contemporary fighting techniques; he discards the wire heavy theatrics of the 80s and 90s for a more realistic approach that incorporates elements of judo, Brazilian jujitsu, Muay Thai as well as more traditional boxing and high kicks – this is what is called mixed martial arts (MMA). He introduced this approach in last year’s SPL and develops it in Flash Point. Yen shows plenty of business acumen in incorporating MMA elements in his films; MMA is the fastest growing sport in the US and already extremely popular in Japan. Flash Point received extensive coverage in English language blogs because of Yen’s reputation overseas and response to his contemporary fight scenes has so far been positive.

But back to the movie. Flash Point features a simple and direct plot. A trio of Vietnamese gangsters led by Ja Ge (Ray Lui) out muscle local gangs with their reckless and violent methods. Jun Ma’s (Donnie Yen) partner Wilson (Louis Koo) is an undercover agent close to Ja, and when Ja is caught and put to trial, his gang decides to kill all the witnesses. They soon discover that Wilson is a cop and proceed to threaten him by kidnapping his pregnant girlfriend. With major witnesses dead, Ja gets off easy – this leads Jun to take matters into his own hands, confronting Ja’s brother Tony (Collin Chau) in a bloody battle.

I felt Flash Point’s dramatic elements were superior to the heavy handed SPL. The action doesn’t really kick in till the second half of the film, but this didn’t pose as a problem for me as I sort of liked the way the plot builds towards a showdown at the end. There are two major action scenes – Yen vs Xing Yu (he was in Stephen Chow’s Kung Fu) and Yen vs Collin Chau (he played Seraph in Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions). The fight with Xing Yu involved more punches and kicks while the climatic duel with Collin Chau is a full fledged MMA fight. I saw Muay Thai knee and elbow strikes, straight armbars, leg locks, toe holds, rear naked chokes, German supplexs and triangle leg locks!!

This is by far the best action film I have seen in a while. Highly recommended for MMA fans!