Films of Fury: The Kung Fu Movie Book

by Meyers, Ric

  “Although the film had many light moments and was even silly sometimes,” Michelle admitted to me, “Yuen Wo-ping was very particular about the martial arts. Since I was playing Wing Chun and the movie was called Wing Chun, the movements had to be wing chun.” All involved managed to make it so, despite obvious wire-enhanced leaping and spinning. Serious kung fu fans wished for a less loopy story, and were aghast that the powerful Donnie Yen was reduced to a comic supporting role, but even they enjoyed Michelle’s repeated, climatic confrontations with a sexist bandit lord (played by Bastard Swordsman Norman Chu Siu-keung).

  Her second movie of 1994 signaled another change in direction. Wonder Seven was done as a favor to director Ching Siu-tung, who was using the knock-off of The Magnificent Seven (which was, in turn, a knockoff of Seven Samurai) to showcase an Olympic-medal-winning Chinese gymnast. Not surprisingly, the result was a mixed bag, to say the least, with Yeoh as a lovelorn villainess won over by the honest affection of a gymnast turned secret agent. After that, Michelle knew she would have to find more serious roles if she wasn’t to suffer the fate of Yukari Oshima, Moon Lee, Cynthia Khan, and even Cynthia Rothrock — namely, to toil in increasingly cheap, unimaginative, exploitation movies for the rest of her career.

  Michelle knew it could happen: after all, Yukari Oshima had been in Project S, but only as one of many unnamed villains in the pre-credit sequence. So she put her extraordinary managers Terence Chang and Chris Godsick to work, and then waited for better scripts to come her way. In 1996 she appeared in two films — only one of which was even nominally an action film. The other, The Soong Sisters, was an important, heartfelt drama that proved that Yeoh was more than a pretty face, a dancer’s body, and fast limbs. But she was also that, so her final, pre-handover Hong Kong film was especially disappointing.

  Stuntwoman: The Story of Ah Kam seemed made for Michelle. It was directed by the illustrious Ann Hui, who was known for such powerful dramas as Boat People (1983). It also featured Sammo Hung, playing an action choreographer. What could go wrong? Two things. First, the action was awful. Like so many movies about stuntpeople made by people who don’t use them much, the director seemed loathe to show the audience the way stunts are actually done — creating absurd continuous, multi-angle, multi-cut action sequences instead.

  Second, and in a more personal vein, although Yeoh had suffered many bumps and bruises along the way, Stuntwoman was the only movie up until then in which she got seriously hurt … which was all the more unfortunate since the movie’s action is so ridiculous. After a completely unnecessary shot where she jumps from a bridge, Michelle landed badly, tearing ligaments, fracturing a rib, and nearly breaking her back.

  “I felt my spine bend,” she told me. “I was afraid I had broken it in two.” It would have been terribly ironic, since she was just months away from one of the greatest coups in movie history. Only once before in action movies had an established action superstar allowed a veritable unknown to step in and share the spotlight. That was Jackie Chan in Supercop. But lightning struck again for Michelle when the only action icon in the world greater than Jackie invited her to become “Double Yeoh Seven.”

  That would be James Bond, of course, in the person of Pierce Brosnan, and the film was Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) — the eighteenth movie in the series. Reportedly, the movie was set to be called Tomorrow Never Lies, and the wife of a megalomaniacal media mogul was supposed to be sharing Bond’s bed at the fadeout. But the “Die” was cast because the filmmakers decided it sounded better and, for whatever reason, the media mogul’s wife was dead within fifteen minutes of her introduction on-screen.

  The day before Michelle was to report to the set, she was at a party in New York celebrating her films. There, the rumor spread that the 007 producers were discussing cutting her action scenes, so as to not upstage their Bond and his then Bond girl. “Why hire me if they aren’t going to use me?” she was overheard as saying. But once Michelle arrived on set that story, true or not, changed. Roger Spottiswoode, the director, and Pierce Brosnan were both charmed and impressed by their new co-star, and the producers saw a prescription for a revitalized series. If many considered 007 out of fashion, then what about a woman who could believably match him kiss for kiss, kill for kill? No one had really been convincing in that role since Honor Blackman’s Pussy Galore in Goldfinger (1964).

  Thus the set was staged for one of the greatest introductions in the annals of action films, because, just years before, this sort of thing couldn’t happen to a white Anglo-Saxon, let alone a “woman of color.” And it wasn’t just the film world that accepted Yeoh with open arms; it was Madison Avenue as well. It was Michelle’s face, alongside Brosnan’s, in the cosmetic ads. It was Michelle who was standing next to Pierce in the supermarket beer standees. It was her character who was made into an action figure along with Commander Bond.

  Rumors of an extremely difficult production were rampant, yet Michelle insisted that her fight scenes be choreographed by a kung fu pro, so they let her bring in ex-Venom Philip Kwok Choy, and even used him as a walk-on villain. If only the filmmakers had trusted him with Pierce Brosnan’s action scenes as well. But veteran stunt arranger Vic Armstrong, of Indiana Jones fame, worked on Brosnan’s battles instead. As a result, James looks old-fashioned, especially after the fine martial arts moves 007 showed in his first Bond outing, GoldenEye (1995). Sadly, the hoped-for finale in which 007 and the dully-named Wai Lin trade styles and skills, never materialized.

  Even though director Spottiswoode chose to have the villain (ably played by exceptional actor Jonathan Pryce) make fun of Yeoh’s kung fu skill without giving her a chance for an audience-satisfying response in the climatic battle, all could be forgiven (I suppose), since the crew was purportedly making up the film as they went along, and Michelle was so lovingly showcased otherwise. Then, to add monetary success to critical success, the movie was the largest grossing film in the series thus far, making more than $300 million worldwide. There was even talk of giving Michelle a parallel series to Bond, allowing a new 007-produced action movie to come out every year in a “boy, girl, boy, girl” sequence, but that was not to be (even when they tried it again years later for Halle Berry’s character, Jinx, from 2002’s Die Another Day).

  Rumors abounded that Yeoh had turned down roles in the Charlie’s Angels film series, a live action adaptation of the Danger Girl comic books, and even The Matrix movies, to concentrate on a long-term goal. Like her mentor Jackie Chan, Michelle apparently wanted full control of her creative destiny. So deciding, she instituted Mythical Films, and set to work on movies that she could run completely. It wasn’t easy. She labored for years on just the right stories. And while she labored, so did another humble, unassuming, Taiwanese filmmaker named Ang Lee.

  While Michelle was reviving her career in Supercop, he was starting his career with the thoughtful, effecting Pushing Hands (1992), about a Chinese taichi teacher who unavoidably disrupts his family by moving in with his son and daughter-in-law in New York state. Already the director was showing the depth of his artistry by melding external taichi practice with internal taichi healing, as the teacher attempts to create a balance between his son’s responsibility and daughter-in-law’s resentment. As such, the director created one of the best “pure” kung fu films ever, although there is apparently no obvious kung fu in it.

  When Michelle was starring in Wong Jing’s forgettable Holy Weapon in 1993, this Taiwanese filmmaker created his first hit, The Wedding Banquet, a comedy of manners about a gay Asian man pleasing his parents with a sham heterosexual marriage. While Michelle was Wing Chun, he continued his career with the heartwarming (and mouth watering) romantic dramedy Eat Drink Man Woman (1994). As Michelle waited for better scripts, he pressed his advantage by making a sparkling, very English, adaptation of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility (1995). And, while Michelle was cavorting with 007, this modest moviemaker stunned critics by making a powerful evocation of a lost American generation in The Ice Storm (
1997).

  Finally, after an underappreciated western (1999’s Ride with the Devil), this eclectic, extremely talented director finally decided to return to his cultural and cinematic roots by taking on both the wuxia genre, and every inaccurate American film industry preconception about what the audience will accept. Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, and now Ang Lee (no relation) had been told: one, that Americans would never accept an all-Asian cast. Two, that U.S. audiences would never accept a subtitled film. And three, that Western filmgoers would never accept a film with women as the main action heroes.

  The tragic romantic action film, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000), made lies of all these standard operating racisms, went on to make more than a hundred and twenty-five million dollars in America alone, and won four Oscars — as well as four British Academy Awards, two Golden Globes, five Hong Kong Film Awards, three Independent Spirit Awards, and many others. It was a suitable reward for a film that seemingly came out of nowhere, but was, in fact, the result of a long, arduous production that was fraught with setbacks — including the exit of its original male star, Jet Li, due to a scheduling conflict.

  Li’s loss was the film’s gain. Chow Yun-fat replaced him, and, because he was so unskilled in kung fu, Ang and his choreographer, Yuen Wo-ping, only really had time to teach him the bare necessities. That not only served to enhance the fight scenes of his female co-stars, but set him apart from them, since one sign of true kung fu masters is that they only move as much as they absolutely have to, rather than show off with elaborate displays of physical pyrotechnics. Or, as one world champion put it to me: “You ever notice that the louder they are, the less skilled they are?”

  Further complicating matters was that both Chow, and his co-star Michelle Yeoh, didn’t know the source material’s original language, Mandarin, which Ang insisted be spoken. They learned their scripts phonetically. Sets burned down and blew away. Cast and crew froze, sweated, and got lost in the desert. Each shot was an agonizing trial of multiple languages and cross-purposes. Not a frame was created with computerized digital effects. Instead, the actors were outfitted with thick cables, and hoisted from construction cranes. Like human yo-yos. they were lifted and thrown across ceilings, lakes, and trees — often to heights greater than sixty feet. Finally, Michelle got a serious injury during her first fight scene with co-star Zhang Ziyi.

  “I was doing a forward jump kick that I’ve done thousands of times,” she told USA Today, “but I had a mishap landing. My knee just gave out.”

  Ang shot around her as she went for an operation and intense rehabilitation. And when it was all over, after more than two years of intense work, they had only spent a bit more than fifteen million dollars, launched the career of the ethereal Zhang Ziyi, and created a fitting culmination to the career of a woman who had never before played the villain: Cheng Pei-pei.

  “I’m the good girl!” she laughed. “But the film was very good, very important, so I did it.”

  Very important, indeed. Not only did it introduce Western audiences to a genre the Eastern audience had come to take for granted, but did it with an artistry never before communicated. Despite the talents of King Hu, Chu Yuan, and all the others who made the genre famous, only Ang Lee made that small, seemingly obvious, connection that explained why these seemingly normal swords-people could soar across the tops of trees and even fly: their bodies were doing what their hearts could not.

  American, European, and Canadian audiences were invigorated by the soaring images that embodied the powerful passions of the exotic (yet somehow powerfully normal) swordswomen, desert bandits, perverse villains, and heartsick martial arts masters who filled the film. It was the first fully realized, universally understood kung fu “art film” — a great wuxia movie, a wonderful tragic romance, and simply a remarkable film made by an exceptionally courageous and dedicated filmmaker.

  Naturally, the American film industry rallied to make it “the exception,” rather than the norm. Hundreds of kung fu and wuxia films were bought by American distributors — the bulk of which were then shelved, with only a precious few edited, dubbed, rescored, and/or sporadically released with misleading, or flatly inaccurate promotion. Even the dean of film critics, Roger Ebert admitted that, when asked by a novice fan what they should watch next, his reply was “Seven Samurai.” With all due respect, that’s like answering a query for another great football movie with Pride of the Yankees.

  But that really didn’t matter to Michelle Yeoh. She had her production company and finally set about creating her own films. Sadly, both the misbegotten The Touch (2002) and the misconceived superhero film Silver Hawk (2004) were panned by critics and rejected by audiences. Then came the arrogantly woe-begotten American adaptation of the best-selling book Memoirs of a Geisha (2005). This supremely Japanese tale was bone-headedly handled by a condescending, blissfully tone-deaf crew who chose to cast three Chinese (Michelle, Zhang Ziyi, and Gong Li) in the leading roles, then “improved” the strictly-designed, meaningful geisha wardrobe with blinkingly ignorant Hollywood costuming changes.

  Nevertheless, Michelle slowly worked her way back into the audiences’ good graces with a series of honorable supporting roles, including Danny Boyle’s science-fiction epic Sunshine (2007), Yuen Wo-ping’s elaborate retelling of the Beggar Su story, True Legend (2009), and John Woo’s critically acclaimed romantic fantasy wuxia, Reign of Assassins (2010).

  “Each time I make a movie,” Michelle has said, “I put my heart and soul into it.” It showed.

  Picture identifications (clockwise from upper left):

  Jet Li in Fist of Legend; Jet Li in Swordsman 2; Jet Li in Fong Sai-yuk; Jet Li in Fong Sai-yuk 2; Jet Li vs. Vincent Zhao in Last Hero in China; Jet Li vs. Billy Chow in Fist of Legend.

  His name is Li Lin-jei and he was a mainland Chinese wushu champion at the age of eleven. Shortly after Bruce Lee died, Li was performing at the White House for Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger. After being all-around winner of the National Martial Arts Championships five times, Li even received a backstage bouquet for his performance from Jackie Chan. Little did either man know that, in a few years, they would be vying for the championship of the Asian action film box office.

  It all started in 1981, when Li was eighteen, and already considered a wushu superstar in his homeland. “Kung fu” was a form of self-improvement that Jet would later define on-screen as “concerted effort toward a specific goal.” Wushu is translated as “martial arts,” but is actually more along the lines of a national sport. It’s kung fu with its more powerful internal and external elements removed, making it more comfortable for government officials worried that it might be too effective for them to control — a state of affairs that had been repeated throughout Chinese history. Li, however, excelled at both kung fu and wushu.

  After the death of Mao Tse-tung, filmmakers’ freedoms were enormously extended. Greatly influenced by the work of Liu Chia-liang, the Hong Kong Cheung Yuen Film Production Company conceived The Shaolin Temple (1981), a realistic kung fu epic featuring an all-champions cast, to be filmed on actual locations. Despite having every Chinese kung fu artist at their disposal, the filmmakers only thought of Li to play the leading role of Shiu Hwu, a young revolutionary who is out for revenge against the emperor’s evil nephew.

  The inexperienced actor threw himself into the production with the same energy he had brought to his martial arts. After three years of production, and ten million dollars in expenditure, the movie exploded onto the international scene with the newly renamed Jet Li in front (although the Bruce-baiters tried to graft “Jet Lee” onto him in English-speaking territories). The film was a magnificent showcase for authentic kung fu, and is, in effect, a distillation of all the ingredients that made Hong Kong movies work for decades. In fact, it even used Shaw Brothers Studio space and Liu Chia-liang’s expertise in a four-seasons training sequence.

  Director Chang Hsin-yen was also able to utilize the country’s best equipment — resulting in a splendidly visual
film, with impressive attention to detail, sumptuous cinematography, and truly great kung fu. Although advertised as an “all-gravity” kung fu film with no special effects, there are hints of such old-school tricks as reversing the film, and maybe a wire or two. Otherwise, The Shaolin Temple tells the tale of the conflict that ended the Sui dynasty and started the T’ang with wit and imagination — through the eyes of a boy seeking vengeance for the murder of his father. The boy is rescued from his father’s killer and then taught a wide range of kung fu styles by an unusual group of monks — outsiders who are not averse to drinking wine, eating meat, and even killing when they have to. And as far as they are concerned, when it comes to Sui soldiers, they have to.

  Yu Cheng-wei, the creator and master of the real-life “Shark Fin Broadswordplay,” portrayed the villain, while mantis fist champion Yu Hai played Li’s sifu, and National All-Around Champion Hu Chien-chiang played Li’s temple “brother.” The lovely Ding Lan played the sifu’s niece and Li’s love interest, who just barely loses him to the temple when the newly crowned T’ang emperor arrives a moment too late to prevent Li from taking the monk’s “Thou Shalt Not Sex” oath. The monks celebrate as he eliminates the “Thou Shalt Not Drink” rule by royal decree, leaving the niece to tearfully sneak away.

  The movie was a greater success than anyone anticipated. It was so popular in its home country that the government had to issue a request that students not leave school in order to go searching for the Shaolin Temple. Meanwhile, Jet Li was now a movie superstar in addition to being a martial arts champion. In fact, one of the billboards greeting President Ronald Reagan when he visited China showed Jet hawking “Shaolin Wine.” Such popularity was a double-edged sword, however, especially in the topsy-turvy Chinese world where success elicited government scrutiny.