Films of Fury: The Kung Fu Movie Book

by Meyers, Ric

  “This seemed appropriate for Po … and reminded me of another of my cartoon heroes: Bugs Bunny. In the Bugs films directed by Chuck Jones, he never provoked or started a conflict. But when trouble found him, watch out. Bugs would demolish the guy. We had also read the Tao Te Ching by Lao-tzu and had found in the seventy-sixth verse the stanza ‘the hard and strong will fall, the soft and weak will overcome’ — which gave us the philosophical underpinnings to go along with our martial arts approach.”

  Not only did they have their approach, but they also included foreshadowing to the monumental moment. “Rodolphe had drawn extensive boards of Po fighting the training dummy when he first meets The Furious Five. Originally this was a much more elaborate scene with Po launching repeated assaults on the dummy and getting bounced off. That scene eventually got boiled down to just one punch from Po in the final movie. Then we also used to have a protracted scene of Tai Lung attacking Po in front of his gang of wolf bandits (before we realized Tai Lung was so tough he didn’t need a gang), and Po just kept on bouncing back like the dummy until Tai Lung was humiliated.

  “As in the dummy training scene, this got refined down to one huge blow from Tai Lung (provoked by his anger at not understanding the secret of the Dragon Scroll), and Po acting like the training dummy — returning Tai Lung’s force ten-fold. Simon Wells did the final boards for this scene. Po looks at his hands in wonder, because that is the moment when he finally believes without any doubt that he can do it. He accepts that he is the Dragon Warrior, a kung fu master and the only one able to stop Tai Lung. And that makes him happy.”

  It also made kung fu students, kung fu teachers, kung fu film fans, and moviegoers happy all over the world. Despite the fact that projections for its opening weekend topped out at about thirty million dollars, Kung Fu Panda made twice that in three days — making it DreamWorks Animation’s biggest opening for a non-sequel film. It went on to become the highest grossing animated movie of the year (and the third-highest overall, animated or live action). But in terms of this book’s subject, it also did something unprecedented: it was reported that the Chinese Government chided its own film industry for not doing something like it first. And, unlike Forbidden Kingdom or even Crouching Tiger, the film was also a big hit in China.

  It has now spawned a sequel, as well as a TV series on Nickelodeon (for which I was asked to do a second seminar – one of the unexpected rewards for which serves as my “about the author” picture on the back cover). “Kung Fu Panda was a huge labor of love for everyone who worked for more than four years to bring it to the screen,” John Stevenson concluded. “It was always hard work, but it was work we loved. It will always be a happy memory for me. I hope King Hu and Jim Henson would have liked it.”

  Picture identifications (clockwise from upper left):

  Sammo Hung vs. Donnie Yen in Ip Man 2; Wu Jing in Master of Taichi; Stephen Chow in Kung Fu Hustle; Michael Jai White in Blood and Bone; Tony Jaa in Ong Bak 2; Andy Lau and Nicholas Tse in Shaolin.

  At the end of the first decade in the 21st century, kung fu films are back to where they started. Although an animated Panda has shown Westerners the way, for the most part, kung fu films have retreated from Hollywood — which has made it clear that they not only do not understand, but don’t particularly appreciate the cinematic technique involved. One of the very few who does is Michael Jai White.

  Born in Brooklyn, New York, then raised in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he started soaking in martial arts at the age of seven. “I was taken by it from the first moment I saw a kung fu movie,” he told me. “It was Five Fingers of Death, and it scared the life out of me! I was too young to see a picture where they were tearing eyes out of people. After that there was a kung fu craze. I had a picture of Joe Louis on my wall, and I said when I grow up I want to look like that! I wanted to be powerful and have that prowess.”

  By the time he was fourteen, he had worked extensively with Eric Chen and his teacher Wu Bin, who was the coach of the prestigious Beijing wushu team — as well as sparred with Bill Wallace, among many other world champion boxers and kickboxers. Through all of them, he not only learned about the external martial aspect, but the internal, self-improvement aspect as well. “When I was a celebrated fighter, I was less of a martial artist. I didn’t want to win as much as I wanted to learn something. I respect every opportunity to better myself. It’s really about that.”

  All along, White was winning multiple contests, and teaching. His desire for learning developed as fast as his physique. “When I got a chance to start martial arts I trained incessantly. I didn’t play basketball or baseball, I practiced martial arts. Meanwhile I would take acting and filmmaking classes for fun. Started going on auditions, and landed three things at the same time. At that point I figured I had better start paying attention to this.”

  Producers and directors had certainly already started paying attention to him. After extensive experience in New York plays, White followed his agent out to Hollywood where he found parts in cheap movies (1989’s The Toxic Avenger Parts II and III, for example) and TV series before nailing the lead role of boxing champ Mike Tyson in the Tyson (1995) TV movie. That led to playing the title superhero in the live action movie version of the comic book Spawn (1997).

  To his fans and peers, he was best known as an actor, but his friends knew his consummate kung fu skills. Throughout his career, White wanted to meld both, and it would look like he would be able to do just that when Quentin Tarantino came calling with a major supporting role in Kill Bill.

  “At first I was supposed to do a much larger role in the movie,” he revealed. “There was a whole casino sequence where Bill (David Carradine) was originally going to be introduced. I was the guy running the place, and Samuel L. Jackson was going to do a cameo as the piano player. I was going to be a tuxedo-and-Hanzo-sword-wearing boss who’s partnered with the piano player’s wife. But later on, Quentin changed it. I didn’t take that personally, because we were friends before I went to work with him. Then, later, he called with the idea of a flashback to highlight David Carradine’s skill because, one, he wanted a fight scene with me, and two, the audience had never seen David’s prowess. Although it didn’t really fit even then, I still got to go to Beijing, meet Gordon Liu, and had a great time. But I wasn’t surprised when it didn’t make the final cut.”

  Happily, the edited fight scene is available for viewing on the Kill Bill Volume 2 DVD, and it inspired White to take an even greater role in shaping his own destiny. “I’ve always been a writer, so when I’m not satisfied with scripts I’m getting I write my own.” Blood and Bone (2009) was a prime example, and White’s first major showcase displaying both external brawn and internal skill. “It’s not the muscle,” he said, “it’s the technique.”

  It was also a satisfying experience, and, even before he finished making the film, he already had his next film prepared. “I finished Blood and Bone and started Black Dynamite ten days later,” he said. “I knew I had to take the reins on it because all too often people in power at the major studios can’t admit when they don’t know how to do something right. I knew how to do this movie, so I didn’t want to go the studio route.” Black Dynamite (2009), a delightful satire of the blaxploitation genre, became an international phenomenon — showing White the way to make a childhood dream come true.

  “I want to continue this way, especially for kung fu films,” he explained. “Usually the best martial artists are not self-promoters, so a lot of Hollywood martial art films are choreographed by people who really don’t know a lot of, or a lot about, martial arts. I’d love to change that. In fact, I feel like I haven’t even gotten in my stride yet. Martial arts is pervasive all over the world and is a great money maker. Great kung fu, and how it should be depicted, is not going to come from the studio system. I want to find good people, stick with them, and do great work.”

  As Michael Jai White uses his many talents to change the course of live action American kung fu films, John Woo slowly r
eclaimed his reputation by returning to China to make Red Cliff Part One (2008) and Two (2009). An epic examination of the battles that ended the Han Dynasty in 209 AD, it cost more than any Asian-financed film in history, and presented Woo with incredible obstacles and challenges — not the least of which was Chow Yun-fat exiting the lead role. He was replaced with Tony Leung (as he had been before during Bullet in the Head).

  As exciting as the sweeping saga was — with Woo filling the screen with extraordinary beauty, and deftly resting the fate of a war on a change of wind and a cup of tea — the real treat for kung fu fans was the production’s realization of several historical martial art icons. Generals Guan Yu and Zhang Fei will be familiar to anyone who’s ever visited a Chinese souvenir shop … although they might not recognize their names. Both men are the models for multiple sculptures in every medium.

  But, as realized in Red Cliff by actors Ba Sen Zha-bu and Zhang Jin-sheng, respectively, then choreographed by Corey Yuen Kwai, these seemingly mythical characters are brought to life in several show-stopping “battlefield-fu” sequences — ala Orlando Bloom’s Legolas in the Lord of the Rings movies (as you may recall, Legolas was really the only character given a virtuoso fighting scene in all three films). But, as previously stated, it was these terrific displays of kung fu prowess that were either eliminated or homogenized in the two-hour-thirty-minute U.S. version of the original three hundred and twenty-minute, two-part Chinese version. The reported reason for the editing was that these superlative kung fu displays were “unrealistic.” So, again, “standard operating ignorance” takes its place alongside “standard operating racism.”

  In any case, both the Chinese and American versions of Red Cliff were worthwhile and successful — winning awards and setting new box office records in Asia. John Woo recovered from the arduous production by helping out with Reign of Assassins (2010), his first flat-out wuxia film, co-directed by Su Chiao-pin and starring Michelle Yeoh. Premiering at the Venice Film Festival, it took another great step in reinstating Woo’s cinematic standing, garnering rave reviews for its action, humor, and filmmaking verve in every corner of the world.

  But Woo, then sixty-four years old, is just one of the old guard still fighting his way into the new century. Zhang Yimou, having illuminated kung fu and wuxia films with the magnificent Hero, mysterious House of Flying Daggers, and maddening Curse of the Golden Flower, has moved on to other genres. Yuen Wo-ping, sixty-five years old in 2010, and Liu Chia-liang, seventy-four, started collecting lifetime achievement awards. Jackie Chan, fifty-seven, loves making movies, but keeps announcing his eventual exit from doing elaborate on-screen kung fu. Same with Jet Li, forty-seven.

  So what is a genre to do? Well, there’s always China. Although the Peking Opera Schools are closed in Hong Kong, the China Sports Universities are still going strong. China’s history is all about kung fu, and, although the government stresses the sports version, wushu, that’s more than enough for filmmakers and action actors. It’s also more than enough for the Asian movie industry, which finds kung fu films far easier to get approved by the ever-vigilant Chinese Communist Party than almost anything else. So, if any actor knows kung fu, they have a great shot at longevity. Just ask Sammo Hung, Yuen Baio, Chen Kuan-tai, Lo Mang, and Fung Hak-on — all old school stars who work as much as they want to.

  But 21st century China is a double-edged sword for kung fu film hopefuls. While the old guard are back at work, the men who might have been Jackie or Jet are in a holding pattern. Clearly the biggest kung fu-star-waiting-to-happen is Jacky Wu Jing, aka Jason Wu. Another graduate of the Beijing Sport University, he was discovered by Yuen Wo-ping, who was looking for someone to help him better capture the power and beauty of taichi on screen. He looked no further than Wu Jing.

  Born in 1974 into a royal Manchurian family, his father was an assistant coach of the Beijing Wushu Team who sent his son to start training at the age of six. That’s where Wo-ping found him fifteen years later. Following The Tai Chi Master with Jet and Michelle Yeoh, Master Yuen wanted to try again with Tai Chi II (1996). It was within this film that Wu’s character took on the first name Jacky, and it stuck. Although Wu’s charm was obvious, and his kung fu technique phenomenal, the plot was even goosier than in the original.

  Even so, Yuen Wo-ping signed Wu to a three-year contract, and kept them both busy with the landmark television series New Shaolin Temple (1998), Swordsman of Flying Dagger (1999), and, most notably, Master of Taichi (1997) — which contains the finest taichi ever put on screen. Although available in a complete form on DVD, when Tai Seng Entertainment cut the series down into an American TV movie, they inexplicably changed the title to The Tai Chi Master … creating endless confusion with the Jet Li version.

  Under any name, it contains some of the finest fights in kung fu film history. Using much the same cast as Tai Chi II, there is authentic taichi throughout, as well as two taichi versus ba qua battles that remain the industry standard. The movie’s central sequence puts Wu in a Bruce Lee situation: having to fight five true martial art masters, each on a different floor of a pagoda, but Yuen takes the Game of Death conceit and turns it into a magnificent kung fu lesson in both physical and mental martial arts.

  Although the pagoda fights are the most memorable, the final fight is the most interesting and telling. Forced to face an obstinate, rage-full general (expertly played by Billy Chow), the entire confrontation is the finest “hard” versus “soft” kung fu fight ever conceived and executed — from the pre-battle stretching to the post-battle realization. All three TV series were hugely successful throughout Asia. At any other time in modern history, they would have heralded the discovery of a new kung fu star, but when Wu Jing left Yuen’s wing, the Hong Kong film industry was in deep, post-1997 takeover, post-Japanese-economic-meltdown, post Triad-mobster-infiltration funk.

  More than fifty percent of the industry was looking for work, and those working were in somewhat uninspired fare, to say the least. Wu appeared in Tsui Hark’s technologically exceptional, emotionally vacant remake of Zu Warriors, Legend of Zu (2000), but his kung fu skills were not required. He was further anointed as a kung fu star by being personally chosen to co-star in Liu Chia-liang’s farewell feature Drunken Monkey in 2002, but, although he got to strut Master Liang’s stuff, the film was not the consummate classic everyone was hoping for. Wu had little choice but to return to TV and await further developments. He made good use of his time back on the small screen, however, developing his own skills as a choreographer.

  Money began to flow again in 2004 when Wu was signed by a new talent agency. Seeing the genre turn toward more modern crime tales, Jacky was cast as an extremely dangerous villain, starting him on a string of minor thrillers — Fatal Contact, Twins Mission, Invisible Target (all 2006), and Fatal Move (2007) — all with exceptional kung fu. He even got to fight Jet Li on screen in Mummy 3: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2007). Finally, as of this writing, Jacky Wu is starring alongside Jackie Chan in Shaolin (2010), the official sequel to the 1981 Shaolin Temple film that started it all for Jet. Wu Jing is clearly the genre’s new kung fu star … now all he needs is a leading role worthy of him.

  The new century is also a time when actors who were previously minor stars get to take their place as major stars. Just ask Vincent Zhao, aka Zhao Wen-zhou aka Chiu Man-cheuk, who had to carry the stigma of being the George Lazenby to Jet Li’s Sean Connery for years before Chinese studios became beggars who couldn’t be choosers. Another graduate of the prestigious Beijing Sport University, Zhao was discovered by Corey Yuen to be the villain in Fong Sai Yuk, then got saddled with the Wong Fei-hung yoke after Tsui Hark’s declaration that Jet Li was nothing without him.

  Retreating to television roles to lick the wounds inflicted by critics, Zhao was chosen by Yuen Wo-ping to star in True Legend (2010), a new take on the Beggar Su character immortalized by Yuen’s father, Simon, in Drunken Master. Although unfocused, the disjointed tale of Su’s rise, fall, and rise, filmed partially in 3
D, was a monument to kung fu, featuring myriad fight and training sequences that only improve with repeated viewing. It also served as a showcase for MMA fighter Cung Le as a barbarian, Gordon Liu as a mad monk, Jay Chou as the “God of Wushu,” and especially Andy On Chi-kit as a truly demented, truly dangerous villain.

  Speaking of villains, there’s Fan Siu-wong. Born in 1973 Hong Kong, he was the son of popular, famed supporting actor Fan Mei-sheng, who was the man they brought in to replace Simon Yuen when he passed away during the filming of Magnificent Butcher. Sent away at the age of fourteen because he was so scrawny, the younger Fan bulked up by studying martial arts, then followed in his father’s footsteps.

  Known for his round, dark eyes, he first came to major international fame at the age of eighteen as “Terry Fan” in Story of Ricky (1991) — the Chinese live action adaptation of an absurdly violent Japanese manga called Riki-Oh. With his father playing a demented, hook-handed assistant prison warden, the Chinese Ricky uses growing powers to take on stupendously sadistic guards (including a psycho-sexual whiptress played by Yukari Oshima) until the jail staff mutates into monsters, and Ricky punches them into chopped meat and jelly.

  Terry continued working in the movie industry in such efforts as Project S: Once a Cop, but the quality of his roles lessened as the film industry struggled post-1997. Where once he did five movies a year, he was reduced to none in 1999. But all good things come to those who wait (and train), so when China started pouring money into the local film industry early in the 21st century, the actor, now known as “Louis Fan,” returned with a vengeance. He made twenty movies in the first six years of the decade and became action choreographer for Kung Fu Fighter in 2007. With the semi-retirement of Jackie and Jet, Louis has become the go-to supporting “best friend” or “villain” actor for the Chinese kung fu film. He did eight films in 2010 — including Kung Fu Chefs with Sammo Hung and Future X Cops with Andy Lau — and made an excellent impression in every one.