Fong Sai Yuk (1993)

AKA: The Legend of Fong Sai Yuk, The Legend

Literally: Fong Sai Yuk

Director: Corey Yuen Kuai

Producer: Lee Yeung Hung

Writer: John Chan Kin-Chung, Kay On, Choi Hong Wing

Cast: Jet Li, Josephine Siao, Michelle Reis, Sibelle Hu, Chan Chung-Yung, Paul Chu Kong

Running Time: 100 min.

Plot: See reviews below.

NUMSKULL'S REVIEW: Ah, the days when duels to the death (or at least to the severe bruising) were fought in public at the drop of a hat and ripe, buxom young women were offered as prizes to the most skilled combatants. Fling all the synonyms for "barbaric" you want, but at least they made for some cool martial arts movies.

Corey Yuen Kwai ventures into the love-it-or-hate-it realm of wire fu without penetrating too deep; the characters in this movie don't BREAK the laws of physics, they just bend them...well, okay, they make pretzels out of them, actually, but they don't have any other ridiculous super powers, so it's fine with me.

After a surprisingly gory scene where a guy gets his forearm snapped right off and another one's face gets torn off of his skull (brings new meaning to the Chinese term "giving face", does it not?), we are introduced to the roguish Fong Sai Yuk...definitely one of Jet Li's more likable heroes...and his future sweetie Ting Ting (Michelle Reis). Fong is something of a mama's boy, but that's okay, because his mom (Josephine Siao) is something of a rogue herself (think Anita Mui from Drunken Master 2) and loves a good fight as much as her son does. And good fights there are; few in number but big on fun. Early on, Fong and Ting Ting's mother duke it out while keeping their feet off the ground at all times, using a structure dedicated to the competition and the heads of spectators for support. This is followed by a (believe it or not) less plausible scene in which Fong's mom poses as his brother. Always with the cross-dressing in these movies...cripes...

The first serious (as in, hostile) fight scene of note takes place about an hour into the film, but it's not some unbearably silly clown fu flick in the Fearless Hyena vein, and the in-between parts are at least watchable, even when they're not that funny. The climax is a good one, with Fong shooting a whole bunch of arrows at a whole bunch of guys. His aim for multiple targets all at once is, of course, impeccable.

Dimension has released this film in typically banal Dimension fashion as "The Legend". The Universe DVD is the only way to go; it has a good transfer and above average HK subtitles (and, if you like to keep an eye out for double meanings resulting from translingual imperfections, the line "The meat you love is coming!" is priceless).

NUMSKULL'S RATING: 7/10

TYLER'S REVIEW: Definitely a charming film with enough action and melodramatics to keep you watching. The martial arts choreography is great, and the appearance of one of my favorite stars Zhou Wen Zhou is welcomed. Even though he plays a villain does not deteriorate from the fact that Zhou Wen Zhou is the coolest and darkest Wushu players in China. While Jet Li is earnest and hard-working demeanor is the exact opposite to Zhou. There is also a lot of Jackie Chan style comedy with peticuler funny gag when Jet Li leaves the jail. The fight scenes are great, but the heavy use of wires knocks me, I only like a lot of wire use in Fantasy films. For anyone who loves Jet Li this film is for you. You can't go wrong with this film.

TYLER'S RATING: 9/10

MASSACURE'S REVIEW: This is a great movie, it has to be the funniest hong kong flick i have ever seen, well it was to me, i find jackie chan movies a lil corny, and so are most HK movies, i end up laughing at things that arent intended in being jokes, Sai Yuk (jet li) and his mom are hilarious, has alot of action, and a decent story, this movie gets alot of replay in my dvd player, i would recomend it to anyone.

MASSACURE'S RATING: 8.75/10

PERKELE'S REVIEW: This is the first 1990's martial arts flick I've seen and one of the very few HK martial arts movies ever to get a theatrical release here in Finland. First time I saw it, I loved it. When I watched it the second time, I still loved it. The same thing happened also with the third time! Now I'm too afraid to watch it again, because I hate the sequel so much and maybe I'll begin to hate this one too. So now I'm writing this film as I remember it [it wasn't actually long time since, probably some year agoÉ].

I consider this to one of the best kung fu movies of the 20th century [others being "Wing Chun", "The Fist of Legend" and a couple other filmsÉ], but because 90's kung fu movies suck, that isn't a major statement. This film has a magical "feel" in it; the sets presented are nice-looking and colourful. Jet Li gives one of the best performances of his life, but is still overshadowed by Josephine Siao, who has a great comedic role as Fong Sai Yuk's kung fu -fighting mother. The other characters do suffice as well, Tiger Lu is funny enough and the role of the main villain is given to Zhao Wen-Zhou, who would later replace Jet Li as Wong Fei Hung in the movie "Once Upon A Time In China IV". The plot is really bizarre and complex, but a lot of fun. The only bigger minus comes from them stupid mistake-sequences, where everyone thinks Fong Sai Yuk's mother is a man and Michelle Reis is her own mother (who falls in love with Yuk's mother who she think is a man). Are the Chinese really this easy to cheat? Fucking idiots. Fights are intense and funny. Yes, they use wires but this time IT LOOKS GOOD. There's only a few ridiculous tricks but most of them are just plain fun [like Fong Sai Yuk shooting 10 arrows with the same bow at the same time and all of them hit - different targets].  The final battle is awesome [except that part where Jet Li rides a horse and swings two swords] and they tried to copy that [bad people trying to hang some Fong Sai Yuk's relative] in the finale of "Fong Sai Yuk II", which is a very bad film. This is not. Highly recommended.

PERKELE'S RATING: 8.5/10