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PRIDE'S DEADLY FURY
Thursday, Sep 4, 2008 10:11PM / Members only
Because of the repeated inquiries by the countless fans (just kiddin') of my dreaded outpourings on Chinese Mainland Wushu Cine of the 80s (yes, JRS... this one goes out to you
), I'm hereby posting Part IV of the series. You asked for it...Wu Lin Zhi
武林志
This movie was actually the first official (and therefore still somewhat timid) co-production between the People’s Republic of China and the British crown colony Hong Kong. It was produced in 1982 by the Beijing Film Studio and released a year later by the Hong Kong distribution company Naam Fong 南方.
The film was selected as the Motion Picture of the Year by the Chinese Ministry of Culture, translated into 5 languages and released in the U. S. as The Honor of Dongfang Xu.
All the previous Wushu movies shot in the Chinese mainland from the late 70s on, including the first two films featuring Jet Li, had been exclusive Mainland ventures. But the huge success of The Shaolin Temple 少林寺 got Hong Kong investors interested, and so a number of commercially promising collaborations were bound to follow.
Truth be told, Deadly Fury 武林志 is not one of my personal favorites, although the movie holds several indisputable assets.
Above all, long-standing Beijing Wushu Team 北京武术队 coach Li Junfeng 李俊峰 in the title role & his real-life student from this very team, the fabulous Ge Chunyan 戈春艷, as the leading lady.
Li Junfeng Ge Chunyan
But the film smarts from so many weaknesses and lapses of taste that I can’t in good conscience rank it at the top of my list of Mainland Wushu movie highlights.
On the plus side: extensive martial arts training sequences & Wushu demonstrations by Li Junfeng & Ge Chunyan, with the latter unfortunately wasted throughout the entire movie... yes, we certainly would have loved to see more from this remarkable Wushu Amazon
. At least, we get to admire her famous long-tassel swordplay 长穗剑 (she used to be a gold medalist in this particular event). Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5XBr_xzh6w
Other than that, Deadly Fury boasts some of the finest and most explicit Bagua Zhang 八卦掌 performances ever captured on film.The action set pieces are pretty much real and – again - executed by genuine martial arts athletes rather than popular movie stars. The trio of action directors abandoned special effects most of the time and kept much of the combat action halfway believable (apart from an unnecessary fast-rewind shot, when Li Junfeng leaps “up” a five-feet-tall Plum Blossom Stake).
Another fly in the ointment, the obviously Chinese actors posing as Russian boxers... with the obligatory blazing red wigs and bushy mustaches
. Doubtless, this is due to a lack of foreign actors available to the People’s Republic at the time (in addition to an overall low production value) and it gives the movie an annoying B-grade feel. 
Nastrovia!
Sadly, in spite of the first-rate martial arts performers and their realistic approach, the fight choreography comes across a little lame on occasion. And as with many other Chinese martial arts flicks, the actors’ cringe-making heroics in Deadly Fury are pretty hard to endure, to boot (by the way, Li Junfeng was awarded a Chinese National Award for “Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role”!).
Yup, it’s all black-and-white with a good helpin’ of nationalistic propaganda... pride and honor and patriotic dignity and all the stuff that makes people beat the shit out of each other... covered in a watery sauce of pseudo philosophy. But what the hell... I’ve seen worse.
At the end of the day, chopsockies are a bit like porn... we just don’t watch ‘em for the story, do we (of course, I NEVER watch 'em... porn, I mean...
)? On the other hand, I’m pretty sure that even if the average movie-goer may not NEED a decent plot, not many viewers would actually MIND one, at least every once in a while (with chopsockies, not so much with porn). But I digress.Another drawback: it’s next to impossible to get a good DVD version of the movie. You’ll either find it badly dubbed or in Chinese without subtitles, meaning that if you’re not fluent in Mandarin you’re likely to miss a lot of the nuances of the dialogue (or so I’m told).
The plot:
China 1916. Martial arts master Dong Fangxu (Li Junfeng) and his family roam around the country, trying to scrape a living by doing Wushu demonstrations in market places and village squares. This stirs the wrath of local hero He Dahai (Li Deyu 李德玉). But alas, before they can settle their differences, He Dahai is lured into taking on “Russian Hercules” Datlov (Ai Haiti 艾海提) in a no-holds-barred boxing match in Tianjin. Quiet Dong Fangxu is so peace-loving that he rather breaks his own arm than engaging in senseless violence, but the bloodthirsty & foul-playing barbarians eventually manage to make him lose his Taoist temper. As usual, the Chinese use their superior kungfu fighting skills against the brute force of the grunting & eye-rolling foreign devils. Hurrah!!!
Good vs. Evil
Gloss:
Wu Lin Zhi is particularly (or should I say only?) interesting because of its cast. Apart from Li Junfeng & Ge Chunyan, the first generation veteran Beijing opera star and celebrated actor of warrior roles 武生 Zhang Yunxi 張雲溪 plays the hoary but agile Taoist hermit “Magic Palm” Li.
Zhang Yunxi as "Magic Palm"
Li Junfeng, born in 1938 in Hebei province, is something like a living legend in Wushu circles. Along with Wu Bin 吴彬, he was one of the head coaches of the original Beijing Wushu Team. The list of his achievements & awards is endless, but it should be noted that other than being a chief coach of the Beijing Wushu Team for 14 years, he’s been also a professor at the Institute of Chinese Qigong, Chief Coach of the Philippines National Wushu Team, Commissioner of the China Wushu Association (CWA), and author of many books & publications on the subject of Chinese martial arts.
He has appeared in three additional films, was a film action choreographer and hosted the television series “Learning Wushu”.
In 2002 he moved to the U.S., accepting a position as a Qigong 气功 instructor at the Academy of Oriental Medicine in Austin, Texas.
His daughter Li Jing 李静 – the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree - became a successful member of the Beijing Wushu Team and Taiji 太極拳 National Champion of China (not to be confused with the actress Li Jing, who also used to be a member of the Beijing team & who is a well-known Official Artist here on AnD... complicated stuff!
). Ge Chunyan was among the first batch of the professional Wushu athletes that formed the original Beijing Wushu Team in 1978 & one of the top female Wushu competitors of the 80s. She has won gold medals for Bagua Zhang 八卦掌 , Chen Style Taiji 陳式太極拳, Long Tassle Sword 长穗剑, 3-men weapon set sparring routine 队练, and the Individual All Round Competition. She subsequently became the women’s team captain and eventually the head coach of the entire team. In 1985 she starred in another movie, Kung Fu Hero Wang Wu 大刀王五.
Since 2004 she’s been living & teaching in Singapore, where she set up her own “Ba Fang Wushu Training Center”. She is married and has 2 kids.The stunt crew for Wu Lin Zhi was exclusively put together from the near-complete professional Wushu teams of Beijing & Hebei.
Other titles for Wu Lin Zhi:
Deadly Fury
Pride’s Deadly Fury (HK)
The Honor of Dongfang Xu (US)
Le Champion de Tianjin (France)
Duell mit harten Faeusten (Germany)Director: Zhang Huaxun 張華勛
Action Director: Zhang Wenguang 張文廣, Men Huifeng 門惠豐, An Tianrong 安天榮
Producer: Feng Zengdu 封增杜, Yu Xueshu 于學書
Film Company: Beijing Film Studio 北京电影制片厂
Starring: Li Junfeng (as Dong Fangxu), Li Deyu (as He Dahai), Zhang Yunxi (as “Magic Palm” Li), Ge Chunyan (as Gao Lianzhi), Ai Haiti (as Datlov)
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IT'S A WRAP!
Friday, Jul 18, 2008 5:55PM / Members only
Been back on the set of LASKO this week. Didn't have much to do, really... since we'd shot all my fight scenes already, I just went there to be in one single shot (which got canceled, in the end)... so, I took a few random pics of the location & the crew, instead. You gotta do SOMETHING!
And just in case you're wondering, it's a famous mountain area in East Germany (Saxony, to be precise)... quite popular with rock-climbing freaks & Japanese tourists, hehe!
Is that a view or is that a view? Great, if you're into castles and stuff... not so great, if you're afraid of heights...
The make-up girls at work, touching up leading man Mathis & adjusting Serbian gang leader Lupo's numerous scars.
Stunt double Swen & stunt coordinator Ramazan cooking up a fight choreography
I think this was my last shooting day with this project... not quite sure, though... all I know is that they've apparently wrapped the episode I had that small role in.
Yet, this is an ongoing project and I might get some more stunt work on it later on.
We'll see.
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THE UNDAUNTED WUDANG
Saturday, Jul 12, 2008 11:01PM / Members only
Yes, yes, I know... long time no review
. Been crazy busy with other stuff, and I plead guilty of neglecting my ambitious endeavor of regularly paying homage to the best of the best of the 80's Mainland China Wushu flicks. But somehow I've finally managed to come up with Part III of this review collection & I hope that you guys who used to check out my blog particularly for this little column will enjoy the new sequel all the more...Wudang
武当
This is actually it. The movie that started it all. I had never even heard of Li Lianjie 李連杰 and The Shaolin Temple 少林寺, when Wudang was first aired on German TV in January 1985.
None of the actors’ names rang a bell, but the TV guide said something about “... real-life Chinese martial arts champions...” and for the first time in my life I heard the term Wushu.
The lead roles were played by 2 Mainland Chinese Wushu hotshots of the time: Lin Quan 林泉 (member of the Guangdong Wushu Team 广东武术队) and Zhao Changjun 赵长军 (from Sha’anxi Wushu Team 陕西武术队 & Li Lianjie’s follow-up as National Wushu All-round Champion of China).
The movie was released in 1983 by the Changchun Film Studios and – produced in the Mainland, 2 years after the box-office hit The Shaolin Temple – wasn’t too well received with Hong Kong audiences. A local reviewer called it a “...mainland mediocre film...” and criticized the director for not knowing how to shoot fight scenes and the extras for doing what they want.
Well, I’m not sure about the extras. When I watched this film, I was apparently too enamored by the unknowably shot action scenes to pay much attention to what the extras were doing.
Lin Quan... Chinese babe in the woods
As to the fight scenes, they had such a lasting effect on me - and many other martial artists that I know of - that we keep discussing certain scenes in this movie even now. Granted, the way of shooting these Wushu virtuosos at work was completely different from what had been coming out of the Hong Kong Shaw Brothers Studios for decades. No wire-fu... no excessive mini tramp work... no speeding up of the fighting movements, making the actors look like Looney Tunes characters on amphetamines...
Au contraire, the martial arts performances of the actors in this picture are nothing short of superb and therefore repeatedly & deliberately shown in gorgeous slow motion... for all to see... no cheating involved. Unforgettable the image of Lin Quan biting her braid before she sets about kicking ass (even the merciless Hong Kong reviewer couldn’t help praising her “wild beauty”). The 2 shots when she does an aerial & a butterfly twist in slow-mo, landing each movement effortlessly in the splits, made me fall in love on the spot... firstly, with the sport and secondly, with the actress... (or was it the other way round?).
And then young Zhao Changjun! Bare-chested & ripped to shreds, whirling his way through some wicked Ditangquan (ground tumbling boxing) 地趟拳 & Gunshu (cudgel play) 棍术 training sequences... or propelling a hapless attacker through a wooden window screen with a simply breath-taking flying lotus kick.
Ma Zhenbang 马振帮, a highly-respected Xingyiquan 形意拳 grandmaster & one of the original coaches of the Sha’anxi Wushu Team, is perfectly cast as the silver-bearded Taoist abbot at the Wudang Temple and showcases some of the finest Internal Style performances ever featured in one film: Xingyi 形意 , Baguazhang 八卦掌, Taiji sword 太极剑, and some authentic Chen-style Taijiquan 陳式太極拳.
Lin Quan taking a Taoist philosophy class from abbot Ma Zhenbang
The actual fight scenes are not fragmented by fast-paced and often distracting Hong Kong style editing... in some of the choreographies involving several fighters and elaborate, tight-knit combat moves, the director chose to simply shoot the whole thing in one long take, using only one camera angle at times. This is apparently mistaken for a lack of finesse by some reviewers, but it is in fact the smartest thing to do, because it makes the actors’ unbelievable skills look even more real & impressive. It’s like saying: “Hey, look at this! I’m not doing anything here. Just watch what these guys can do.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcjkTJ6A2Z0
The camera work is beautiful in its simplicity. The images of the autumnal Wudang mountains and the original Taoist monastery are awesome and have nothing of the artificial, gaudy post-card feel that some of the sound stage scenes in The Shaolin Temple suffer from.
Having said this, The Undaunted Wudang is far from perfect. Zhao Changjun – pretty much like Steven Seagal - seems only capable of one single facial expression. The plot is hardly brimming over with originality and has low budget written all over it. And yes, there’s that worn-out anti-Japanese theme we’ve seen so many times before, yet scrīptwriters & audiences never seem to get tired of.
But other than that, this is a charming little film, with outstanding Wushu, memorable cinematography and an endearing acting debut by Lin Quan.
It may be interesting to know that the English dubbing on the U.S. release is done by Chinese people, which makes the result much more natural.
Highly recommended.
The plot:
The story is simple & quickly explained: At the end of the 19th century, Japanese martial arts fighters - in order to prove their superiority - challenge Chinese Gongfu masters in an open tournament. But the Japanese use dirty & lethal tricks to win the contest, and reputed Master Chen of the famous Wu School is brutally killed by unfair means. His daughter Chen Xuejiao (played by Lin Quan) swears bloody vengeance and travels to the legendary Wudang mountains to improve her combat technique with the help of the Taoist Head Priest of Nanshan Ma Zhenbang... sounds familiar? You don’t say!!!
She gets two-fisted support from freedom fighter Sima Jian (Zhao Changjun), who – in a classic cornball ending - heroically gives his life for the worthy cause. Sniff.Gloss:
The star of the movie, Lin Quan (Lam Chuen in Cantonese), only made one more appearance in a mainland production, the relatively unknown and rather quaint Heroine in a Melon Shed 瓜棚女傑 (1985). She kind of faded into oblivion, until in 2004 I couldn’t believe my eyes when I met her in Zhuhai, on the set of the Hong Kong action cheapie The King of Wrestlers 搏击之霸. Like a timid third-grader I asked her: “Are you the actress from The Undaunted Wudang?” She was evidently touched by this stammering gweilo who remembered her brief spell as a big-screen actress from about 20 years ago. And I was absolutely thrilled to meet the athlete in person that had initiated & inspired my early Wushu career (she speaks excellent English, by the way).
I still use some of the sword techniques she shows in the movie in my own swordplay repertoire. No kiddin’.
Lin Quan has lived in Hong Kong for many years now. She is a happy wife and mother and rarely steps back into the limelight. She teaches Wushu classes for kids at the "Wushu & Arts Centre" in Kowloon, but with increasing regularity she whips top-billing stars like Michelle Yeoh 楊紫瓊 into shape for their action roles.
The evil samurai unsheathing his katana
Quiet & supermodest Zhao Changjun (alias Chiu Cheung-Gwan) went back to competitive pro Wushu for a number of years, defending his title as Chinese National Wushu All-round Champion (he won a total of 54 gold medals in the course of his athletic career). In the late 80s he was eventually succeeded by the young Wushu phenomenon from neighboring Shanxi 山西, the Chinese tornado Yuan Wenqing 原文庆. That was the end of an era.
Zhao Changjun, a member of the Hui muslim minority, has since appeared in a number of martial arts flicks (e.g. Sammo Hung’s 洪金寶 Blade of Fury 一刀傾城, where he is also credited as the action director), but because of his deadpan and his somewhat plain looks he has never really made it as a leading man in the flickers.
Over the years, he has trained many Wushu celebs & movie actors like Donnie Yen 甄子丹 at the Sha’anxi Athletic Technical Institute; and in 1991 he founded his own Zhao Changjun Wushu Institute 赵长军武术学院 in his birth place Xi’an 西安, home of the world-famous Terracotta Warriors.
He is a polite, busy & dogged ambassador for Chinese martial arts, teaching seminars and giving guest performances all over the world. Alongside Li Lianjie and Yuan Wenqing, he will have a special place in the Wushu Hall of Fame forever.Other titles for Wudang:
The Undaunted Wudang
Wu TangDirector: Sun Sha 孫沙
Action Director: Ma Zhenbang, Han Mingnan 韓明男
Producer: Mao Yinghai 毛英海
Film Company: Changchun Film Studio 長春電影製片廠
Starring: Lin Quan (as Chen Xuejiao), Zhao Changjun (as Sima Jian), Li Yuwen 李宇文 (as Wu Yunlong), Ma Zhenbang (as the Head Priest of Nanshan), Tang Yali 唐亞麗 (as Wu Jingjing)
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STUNTMAN-ON-STAND-BY BLUES
Monday, Jul 7, 2008 6:54PM / Members only
Nothing much happening at the moment... kind of running idle... in between shoots... still ailing from a torn adductor tendon... oh gee, sounds just like the ol' Stuntman-On-Stand-By Blues...
Yesterday, a bunch of guys from our wushu posse went to do a little Sunday exercise in our much frequented local gymnastics hall. We usually go there to practise our tumbling & acro & stuff.
I couldn't do a lot because of my injury, but just to kill time I whipped myself through a few basic flips until the pain got a little too much (oh Christ, what a wimp)!
Seems that I'll be limited to pompin' arn for a while.
Stunt buddy Thommy is still working on his self-inflicted stuntwork task schedule (check out his page on AnD). So, I tried to make myself useful, struttin' (or limpin', rather) around the hall and giving advice to everyone who didn't ask for it.
Later that afternoon we were joined by Li Yanlong, my honorable wushu teacher, friend & business partner... so I summoned everyone for YET ANOTHER thrilling group photo. From left to right: Gramps Joost (our old gymnastics coach), Thommy, his galpal Nina, my humble self, Master Li, and Mathieu (check out that six pack, girls!).
I'll be back on the set in about a week's time, so I reckon dopamine will be flowing freely again soon... HOORAY!!!
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THE UNKNOWN STUNTMAN
Monday, Jun 23, 2008 7:31PM / Members only
I just happened across this little gem. I'd been looking for the lyrics of this song for quite some time now. It's the theme song of an American TV series of the early 80s, "The Fall Guy", starring Lee Majors, Heather Thomas and... another guy. This show was about a movie stuntman who also worked as a bounty hunter to supplement his income
! Great stuff. Buckle up.Well, I'm not the kind to kiss and tell, But I've been seen with Farrah.
I'm never seen with anything less than a nine, so fine.
I've been on fire with Sally Field,
Gone fast with a girl named Bo,
But somehow they just don't end up as mine.
It's a death defyin' life I lead,
I take my chances.
I die for a livin' in the movies and TV.
But the hardest thing I ever do
Is watch my leadin' ladies
Kiss some other guy while I'm bandagin' my knee.
I might fall from a tall building,
I might roll a brand new car.
'Cause I'm the unknown stuntman that made Redford such a star.
I never spend much time in school
But I taught ladies plenty.
It's true I hire my body out for pay, Hey Hey.
I've gotten burned over Cheryl Tiegs,
Blown up for Raquel Welch.
But when I end up in the hay it's only hay, Hey Hey.
I might jump an open drawbridge,
Or Tarzan from a vine.
'Cause I'm the unknown stuntman that makes Eastwood look so fine.
("The Unknown Stuntman" by Glen A Larson, Gail Jensen, and David Sommerville)
Video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPT3rnzXT4A
Hilarious!!! COLT SEAVERS RULES!!!
Stats
- My athletic background as a stunt actor is firmly rooted in the sport of Chinese Wushu (Old School, as it's now called). I used to be a member of the German National Wushu Team for many years and I wo...
- Occupation: Actor , Martial arts , Stuntman
- Gender: Male
- Total visits: 11,659
