Cinema Hong Kong: Kung Fu (2003)

CINEMA HONG KONG: KUNG FU is an hour-long, made-for-television documentary on the history of the kung fu movie that was co-produced by Celestial Pictures and Discovery Channel International. It was originally broadcast in select Pan-Asian countries. It is part of a series launched by Celestial, the company responsible for the restoration and distribution of approximately 800 films originally produced by Shaw Brothers. Other documentaries in the series include CINEMA HONG KONG: SWORDPLAY and CINEMA HONG KONG: BEAUTIES OF THE SHAW STUDIOS. KUNG FU was later reedited for American audiences as CHOP SOCKY: CINEMA HONG KONG, which aired on IFC. This review is of the original Hong Kong version.

This documentary is short but professionally produced, well-written and researched, and informative. It provides a thorough overview of the kung fu movie genre from the 1950s HUANG FEIHONG serialized movies through to the Hollywood actioner X-MEN featuring choreography by Hong Kong action director Corey Yuen Kwai. It’s narrated by Jim Nicholson in English, while most of the interviews and all of the film footage are in Cantonese or Mandarin with English subtitles.

It begins with an introduction to kung fu and the film genre and its history dating back to the long-running series of HUANG FEIHONG films beginning with the STORY OF HUANG FEIHONG in 1949, all starring Kwan Tak-hing. Kwan’s son is interviewed, as is series co-star Sek Kin, the actor who played the lead villain in most of the films, yet is best known today as the notorious lead villain in Bruce Lee’s ENTER THE DRAGON. Archival footage from the series is shown and a brief history of the real Wong Fei-hung is discussed.

Lau Kar-leung rightly dominates the next portion as the leading force in the next wave of kung fu to emerge in 1970. His real influence on the genre is equal to and arguably greater than Bruce Lee’s and the documentary gives this Master martial artist, choreographer, director, and actor proper credit. Several of Lau’s films including CHALLENGE OF THE MASTERS and THE EIGHT DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER are examined in detail as leading examples of the genre. Lau’s top female pupil and star Kara Hui is interviewed, as is Lau himself while on the set of his last traditional-style kung fu movie, DRUNKEN MONKEY.

The kung fu movie technique of “editing in the camera” is explained. This is an editing style unique to the Hong Kong film industry that emerged when the demand for kung fu movies necessitated speedy production techniques to get through films as quickly as possible. It basically boils down to standard long, mid-range and close-up shots being filmed in one continuous series of takes filmed in sequence, rather than the more time-consuming process of shooting an entire sequence three separate times. This way, the actor ideally only performs their movements once and then moves on to the next sequence, while in some cases the film editing would be done on the fly. Lau Kar-leung pupil and star Gordon Liu actively demonstrates this technique for the camera.

The evolution of the kung fu movie during the ’70s is explored, in the shift from realistic kung fu styles to inventions of the action directors like Lau Kar-leung’s infamous “scaffolding kung fu” in RETURN TO THE 36TH CHAMBER. Former action director and Wing Chun Master Leung Ting discusses inventing styles based on poisonous creatures for THE FIVE VENOMS. The Bruce Lee phenomenon is briefly covered with comments from Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Sammo Hung, and others.

The documentary does a great job of vividly showing how Bruce Lee directly influenced the industry and the style of screen fighting, particularly at Shaw Brothers. This leads to the counter-emergence of the comedy cycle beginning with Lau’s SPIRITUAL BOXER and reaching its full stride with DRUNKEN MASTER. Jackie Chan gets his due and Sammo is featured, while details of their opera background are explored.

Alexander Fu Sheng gets mentioned at this point as Shaw Brothers’ leading kung star who died in his prime. From here the documentary winds down pretty fast with a brief summary and mention of the influence Hong Kong action filmmakers are having on Hollywood. X-MEN is the only active example with footage.

There is plenty that CINEMA HONG KONG: KUNG FU doesn’t cover, including the independent film scene, the late ’70s boom of classics (apart from Lau Kar-leung’s work), the horror sub-genre, chambara influences, international perspectives, or much of anything from roughly 1980 to 2000 such as the death of old school or the rise of wirework. But with less than 50 minutes to work with, that would have been impossible. As a Discovery Channel documentary meant for a wide audience, it’s understandable that the time would be kept short and the subject matter easily digestible for general viewers less unfamiliar with the genre. As an hour-long introduction to the genre, particularly from a Shaw Brothers-intensive angle, the documentary serves its purpose well. By getting interviews from some of the top players and showing a good cross section of film and rare archival footage from 60 years of filmmaking, this is a valuable and entertaining documentary for novices and aficionados alike to enjoy.

This documentary has been made available in several forms. It was released in Hong Kong on DVD by Deltamac, attached to several remastered Shaw Brothers movies released in Australia by Siren Visual Entertainment and released on DVD in the U.S. by IFC under the CHOP SOCKY title.