If you watched the Sammo Hung-choreographed Chinese film MY KINGDOM last year, you may remember a scene showing the heroes, Peking opera performers played by Wu Chun and Han Geng, being kicked out of a movie theater for cheering too loudly during an action sequence. They complain to each other that nobody appreciates good stunt work. We only see a few brief shots of the film they’re watching, but I think it was the 1929 film POOR DADDY, aka HEROIC SON and MY SON WAS A HERO. The final scenes of this silent film from the Great Wall studio of Shanghai do feature some pretty impressive stunt work. The young hero battles the bad guy in an abandoned temple on a mountain peak, forcing the villain to dangle from a plank that hangs from a window, and eventually lose his grip and fall to his death. The kid, having tried to arrest his adversary’s fall, ends up trapped on the plank, which is precariously wedged into a window frame. He manages to hang on until a crowd of villagers rescue him.
POOR DADDY was directed by Yang Xiaozhong (1899-1969), credited in the English titles as Dumas Young. Yang’s directing career began in 1925, when he made his first film, ETERNAL REGRET IN DRUNKENNESS, and continued until 1963’s SECRET OF THE MAGIC GOURD. Like the kung fu movie pioneer Ren Pengnian, Yang got his start working at the Commercial Press, the Shanghai publishing company that established a motion picture division in 1919. The Commercial Press studio produced some of Shanghai’s earliest films. Yang’s first assignment was to write the screenplay for YAN RUISHENG (1921), a thriller based on a notorious murder case. YAN RUISHENG, which was directed by Ren Pengnian, is considered China’s first feature film.
Publicity photo from THE HERO GAN FENGCHI (1928), directed by Yang Xiaozhong.
Yang continued to write, and starting in 1925, to direct films for the Commercial Press. In 1927, he went to work for the Great Wall Film Company (not the same as and seemingly unconnected to the later Hong Kong-based Great Wall Movie Enterprises Ltd). From 1927 to 1930, Yang directed eight films for Great Wall. From the titles – WU SONG’S BLOODY BATTLE AT YUANYANG LOU (1927), SINGLE ARROW REVENGE (1927), THE HERO GAN FENGCHI (1928), and HEROINE OF THE SOUTH (1930) – it can be inferred that Yang had a pronounced interest in making action and wuxia films. Unlike many of his peers in the Shanghai industry, he never migrated to Hong Kong when the Chinese government became hostile to that type of genre filmmaking. He continued working in Shanghai, specializing in folklore stories like MONKEY SUBDUES THE WHITE BONE DEMON (1960). The Chinese Mirror biography of Yang Xiaozhong suggests that at the end of his life he may have been crushed by the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, like many of those who worked in the entertainment industry.
(left) Liu Jichun as the Poor Daddy, and Zhang Zhede as his heroic son. (right) The deceitful wife and her lover.
The star of POOR DADDY is Liu Jichun, a rotund comedian (see his biography at The Chinese Mirror). The hero of the movie is Zhang Zhede, who plays the young son. I can find only two other film credits for him. Both are from 1927, and one of those, NEZHA IS BORN, was also made by the Great Wall studio. In POOR DADDY, Liu plays a widowed fisherman who has made an unfortunate remarriage. His new wife bullies him and beats his son. She also reconnects with an old lover. The lover robs a wealthy landowner and frames the fisherman for the crime. When the father is arrested and thrown in jail, the son turns detective and tracks down the real thief. Liu Jichun has a wonderfully expressive face, and it’s easy to see why he became a popular character actor. The acting otherwise tends towards stylization, and Zhang Zhede’s fight scene at the end is at least half a game of hide and seek, and is played for laughs until that final struggle on the mountain top.
Is it for real? Or is it an animation?
There is one other action sequence in POOR DADDY. It takes place during the jewel robbery, when the thief is discovered by the rich man and a struggle ensues. It’s shown in a relatively realistic fashion – no martial art here, just desperate men grappling with each other. The only odd touch, to modern eyes, is when they chase each other around a table in a synchronized manner that brings to mind a Charlie Chaplin routine. The print of POOR DADDY currently in circulation is missing a reel, but the story is intact – evidently the missing part was a flashback to the fisherman’s former happy marriage.
Watch the fight scene from POOR DADDY:
early Chinese movie history • Ren Pengnian • Yang Xiapzhong
