The Underdog Knight (2008)

Writer-director Ding Sheng makes his debut with the quirky action drama THE UNDERDOG KNIGHT, starring talented mainland Chinese actor Liu Ye (BLOOD BROTHERS) as Lao-san, a slightly brain-damaged former Navy submariner who applies fighting skills and life lessons taught by his former C.O. (Yu Rongguang) to vigilantism and fighting those he perceives as “evildoers.” While trying to maintain an awkward relationship with his would-be girlfriend, Daffodil (Liu Yang), Lao-san becomes mixed up in efforts by a gang of thieves (led by Anthony Wong) to steal a priceless spear while a police captain (You Yong) tries to track them down.

Having seen quite a few modern action films from Hong Kong in recent years both good and bad, it turns out that THE UNDERDOG KNIGHT, actually a Hong Kong-China co-production, was nothing like what I had expected it to be especially with Wong Jing producing.

For his first feature film, former TV commercial director Ding Sheng has crafted a highly polished and thoughtful film that is peppered with odd and wonderful little surprises within a partially original story that plays out with shades of FOREST GUMP and TAXI DRIVER. The film isn’t anywhere near as dark as a Martin Scorsese film and its narrative is at times too random and accidental. One problem is that the film is working with two elements that conflict with one another. One is a creative and compelling character study and the other is a worn out and abused plot device, previously used for dozens of Hong Kong action movies.

Where Ding succeeds is in focusing on Lao-san, a pure-hearted hero living in a world he doesn’t belong in. It has been a long time since I have seen a Hong Kong character in a genre movie that is authentic. Liu Ye’s acting is phenomenal which comes as no surprise given his Golden Horse winning role as a gay architectural student in LAN YU (2001). Liu is the real deal when it comes to a dedicated actor and the proof is in his performance in an impefect movie like THE UNDERDOG KNIGHT which hinges on his ability to make the viewer care about an emotionally withdrawn and mentally disabled martial arts hero. The character is so endearing that I would personally love to see a sequel or series of adventures with him. There have been numerous attempts in Chinese martial arts cinema to capture the magic of Shintaro Katsu’s lovable and dysfunctional hero Zatoichi and yet perhaps by accident Ding Sheng has stumbled upon the perfect Chinese variant.

Ding seems to have a very strong sense of who Liu Ye’s character is and this keeps the first half of the movie grounded and entertaining despite frequent jumps between multiple characters and seemingly disparate plots that eventually crash into each other in the second half of the movie. On the surface, Lao-san is a thick-headed street brawler whose over-simplified view of the world, coupled with the compulsion to right wrongs and defend a country he no longer serves drives him to assault deadbeat fathers, bullies, muggers, and other social misfits. He mentors a child who models his behavior and provides some of the film’s lighter moments which offsets the less interesting and underdeveloped relational problems he suffers with his girlfriend. There is a mild streak of nationalism in Lao-san’s blind patriotism to China. In one scene, he sings along with the national anthem on TV while saluting. I do not find this offensive because his broken mind processes everything in black and white.

Liu Ye in THE UNDERDOG KNIGHT (2008).

Looking a little deeper, Lao-san could be viewed as a modern-day wuxia hero, which may be why the English title refers to him as an “underdog knight.” Sword heroes of ancient China could be likened to knights of honor and virtue who roamed the land protecting the innocent and ridding the world of evil. Although a self-styled hero, Lao-san is no Don Quixote chasing windmills. He’s a highly skilled fighter who has become addicted to battling bad guys wherever he finds them after his initial encounter with a pair of burly butchers. In every case, he is more than a match for his opponent so long as they aren’t pointing a gun at him.

Although a skilled open-hand fighter, Lao-san’s weapon of choice is a spear. A common theme in wuxia stories is that competing warriors vie for control of a super weapon. In the film there is an ancient spear that thieves are trying to get yet it predictably ends up in the hands of Lao-san who eventually wields it during a standoff involving the thieves and the police.

The film leans towards lightly comic drama with excellent performances from all of the leads but it still possesses a fair amount of fine fight choreography served by first-time action director Hua Cao. Hua previously worked under Ching Siu-tung as a stuntman in HERO and HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS. He can also be briefly seen onscreen as the “Evil Team” goalie in Stephen Chow’s SHAOLIN SOCCER.

The film’s style of fighting is very interesting. It mixes early 1970s yakuza screen brawling with action accents from ONG BAK and DAY WATCH. The camera and post-production editing are tightly tuned to movements that are intentionally made to look both theatrical and rugged. The camera bounces and rolls with some movements and film speeds are altered to accentuate various throws and general fighting highlights. Old school martial arts movie fans will likely find the large number of cuts and reaction shots too invasive to fully enjoy the fight work but it’s very well done stylistically, unlike a lot of recent Hollywood screen fighting. The exchanges look realistic enough and many of the moves, as much as we can see them through the editing, appear effective in a real-world context. This is as it should be given that the main character is military trained.

Liu Ye gives a solid screen fighting performance but he probably won’t become a kung fu star after appearing in this movie, much like Chiwetel Ejiofor, who dropped his mixed martial arts training after starring in REDBELT. What I see in Liu is an actor’s instinct to successfully adapt to whatever challenge he sets for himself and I’m happy to see him return to even more dramatically challenging material, specifically with NANKING! NANKING! (2009). However, there is a place and a need for serious dramatic actors who can and will fight, especially if the genre is going to continue to grow. Just as important are filmmakers who can bring fresh ideas to the genre and I feel strongly that Ding Sheng has a lot of potential to help revitalize Hong Kong action cinema based on his skillful, albeit limited treatment of martial arts and gunplay in this film.

There is a terribly good movie contained in the story that forms THE UNDERDOG KNIGHT that doesn’t surface entirely although it’s still well worth watching. What starts out as a fascinating and unpredictable focus on a likable protagonist gradually disintegrates into more conventional and forgettable territory. It seems like someone, very likely a certain Wong Jing, decided that the movie had to end as a typical Hong Kong action movie no matter how atypical the rest of the movie might be. Ding tries to salvage it with an artful finish but it isn’t enough. The film works better on a smaller scale where Ding displays a penchant for detail and creativity in little things like a frenzied kid spraying one of Lao-san’s fallen victims with a squirt gun or in a brilliant reveal in a scene where Lao-san meets a man even more mentally disturbed than he is. Even with a disappointing finish, this is still a vast improvement over the status quo. It signals that in Ding Sheng, China has a fresh talent, full of surprises. My expectations for his next film, JUNIOR SOLDIERS starring Jackie Chan, have risen. I’m also going to keep an eye on Liu Ye, who is one of China’s brightest acting talents at the moment and poised for international stardom if NANKING! NANKING!, an account of the 1937 Nanking Massacre, delivers the dramatic muscle that it promises to do.

Related Topics: Anthony Wong, Ding Sheng, Liu Ye, The Underdog Knight (2008), Wong Jing