The Story of Drunken Master: Yuen Siu-tin

If you were following my recent series on the earliest Chinese martial arts movies, you know the name Yuen Siu-tin (Yuan Xiaotian, Simon Yuen) came up several times as one of the first martial artists to specialize in film choreography. His son Yuen Wo-ping is a giant of contemporary action cinema. The senior Yuen became a bona fide star with the release of SNAKE IN THE EAGLE’S SHADOW in 1978. His comic turn as the secret kung fu master of the young orphan played by Jackie Chan delighted audiences at the time. But that film was merely a warm-up for the pair’s next hit, the astounding DRUNKEN MASTER (also 1978). These two films launched Chan’s career as an international star. But the belated stardom for choreographer and stuntman Yuen Siu-tin merely capped a lifetime of action filmmaking that spanned five decades.

Yuen Siu-tin as the Drunken Master (above left) and in THUNDERING RED ROSE (on left).

Yuen was born in 1912 in Beijing, and began his training in Northern style opera and martial arts at the age of 6. Glittering Shanghai, the entertainment capital of China, must have beckoned irresistibly to the young performer. Audiences were mad for swordplay films, and the early film industry was hungry for trained actors and stunt performers. A teenaged Yuen soon found a position at Yueming studio, where he choreographed the fight scenes for NORTHEAST HERO, a 13 part wuxia series made between 1928 and 1931. Yueming was the production company founded by action film pioneer Ren Pengnian and his wife, the martial arts actress Wu Lizhu, who starred in the NORTHEAST HERO series. It was the beginning of a long association between the three filmmakers. But when Ren was forced to close Yueming and flee to Hong Kong as war threatened Shanghai, Yuen seems to have remained behind. He would not reach Hong Kong until after the war. By that time he had started a family – his oldest son, Wo-ping, was born in Guangzhou in 1945.

By 1947, Yuen Siu-tin was settled in Hong Kong, and working with his old friends. He appeared in Ren’s martial arts films LADY ROBIN HOOD (1947) and THE BIG FIGHT BETWEEN HERO COPPER HAMMER AND MADAME NINE FLOWERS (1948), as well as in a remake of their hit Shanghai series, NEO-NORTHEAST HERO (1949). Yuen also choreographed and acted in FONG SAI-YUK AND MIU CHUI-FAI (1948) for director Hung Chung-ho. In 1949, he joined the all-star cast of that most famous of early kung fu movies, THE STORY OF WONG FEI-HUNG. As the resulting series continued through the 1950s and into the 1960s, Yuen Siu-tin either choreographed or appeared in a fighting role in most of the films. Yuen’s status as a “Dragon Tiger Master,” one of Hong Kong’s top post-war stunt performers, was assured.

Even when Yuen wasn’t credited as choreographer of a given film, it’s safe to assume he contributed, at a minimum, to his own fight scenes. The relatively small circle of postwar directors and stars who made the action films of that period relied on Yuen Siu-tin and a handful of other professionals to come up with fresh, dynamic fight sequences. In a pinch, a classic battle from Chinese opera could be recreated on screen, since virtually all the performers had undergone opera training. Yuen’s success in the film industry would also have required that he be able to call on a team of highly trained young stunt performers whenever needed. To that end, he also ran an opera-style school. His students included, in addition to his own children, the noted Shaw Brothers studio choreographer Tong Kai and Cantonese opera performer Yuen Siu-fai. Tong moved in with the Yuen family while still in his teens, and studied full time with the senior Yuen. After serving an apprenticeship as a stuntman, he partnered with Lau Kar-leung to form the hottest action choreography team of the 1960s. Both men were recruited by the Shaws in 1967.

The passing of the kung fu movie torch to the Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest studios saw Yuen Siu-tin, now over 60 years old, continue to work and teach. Meanwhile, his sons Wo-ping and Cheung-yan were finding steady employment as stuntmen and action choreographers. Both worked at the Shaw studio in the 1970s. It was there that Wo-ping met a director named Ng See-yuen. When Ng left Shaw Brothers to form his own production company in the late seventies, he invited Yuen Wo-ping to direct a film. It would star a young up-and-comer named Jackie Chan. Wo-ping, now in charge of his own movie set, knew better than anyone else what kind of role would suit Dad to a T. Thus the character of “the drunken master” was born. Yuen Wo-ping directed both SNAKE IN THE EAGLE’S SHADOW and DRUNKEN MASTER, turning Chan and his own father into well-known kung fu movie stars, and establishing himself as one of the top action directors of the next generation.

From 1978 until his death in 1980, Yuen Siu-tin reprised the drunken master role in at least a half dozen films. In 1978, he also appeared in two of Lau Kar-leung’s iconic kung fu films, 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN and HEROES OF THE EAST. His sons Wo-ping, Cheung-yan, Shun-yi, Brandy, and Yat-choh all joined him in the family business – the Yuen Clan. The Yuen brothers would go on to create some of the most surreal, hilarious, and lyrical action films of the past 30 years. Yuen Siu-tin saw his sons well on the road to success before he passed away.

In NAZHA RESCUES HIS MOTHER (1960, aka NAZHA SAVES HIS MOTHER), Yuen Siu-tin plays one of the demons who make Nazha’s life miserable. In this scene (see clip below), he conspires with a female demon to stage a distraction, a faked assault. While young Nazha responds by fighting Yuen Siu-tin, his mother is kidnapped by the demons. (The clip has been slightly edited to focus on the fight choreography.) Nazha is portrayed by Yuen Siu-tin’s student Yuen Siu-fai (probably a stage name taken to reflect his teacher’s name, hence the similarity). So this sequence gives both teacher and student a chance to show their best. Yuen Siu-tin has a lot of fun with his stylized villainy, painting a portrait of lechery, arrogance, and cowardice in just a couple of minutes of screen time. Faced with Nazha’s spear, his unarmed demon magically transforms a tree branch into a sword. The brief two-person fighting set is swift and elegant despite the clowning.

This entry was originally posted on August 7, 2007.