Tuesday 20 January 2009

Ip Man



It's been quite some time since I saw a kung fu movie which is effectively and beautifully choreographed like this. About the real life Wing Chun school of kung fu, Master Ip Man, the fight sequence is lovely to watch, not like the MTV, shaking, heavily edited movement so in favour right now, which is a pain to watch. The fight sequence reminded me of the early 90s favourite of mine, Once Upon A Time In China (1991) and its sequel (1992 ~ incidentally also starred Donnie Yen as the antagonist, opposite Jet Li, the end climatic fight stand out to be my favourite fight scene of all time, apart from, SPL (2005), again, by Donnie Yen...he's quite prolific recently). I realized under the right direction, Sammo Hung as well as Yuen Wo Ping's action choreography could be breathtaking. Wait a minute, back in 1985, Yuen Wo Ping and Donnie Yen actually appeared together in that movie called Mismatched Couple, about a break dancin' Donnie going after May Lo's character (Jacky Cheung's wife). Ip Man was often linked to as a one time master of Bruce Lee, but I think he deserved his recognition in his own right. Ip Man is simply one of the better, contemporary kung fu movies out there.

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