Box of Shaw Pt Two: Rivals of Kung Fu

... The 4th movie on disc one is King Gambler (du wang da pian ju), a Shaw produced movie set in modern times, made in 1976. It's set in present times and doesn't appear to be a Kung Fu Movie as such. It pre-dates Wong Jing's God of Gamblers, which is interesting. I'm deciding to go onto the next for now and review this at the end. The tag 'comedy/crime' has put me off.

So, our number two is movie number 5 on disc one, welcome to Kung Fu Rivals.

Credits: The camera runs around a painting of lion dances and traditional drums beat away. Here's the title ... great! Wong Fei Hung yiqu ding cai pao - it's a Wong Fei Hong movie! Shih Chung Tieng is playing Wong and the main bad guy is played by Shih Kien, just a couple of years after playing Han in Enter the Dragon. Lily Li also stars. It's written and directed by Wang Feng.

2.08: Had I not noticed the title in Chinese I would have had Wong Fei Hung by now. He's opened his famous school Po Chi Lam and everyone's coming to visit. There's firecrackers and bunch of congratulations and rituals. Here are two rival business men Boss Wu and Boss Chao, they both want a trophy - the ding cai pao of the title. The title means 'Wong Fei Hong righteously wins the trophy" ... well that's spoiled the ending.

5.57: Ass joke! Boss Chao has an incompetent son, possibly with mental illness it seems - now he's stood up in the bath tub in a room full of ladies. As his cheeks go on view we hear comedy "boing" noises. An angry Boss Chao dubs the son "Bian Tai" (perverted). The director does not share a progressive view of mental illness it seems.

15.01: Exposition overload. But here's the sleight! Rival school head Shen Laoshi scoffs at 5 dollars for his lion dance tribute. Next, Wong is out back and is unaware that Wu Laoban has offered 100 dollars to the next school tribute. Shen finds out, he's not happy.

20.58: Enter local street hustler Little Rat. Together with Shen Laoshi they decide to take revenge on Wong Fei Hong's school by dumping Rat's dead brother's corpse in the clinic and pretending a patient died. There's been a comedy morgue scene and now the body is, in fact, sitting in the clinic waiting room. Wong's school is a clinic too, did I mention?

25.52: It didn't work, the body is clearly days old. A crooked cop tried to put one over on Wong but he's taken a bribe and he's off again.

32.22: Teacher Shen's crew are in the teahouse and they're causing trouble for one of Wong's students. They want him to pay several hundred dollars for their dead canary. It's on, a fight breaks out - action!

33.59: The student, ah-chi, is kicking ass. Shen's henchmen are no match for him. And what's more, ah-chi is a blatant Bruce Lee act.

35:23: Someone's gone over the balcony, senior bad guys are getting involved and here's Wong Fei Hong to save the day.

37.47: Now it's one on one between Shen and Wong. Excellent. A whole school of new bad guys are coming to help Shen! They're running through the lanes in their bright blue uniforms.

39.46: We see Shen's point of view shot as Wong hits him with 4 combo'd kicks to the face.

41.01: Teacher Yuan has arrived, he's a master of Tang fist and wants a one on one with Wong, he obliges.

43.04: Now Wong is fighting Yuan's whole crew, Lam Sai Wing has come to his aid and it's a mass pole fight, it's really going off.

46.11: Yuan cries for mercy! It's all over. Nearly 15 minutes of continuous action.

49.16: The police demand Wong pay 500 dollars in reparations. Chao Laoban will pay him out - as long as he wins that trophy for him.

54.50: Now we have a long comedy interlude featuring the son. Wong is asked to make a man of him. It seems he needs curing of mental illness. What are the symptoms? He likes dresses, wants to be a woman and won't fight - he has a lisping voice too. Oh dear.

59.47: The police chief is corrupt, overwieght and mean. He's taken the money for himself. Now it's the son's wedding day. Boss Wu announces a 1000 dollar prize for anyone who brings him the trophy.

1.08.07: Shen's crew eat traditional hotpot ..oh I'm hungry, there's a place that does that around the corner from my house.

1.16.05: The festival has kicked off and the three teams are suited up - it's going to be a lion dance off. The trophy is a small red tube, a firework. It's been shot up into a big bowl on top of a very large stick. Now they try to climb up.

1.26.08: It's all going surreal. Lam Sai Wing is holding up the two man lion team on a large bamboo pole. He allows them to take down the trophy, they've got it but the bad guys are trying to surround them and pull a fast one. But how? They've clearly won. Wong takes the head of the lion and saves a little girl who nearly got trampled.

1.29.13: Wong can't take it anymore, "you have no shame!". He's going after Shen for a real fight ... and it's all over with a slo-mo roll and kick less than a minute later. In the background, Bruce Lee clone ah-chi kicks a bit more ass.

1.32.57: The bosses are embarrased and apologise for their lack of morals. And here's the son - the wife is pregnant with twins. That was quick. Everyone is happy and the camera zooms on the belly - The End!

Well, that 15 minutes of action in the middle was amazing. What was the director thinking? No other part of the movie had real action at all. The Lion Dance-off was confusing. The interludes were quite offensive to the point of not quite being able to laugh it off. Still worth a watch though. It's a gamble with the lesser directors.  The fighting style was clear, interesting and convincing with large dollops of Bruce influence. See you next week.