Introduction

 

Hong Kong has a world renowned film industry, producing world renowned stars like Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, Jet Li and Chow Yun Fat with all of them making their names in Hong Kong’s Action films during 1970s and 1980s. Hong Kong’s Action Cinema is one of the main sources of Hong Kong’s Cinema fame and has been around for decades. Many sub-genre, such as Wuxia, Kungfu, Action, Gun-fu and Action-Comedy has since been developed. Innovations such as use of cables and Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI) were developed. Positions such as Action Choreographer were created with some choreographer eventually switching to directing. An industry boomed and busted and this essay will try to go through the boom and bust decades of Hong Kong Action Cinema, highlighting important films and iconic developments along the way.

 

Early days with Wong Fei Hung

 

Chinese filmmaking predominantly occurs at Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s, Action films were limited to Wuxia films, with approximately 400 Wuxia films produced before 1949 (Zhang Z. , 2001). After World War II ended and with the Communist Party of China in power, Chinese filmmakers migrated to Hong Kong, then a colony of the British Empire. Many early Chinese Wuxia films were adapted from novels featuring mythical fighters with magical abilities. Comprising of two Chinese words, Wuxia, 武侠, means martial chivalry, is one of the sub-genre of the action. Wuxia films generally speaks of fighters with superior combat abilities and how their abilities are utilised (Chute & Bordwell, 2003).

 

Many early action films were based on traditional Chinese Stage Opera, with actors telling a story through dialogue, singing, music, body movements, costumes and acrobatics (Tsao, 1995). Some of the prominent opera troupes in Hong Kong in the 1950s were The Peking Opera School, The Eastern Drama Academy and The Spring and Autumn Drama School (Li, 2006). These schools would prove to be important training grounds of Hong Kong Action film workers.

 

The 1950s sees a massive production of Cantonese Wuxia films featuring Chinese folk hero, Wong Fei Hung, who is portrayed by opera-trained martial artist Kwan Tak Hing no less than 62 times throughout the decade (Kwan Tak Hing, n.d.). The Wong Fei Hung series portrayed a grounded form of Wuxia, with mildly realistic hand-to-hand fighting with little fantasy and mystical effects at an era where action choreographers doesn't exist.

 

Shaw Brothers

 

In 1961, Shaw Brothers Studios opened the largest filming studio in the world in Hong Kong at a time when they were extending their film industry interest (Fo, 2008). The age of Shaw Brothers dominance of Hong Kong Cinema began although Shaw Brothers was still in great competition with Cathay Organisation. Shaw Brothers aimed to popularise Kungfu films and that was a time where many opera trained youngsters joined the industry as stuntman due to dwindling popularity in traditional Chinese opera. Some of them are famous names such as Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Yuen Woo Ping and so on (Li, 2006) (Bao, 2010).

 

Production of Wuxia films continued in early 1960s as Shaw Brothers stabilise their foothold in Hong Kong, albeit with improved quality films, now with their filming studio constructed. Innovative special effects, albeit crude, were seen in the “Buddha Palm” series of black-and-white films where its iconic fights scene, which was re-enacted many times in future films, the use of “qi” or internal energy, hand-drawn onto the film, to defeat opponents (Ling, 1964).

 

Shaw Brothers infused Kungfu into Wuxia films in the 1960s, removing fantasy elements and increase the concentration on direct hand to hand fighting with improvement in plot and character development. The position of action choreographer was created.

 

An iconic film is Chang Cheh’s “One-Armed Swordsman” (Chang, 1967). The film features plain one-on-one fights, credible acting and no fantasy effects. The film launched both director Chang Cheh and actor Jimmy Wang Yu in stardom. Other than the refreshing change in fight choreography, the film also sees breakthrough in the Wuxia hero’s image, bringing in personal tragedy, love and fighting spirit to show the humane side of a hero. These is done alongside a small break from traditional operatic style filming into a more realistic, novel and confrontational style that people would associate with Wuxia fighters (Miller, 2015).

 

Bruce Lee and Kungfu

 

The 1970s sees the rise Kungfu films starting with Bruce Lee. Other artist who rose to prominence were Gordon Liu with Lau Kar Leung and Jackie Chan with Yuen Woo Ping (Chute & Bordwell, 2003). Kungfu, 功夫, means skill but is generally known to refer to martial arts (Chute & Bordwell, 2003).

 

Golden Harvest, a new film production company formed by former Shaw Brothers’ executives, emerged and eventually brought Hong Kong Cinema onto the international stage (Fore, 1994).

 

Bruce Lee, returning from America after success in “The Green Hornet”, rejected Shaw Brother and Hollywood and signed with Golden Harvest and made 4 films, “The Big Boss”, “Fist of Fury”, “Way of the Dragon” and “Enter the Dragon”, before his unfortunate passing from cerebral edema, aged 32 (Stokes, 2007) (Beaudine , Martinson, Peerce, Reisner, & Robbie, 1966) (Lo, The Big Boss, 1971) (Lo, Fist of Fury, 1972) (Lee B. , 1972) (Clouse, 1973). Bruce Lee was propelled to international stardom in “The Big Boss”, but it was not until “Fist of Fury” where his input into the action choreography, incorporating Hollywood filming methods, did Hong Kong’s action filming sees an improvement (Logan, 1996). In “Fist of Fury”, Bruce Lee choreograph action scenes to show the use of hands, legs and weapons, demonstrating the power of the body and the effectiveness of Kungfu. Bruce Lee’s action sought to have the effects of a real hand-to-hand and leg-to-leg combat. Bruce Lee’s character in “Fist of Fury” has also struck a chord among the Chinese diaspora community around the world, by upholding the pride of Chinese among foreign bullies and oppressor and eventually defeating them in a David versus Goliath contest.

 

In Bruce Lee’s short Hong Kong film career, he elevated Hong Kong Cinema onto the international stage and made the world interested in Kungfu and Hong Kong action film. After Bruce Lee’s death, many Bruce-esque Kungfu films were produced in a phenomenon called “Bruceploitation” (Hu B. , 2008). Among the Bruceploitation emerged Jackie Chan, who made headlines with “Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow” and “Drunken Master”, both being Kungfu film directed by Yuen Woo Ping tapping on Jackie’s comedic ability (Yuen, Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, 1978) (Yuen , Drunken Master, 1978). Both films removed the tensed and serious mood in previous Kungfu films, by having a dim-witted kid and mischievous master as main characters to lighten the mood of the films (Logan, 1996).

 

Shaw Brothers reply to Golden Harvest success were Lau Ka Leung and Gordon Liu, 3rd generation disciples of Wong Fei Hung in the award winning Kungfu film, “36th Chamber of Shaolin” (Lau, 1978) (Stokes, 2007) (Logan, 1996).

 

New Wave Directors such as Ann Hui, Tsui Hark, John Woo emerged in the industry. By this era, some action choreographers have transited to action directors, due to many new wave directors handing over film directing duties to action choreographers during action scenes. Among these action directors are Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Lau Ka Leung who then made the transition to directors themselves (Li, 2006).

 

Becoming the Dragon in 1980s

 

The 1980s is an exciting time for Hong Kong Action cinema, with Jackie Chan continuing to make waves in action-comedy with Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao, his Peking Opera School brothers, Lau Ka Leung and Gordon Liu’s Kungfu films, John Woo’s Gun-fu, Ching Siu Tung’s Wire-fu and Tsui Hark’s Wuxia films and the debut of Donnie Yen and Jet Li. Adding into the mix is the establishment of Cinema City & Film Company. (Stokes, 2007).

 

Director John Woo and Tsui Hark joined the newly established Cinema City and would lead a new genre of Gun-fu and revival of Wuxia genre respectively. Directed by John Woo, produced by Tsui Hark, “A Better Tomorrow” was made in 1986. The film spoke about Wuxia elements of honour, chivalry, friendship, brotherhood and getting back what has been lost, in modern settings. The highly acclaimed and multi-award winning film broke Hong Kong box office records despite being produced on a tight budget and inspired the subsequent production of triads and Gun-fu films, gun fights genre, and triggered a “Mark Gor” cultural phenomenon in Hong Kong (Woo, 1986) (Logan, 1996) ([最佳華語片一百部] The Best 100 Chinese Motion Pictures, n.d.) (第6屆香港電影金像獎得獎名單 List of Award Winner of The 6th Hong Kong Film Awards, n.d.) (Stringer, 1997).

 

The revival of wuxia films was led by Tsui Hark in “Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain” and “A Chinese Ghost Story” (Tsui, Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain, 1983) (Tsui , A Chinese Ghost Story, 1987). Tsui Hark added elements of fantasy, sorcery, folklore, elaborate costumes and heavy use of wires, also known as Wire-fu, in the films. “Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain”, released in 1983, is a landmark film with Tsui Hark blending traditional Wuxia elements with Buddhist and Taoist religious teachings, Chinese folklore and Western CGI technology (Logan, 1996) (Chute & Bordwell, 2003).

 

If there is one man to represents the 1980s, it would be Jackie Chan. The 1980s belonged to Jackie Chan in the way he pushed the boundaries of what action actors can do. Directors are re-inventing pre-existing genres and innovating pre-existing techniques, instead Jackie pushed the boundaries by doing things that was previously thought impossible simply by doing things people do not dare to do. One film that Jackie has full control over was “Police Story”, where Jackie attempts to deviate fights from one-to-one martial arts duel and produce more realistic, street-fighting style fights (Chan, Police Story, 1985) (Yetan, 2009). This was done by reducing frames per seconds for each shots, choreographing high energy multi-opponents fights and innovative use of on-set props, and adding Buster Keaton-esque comedy moments at the same time. What really sets Jackie apart extremely dangerous stunts where many have become iconic action scenes in itself (Chan , I am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action, 1998).

 

Wuxia, Jet Li and the decline of Hong Kong Cinema

 

The early 1990s sees a continual revival of Wuxia films, with Tsui Hark continuing to be a prominent figure in films like “The Swordsman”, “New Dragon Gate Inn” and “Once Upon a Time in China” and its sequels (Hu, Ching, Hui, Kam , & Tsui, 1990) (Tsui, Once Upon a Time in China, 1991) (Lee R. , 1992). The 1990s sees the breakthrough of Jet Li as a prominent action actor as well as a return of non-martial artist actors as the main cast in prominent action films (Stokes, 2007).

 

The second half of the decade sees the start of Hong Kong’s Cinema decline, accomplished action stars such as Jackie Chan, Jet Li and Chow Jun Fat has been expanding internationally towards Hollywood (Stokes, 2007). The 1997 Asian Financial Crisis resulted in many investors pulling out thereby reducing Hong Kong film production drastically. Production dropped so much that the industry was on the brink of collapse and there was little influx of new talents to replace older and more accomplished stars. Box office income decreased due to increased demand for Hollywood production and rampant piracy by triads. Hong Kong Cinema also lost a fair share of talents when many locals choose to migrate prior to Hong Kong’s handover to China (Fong, 2012). Rounding up the problems, the 90s was also a period where many films were rushed in production resulting in slipshod works. The problem of succession is more drastic for action cinema, with it being an extremely physically and technically demanding genre. Popular films were still produced during the period, but were mostly restricted to non-action genre films (Cui, 2007).

 

The New Millennium

 

The turn of the millennium has Asia recovering from the economic slump and Hong Kong Cinema still in the state of decline. Huge action films such as “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, “Hero” and “House of Flying Daggers” frequently involves international crews and production teams (Lee A. , 2000) (Zhang Y. , 2002) (Zhang Y. , 2004).

 

Hong Kong Action films sees a minor revival led by Donnie Yen with awards-winning  Kungfu films featuring Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) in “SPL: Sha Po Lang” and “Flashpoint” (Yip, SPL: Sha Po Lang, 2005) (Yip , Flash Point, 2007). One recent iconic Kungfu film is “Ip Man”, a film about Bruce Lee’s mentor, Yip Man and Wing Chun Kungfu (Yip , Ip Man, 2008). The highly-acclaimed, multi-award winning film revived a genre and inspired many films about Yip Man as well as increased Wing Chun’s apprenticeship (Teo, 1997) (Yang, 2003) (Martin-Jones, 2014).

 

Conclusion

 

Hong Kong Action Cinema has evolved much from the era of black-and-white films. Famous stars has been created, many sub-genres have peaked and declined only to be re-invented and Hong Kong Cinema has emerged to be a world-renowned film production country known most famously for action films.

 

Early action films in the 1950s are heavily based on Chinese opera, evident by high number of frames per scenes favoured by early directors. Fights were mildly realistic and resembles dancing, with fists stopping at the point of contact. The fight sequences are just merely relaying the message of an on-going fight to the audience.

 

In One-Armed Swordsman, Chang Cheh made changes, introducing personal tragedy to humanise the hero. Fights became more realistic through convincing acting, showing audience martial arts moves and the effort required. The film rhythm and acting takes a step away from Chinese opera, although elements of it still remains. In Fist of Fury, Bruce Lee introduced Kungfu to the world. Film making under Bruce Lee, bringing with him his Hollywood filming experience, concentrates heavily on Kungfu. The resultant product is an actor that can fight and kill convincingly onscreen. This formula has been repeated throughout Kungfu films since. Jackie Chan developed an action style for himself, showing that action can occur with anything anywhere and are not restricted to duels between martial artists. John Woo changed the settings of Wuxia, transforming them from ancient characters to modern gun-wielding gangsters who upholds the same philosophy, creating a new genre, Gun-fu. Tsui Hark did not transform Wuxia into something else, instead, he enhanced their power, done through CGI and heavy usage of wires, creating the genre, Wire-fu. Films of the early 90s consists mainly of a hybrid of Wuxia and Action.

 

By the turn of the millennium, Donnie Yen revived the Kungfu genre again, putting together the best filming techniques and introducing MMA, a non-Chinese martial arts. Wing Chun Kungfu was introduced in Ip Man with the concept David-versus-Goliath concept being re-visited.

Migrants makes up a significant part of Hong Kong’s population resulting in different cultures and knowledge congregating in Hong Kong (Shen , 1997). Many film workers graduated from opera schools and martial arts schools of different origins and focus, easily explained by the martial arts term, “Southern fists and Northern legs”, which summarises the focus of martial artist from Southern and Northern China. Film making has improved and deviated hugely from traditional Chinese opera. However, opera trainings and concepts still hold an important role in Hong Kong

 

Action films in stunt performance and fight choreography. Many stunt productions rely on simple and low-technology methods which uses elements of opera training as basis and are innovated decades ago by blue collar action choreographer with white collar directors through brains of creativity and brawn of hard work.

 

The diaspora of people with different culture, knowledge, skills, and the combination of people from different education level in Hong Kong which a land with freedom of expression. The industry, predominantly Chinese that comes from different places are still related hugely by race and moral beliefs, Confucianism, that allows them to click together completing a huge jigsaw puzzle that is Hong Kong Cinema.

 

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