Zan xian sheng yu zhao qian Hua

Warrior's Two is not a sequel to Walter Hill's urban action classic The Warriors. In fact, I think it's just the title, or literal translation of the title. Way before Donnie Yen made IP Man a household name, Warrior's Two is another excellent movie about the fighting style known as Wing Chun. This is a groundbreaking film for Sammo Hung that put his mix of kung fu and comedy and got his fight choreography some series respect The fights are jaw droppingly awesome and really complex, but tightly put together. In the restored version I have, everything looks crystal clear and sometimes I forget that I am watching a movie from the 70's. If you like martial arts movies, this is one you should see as everything done here was done really well.

Once this film gets going it features some of the best kung fu ever filmed. The action is tightly choreographed and the strikes look like they really hurt. It's all I can do to stop myself from spilling the beans on the finale, which sees Wing Chun style up against one of my other favourite styles, which I can't reveal because it would spoil the surprise. The film also has a great "what do we have to do to kill this guy?" type scene in it, which is predictably bloody and excruciatingly painful. For lovers of eccentric training routines there's no need to worry, the wooden men are out in force, and the weasel with the glasses and the crap voice makes his presence well and truly felt. If you're a kung fu fan and haven't run into this one yet: this is "the business", up there with Prodigal Son.

Directed by and staring Sammo Hung (whose character, as usual, is referred to as Fatty!), this kung fu flick was definitely one of the good ones. The first half was mostly standard fare but things picked up nicely at around the midpoint. After the cool training sequence, Fatty and friends each pick one of the different-styled baddies and seek them out to set things right. The last 20 minutes or so just kick butt, cumulating with the top bad guy whipping out a creepy praying-mantis style on our heroes that must be seen to be believed. As a Hung production, it does feature some of his cheesy but harmless brand of comedy but he also makes sure to splatter some blood in deserving scenes. Also, for such a movie, there were a number of shots that looked like they were lifted right out of a Chinese horror movie! When I finished the film, I watched the original trailer on the DVD, in which Chinese descriptions appeared over the scenes, translated underneath. Here are a few lines that occurred during some fight scenes: It's authentic! It's clearly shown! It's greatly entertaining! And it was. I just thought that was amusing…"clearly shown" isn't part of the modern fight choreographer's vocabulary.

This is clearly Sammo Hung's tribute to the Shaw Bros. style, which set the standard for Hong Kong film-making for two decades; practically all the great Hong Kong action directors worked for Shaw Bros. at one time, or paid tribute to it in one way or another, up until about 1993. The earmarks of the style developed at Shaw studios include heavy use of elaborate sound-stage exteriors; very steady camera-work with occasional hand-held close-ups for effect, a particularly atmospheric lighting that nonetheless emphasized primary colors. A particular aspect of Shaw narrative style is that the villain would usually be either of aristocratic stock or would have certain aristocratic qualities that would make him admirable if he weren't so greedy or power hungry. The Shaw heroes were always remarkably virtuous, and usually had a side-kick as noble, and sometimes as skilled. The typical Shaw film involved an elder, sometimes of aristocratic background, sometimes simply aristocratic in quality, and usually well-known as a martial-arts master; unfortunately this elder is always doomed to be the villain's chief victim, thus setting the heroes out on their quest for revenge.

All these elements are here - every last one - and accomplished with a high quality professional finesse. with this film, Hung demonstrated his command of the medium as Hong Kong film audiences understood it according to the highest standards held for it at the time. And, of course, it must be admitted that the film is rip-roaring fun for any real fan of the martial-arts genre.

Not necessarily a classic, but certainly looks as good as one!

Aug 21

I havent got anything new to offer here, i can just agree with the other reviews that this is an excellent film.

Sammo Hung, Casanova Wong, Leung Kar Yan, Fung Hark On and Dean Shek star among others.

Dean Shek steals the show here doing some form of martial arts, its typical of the time from Sammo Hung, so we get good humour with the excellent martial arts.

9.5 out of 10.