Long Hu wu shi

The Hong Kong action film is one of my all-time favourite genres so this documentary is right up my street. It explores the careers of the region's stuntmen who have been working in the genre since the ascendancy of Bruce Lee, also following new recruits in China as they train to be the next generation's go-to stunt guys. A wealth of well-chosen film clips illustrate the talking-head interview clips, and it's so nice to see a documentary about Chinese stunts focusing on someone other than Jackie Chan (he barely gets a mention here). Some of my personal heroes appearing include Yuen Wah, Sammo Hung, Lee Hoi Sang, Mars and Yuen Woo Ping.

Listen-this movie is not for everyone. However, if you are a fan of the long history of Kung Fu Action films this is a very interesting documentary. Rather than a film looking at how the special effects world makes action in movies look real we see how death defying stunts made Hong Kong films so action packed. We see the insane routines these action artists went through and we meet a lot of them as they discuss risking their lives for cinema. The documentary is filled with historical and behind the scenes footage. I really enjoyed it. This is subtitled.

Being a Hong Konger grow in 80s, I have watched many many local action movies at that time. Watched so many actions scenes but never aware that they were so dangerous actually. Watched this documentary let me know that the stuntmen were risking their life to make the movie better. Glad that I have watched them and salute to all of the stuntmen~