Wing Chun - Uma Luta Milenar

Despite that fact that different plot ideas for Kung Fu movie has been fully exploited by now and no new ideas are coming, Wing Chun still stands out in its uniqueness mostly because Michelle Yeoh is its star. If this movie was done by anyone else, it probably would have ended up being a dud, but she brings class to this movie it otherwise would not have had. The movie has very different atmosphere from other Kung Fu movies. While silly things are happening, Michelle Yeoh's action is precise and eye opening. She's the only one playing strait, and it works.

There has been other Kung Fu movies done by female lead, but they are mostly gruesomely violent. While there're lot of action in this movie, none of its action is violent. You won't see any blood, no bones being crushed, and yet it's filled with great action.

Somewhat difficult to find these days, but you owe it to yourself to see this movie at least once.

Michelle Yeoh stars as the titular Yim Wing Chun, the spiritual mother of Wing Chun kung fu (the kind they teach in Prodigal Son, amongst others). As you would expect from Yeoh, she is vibrant on screen, kicking a lot of arse and showing us the sensitive side to a martial arts hero.

Wing Chun's village is constantly under threat by bandits led by the…erm… flying simian family (well two brothers, Flying Monkey and Flying Chimp). After she cracks some skulls, while rescuing the widow ‘Charmy', she makes enemies of the local martial artists, who lose face after Wing Chun shows them up, and the bandits, who want her dead and for Flying Monkey to marry Charmy. The scene where Wing Chun shows the local martial arts heros the ‘Art of fighting without fighting' in the soya shop is amazing. Anyway, after castrating flying monkey, flying chimp decides to challenge Wing Chun, for the honour of the bandit clan. With inevitable consequences.

When Wing Chun isn't giving us great fight sequences, it plays it like quite a lot of HK cinema. For laughs. And, like a lot of HK cinema, it can get pretty irritating. A lot of mugging and juvenile humour are the order of the day here. Concentrating on that old Kung Fu film staple, getting laid.

Wing Chun was one of the first great high flying new style kung fu films and stands the test of time, nine years on. I really liked it, and forgiving its faults is easy. Although Donnie Yen was criminally under used, but that's not such a big deal.

Yong Chun/Whing Chun(1994) contains action scenes which are brilliantly Staged and amazingly depicted. Many of the scenes with Michelle Yeoh are examples of why she is the Queen of Hong Kong action films. She is an action star to which many aspiring action heroines looks up to her. Michelle Yeoh combines earthiness beauty with physical endurance as Yim Wing Chun. I show Wing Chun(1994) at the Brattle Theatre in Cambridge and became a big fan of the film and the career of Michelle Yeoh.

One of the best movies in the careers of Michelle Yeoh and Yuen Woo Ping. Their talents for lighthearted comedy and pulse pounding action are well represented here. Certainly, Michelle's greatest solo film. The only minor complaint is that the film is bookended, like so many HK action films, with superb fight sequences, but drags for 30 mins, or so, in the middle. Still, ranks as one of the better kung fu films made in the past ten years. Highly recommended.

I forgot I had taped most of this off TNT a while back. I watched it again and am really beginning to enjoy how good Donnie Yen is. Easily as good as Jet Li and seems to have a greater acting range ( Jet seems always so serious and intense). But I need to see more of each. Anyway the fight scenes are good, good and varied techniques, though not looking like really wing chun. Unnecessarily speeded up (these guys are fast enough) and too much wire fu - typical Yuen Woo Ping it seems. It would be good to see Michelle Yeoh and Donnie Yen together in a modern film.