Tie niu

This is one of those movies that would have been lost to oblivion were it not for the VHS rental craze. The copy I procured is rather poor even for VHS in that the hard subtitles are solid white therefore 50% unreadable. I will try to summarize the plot. Simon Yuen is challenged by a young muscular guy and looses. It was definitely not a fight to death just an honest exchange of technique. Nevertheless Simon Yuen is advanced in years and soon dies possibly from fight related injuries? His last words are to the effect that kung fu is not for fighting. The school is closed with the death of the master and the son goes to be a farmer. That fails immediately and he is reduced to a wanderer. He does good as a coolie and defends his co-workers from the Big Boss. By Big Boss I do mean The Big Boss - Han Ying-Chieh. Eventually the past catches up to him but not in the way you would expect. There is solid drama here but due to the language problem and poor video resolution it sadly becomes tiresome. The fights are certainly good though. Simon Yuen, patriarch of the Yuen clan, is featured in the first fight. He was 61 at the time and does a superb sequence. That alone was worth the price of admission.

I watched this movie back in 2015 and posted a review. The copy I watched back then was such poor quality that it affected the enjoyment of the movie. I since obtained a better quality video and watched it again and rewrote my review.

My copy is a computer file that plays as wide screen on a HDTV but it is not true wide screen. There are Chinese and English hard subtitles that are solid white and therefore hard to read at times. The video resolution is no better than a copy of a copy of a VHS tape.

It starts with Simon Yuen is challenged by a young muscular guy. It is a good fight especially considering that Simon Yuen was 61 years old at the time. Though it was not a fight to the death, just an exchange of technique, Simon was mortally injured. His last words "kung fu is not for fighting". His school is closed and his son sent into exile. Working as a coolie he defends his co-workers from the Big Boss. I do mean "The Big Boss" as in Han Ying-Chieh the title character in the Bruce Lee movie. Eventually the past catches up to him but not in the way you might think.

There is solid drama here but it does not quite click because of the subtitle problem and video resolution. The fights are certainly good though. I rated it as slightly above average for the year and fans of the genre. If you do not know who Simon Yuen is there is nothing for you to see here.