Ceinture noire contre kung-fu

HEROES TWO (1973) was the first in a series of kung fu movies directed by Chang Cheh to focus on a group of legendary fighters from the famous Shaolin Temple. Alexander Fu Sheng appears here for the first time in his signature role of Fong Si Yu, a fighter trained at Shaolin who was involved with a group of Ming patriots opposing Manchu rule during the Qing dynasty. Chen Kuan Tai (fresh from Chang Cheh's BOXER FROM SHANTUNG and DYNASTY OF BLOOD) appears in the pivotal role of Hung Si Kwan, a Shaolin survivor who went on to teach his Southern Chinese style of martial arts, dubbed Hung boxing, to an illustrious line of students and their descendants, extending all the way down to this film's martial arts director, Lau Kar Leung (Liu Chia Liang), who used this film to infuse the kung fu genre with more authentic styles of fighting.

HEROES TWO opens with the burning of Shaolin Temple and deals with its aftermath, focusing on a misunderstanding that pits two heroes, Fong Si Yu and Hung Si Kwan, against each other to the benefit of their enemies. Curiously, the two characters don't seem to know each other even though later films depict them as friends both during and after their tenure at Shaolin. There are only a handful of brief kung fu bouts in the film before the spectacular final battle in which the heroes take on the `the four red-robed fighters from Tibet.' Up until this fight, however, the villains are not too formidable and don't represent much of a challenge to the two leads. Subsequent films would feature much better actor-fighters in the villain roles.

Although this is a weak entry in the Shaolin series, it remains an important film for its introduction of the stars in these roles and the use of authentic Shaolin martial arts styles in the fight scenes. The tape reviewed includes a 9-minute prologue entitled `Three Styles of Hung School's Kung Fu,' in which Fu Sheng, Chen Kuan Tai and Chi Kuan-Chun demonstrate different techniques of Hung boxing. Later films in the Shaolin series include MEN FROM THE MONASTERY (aka DISCIPLES OF DEATH), SHAOLIN AVENGERS (aka THE INVINCIBLE KUNG FU BROTHERS), SHAOLIN MARTIAL ARTS (listed on IMDB as SHAO LIN MARTIAL ARTS), FIVE MASTERS OF DEATH and DEATH CHAMBER (aka SHAOLIN TEMPLE), all from the years 1974-76.

I have to disagree with the above poster. This is the first of the Hung Gar movies, the flick was a big hit, and helped change how fight scenes were directed in Hong Kong. Before this film, with the exception of Bruce Lee, who was very athletic, most action films were either wanna be Bruce Lee clones- Bruce Liang, Li, Le, etc, with some occasional guys with good kicks etc, or clumsy Gang style knife fights- "Duel" "Vengeance" "Boxer from Shantung". The stars would throw flailing punches and kicks, and some how, with out any kind of skill, defeat an army of guys. Instead of trying to get a guy to look like a JKD stylist (i.e. combining boxing and Karate, not kung fu) they scrapped it for this much more classical style of fighting. Highly choreographed and unrealistic, at least it looked good. It's a movie, it's supposed to look good. As far as the "5 venoms" movies go, that was actually more of a Western Cult movie. At the time that came out, Jackie Chan was starting to break box office records, and the Shaw Brothers were getting beaten out by Golden Harvest and the TV serials.

As a fan of Chang Cheh films I would first comment that he has several much better films. Heroes two is honestly pretty unwatchable for anyone but Kung fu film diehard geeks. The story is revealed in very short moments tied together between long scenes of Shoalin boxing. Punch- block-punch-block blah blah. I mean I was entertained but the most remarkable thing about this film was the title sequence was awesome.

Instead of this film I would suggest other Cheh movies first. The heroic ones, five element ninjas or 5 deadly venoms come to mind first.

I have been watching all the Chinese and Taiwan martial arts movies from the 1960s and up in chronological order. The running total is about 300 as of this movie. I have watched some classics, some stinkers, some movies I never even heard of and they were fabulous, some fast-forward only. There have been fights galore, swords to start, then more realistic fists, even grappling on the ground, then trampolines and wire work. They were all starting to look alike. Then I watched "Heroes Two" and suddenly everything was different. Fights of this quality were never filmed before. I give most of the credit to the Grandmaster Liu Chia-Liang but Tong Gai and Chang Cheh certainly contributed a lot. OF course martial arts movies have constantly evolved or they would not continue to exist. I've seen "Heroes Two" at least once, maybe twice before. This time I first noticed it as an incredible piece of evolution. I almost rated it a 9 of 10 but realistically, though Alex Fu Sheng is one of my favorites, his execution of moves was not on focus nor powerful, so 8 of 10 I call.