Director: Wu Ma; Alfred Cheung; Teddy Robin
Stars: Sammo Hung
1974, 1988, 1990 Hong Kong
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Just as the kung fu film seemed to be losing steam as the 1970s came to a close, a new generation of martial arts stars rose to the top of Hong Kong cinema. Amongst them were Yuen Biao, Jackie Chan and the irrepressible Sammo Hung, who found fame as the director and star of The Iron Fisted Monk, The Magnificent Butcher and Encounter of the Spooky Kind. Presented here are three films spanning Hung’s career, from a supporting role in The Manchu Boxer to stardom in Paper Marriage and Shanghai, Shanghai.
In Wu Ma’s The Manchu Boxer, Hung (who doubles up as the film’s fight choreographer) plays the villainous foil to a roaming martial artist who enters a boxing tournament to defeat a gang of bandits. Then, in the action comedy Paper Marriage, Hung stars as a down-on-his-luck Chinese boxer living in Canada who is paid to marry an immigrant from Hong Kong (Maggie Cheung). She wants to gain Canadian citizenship, but he just wants to keep the loan sharks off his back. Finally, in Shanghai, Shanghai, a young man (Yuen Biao) goes looking for his brother, a police officer, in the big city – and also finds himself embroiled with a ruthless gangster played by Hung.
From traditional kung fu to romantic comedy to a tale of cops and crooks with shades of the “heroic bloodshed” films so popular in the 1980s and early 1990s, The Manchu Boxer, Paper Marriage and Shanghai, Shanghai exhibit Sammo Hung’s enormous range and chart his rise from supporting player to top-billed star.
