Enter the Fat Dragon (dir. Sammo Hungg, 1978)
Sammo Hungg needs no introduction - this is a legendary fat fighter and once teammate Jackie Chan is still being filmed, just like Donnie Yen looks good in battles, although not as well as before. I will start the review not with a film that was released a couple of years ago, but with an old one with the same name.
Older people have always associated Sammo with a sidekick Jackie Chan and personally, in my youth, I didn’t perceive it without him until the series came out "Chinese policeman" (1998-2000). I suspect that he was not perceived even in those days when Chan was making his mark in cinema, so people didn’t particularly care about films about him: “without Chan it’s not interesting, without Chan Sammo is just a funny fat guy,” etc., but in vain - Hungg could and did. .. Although to be honest, I didn’t quite reach Chan’s level. Now that Hungg has improved his drama and acting well, gained experience, he himself looks almost better than Chan and gets into more adequate projects ("Stars of Destiny", "Ip Man 2").
But let's talk about young Hung. According to the plot "Fat Dragon", fan Bruce Lee - fat man A-Lun comes from the village to the metropolis with the goal of getting a job with his uncle in a restaurant. As usual, a simpleton in the city begins to have problems with the gopot and the mafia, but A-Lun, trained in an unknown place, copes with all adversities by fighting in style Bruce Lee. Honestly, I expected a lot: they knew how to stage fights back then, they could film and edit them better; Even then, the young actors tried their best - the same Bolo Yen there is a wonderful "Sheriff Bolo" (1977), in which he plays well and fights excellently. My expectations were almost not met.
Then, after death Bruce Lee, very sudden death, a replacement was required. There were clones, “pseudo-sequels” about the Furious Fist, which, for all their seriousness, looked like half-parodies. This is how I started and Jackie Chan (“New Furious Fist”), but in the end he himself became something new, combining elements spied on by gagmen Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd with wushu and getting a killer result... But again I went in the wrong direction - here’s the real deal there is Bruce Lee Mania, and it’s far from the best. However, in order:
- Action. This is the only plus of the film: the fights are well choreographed, the fighters’ reaction to a blow is realistic, bruises, beatings and dirt remain on the bodies, and the enemies merge in a couple of blows. There are fights with weapons, there is drunken skill, there is variety and there are wushu styles, but all this is wildly secondary, we have already seen all this. You will say - a parody, I will say - a copy-paste, and a complete one, without any innovations or anything of its own. However, the film treats Bruce Lee with respect - I really liked the scene where A-Lun beat up the film crew led by Bruce's clone, I even watched it a couple of times - he beat these idiots so well! Next, the team gave good and varied action at the end, where Fat Dragon fought with three masters - it was clear that he was cunning, trying to tactically and seriously tired after the battle.
- Humor. Very weak, at the level of toilet comedies (the scene with bananas) and descent into trash (the main villain, for example). To Chan is like to Moscow from Beijing with cancer. What about Chan, even before "Sheriffa Bolo". Stupid, inappropriate gags, no script with a simple plot, obscenity where it is not necessary - add to this the minimum effort of the actors and the cost of production. The funniest thing was the actor portraying a black man painted in shoe polish - it looked simply pathetic. I know you will say that this is such a parody, but I didn’t see a parody here at all. I only laughed at the scene in the boat.
- Atmospheric. China of that time is shown well - streets, markets, local residents, double-decker cramped buses. They managed it here, but the film is only atmospheric in the first half, then it gets buried in a heap of stupid humor.
The film itself is also very boring. In general, there are few fights, the plot takes a very long time to unravel and you keep sitting and waiting for the action to begin. In summary, I will say that this film does not stand the test of time. I've seen a lot of works made from matches and acorns for three pennies, and many of them looked better. You can watch it if you're a fan Sammo Hunga, or, as I usually advise, look for a montage of fights from this film, but it’s not worth watching the whole thing.
Enter the Fat Dragon (dir. Kenji Tanigaki, 2020)
Donnie Yen despite all the opinions that he is no longer the same and, in his own words, will fight less in films, he still looks great. After a series of colorful pseudo-biopics about Ip Man, he revived his career and is now at its peak, which is why he continues to act - and rightly so. We'll look at his fat cop movie, where Ian, intentionally or not, got into the territory Sammo Hunga and we’ll figure out whether he could do it on this field or not. The trailer for this film was very cool and expectations were high.
According to the plot, the main character is a tough policeman who constantly and single-handedly defeats crowds of gopniks, robbers and murderers, married to a film actress. And everything would be fine, but at the same time no one respects him: his wife - TPshka (fiancée?) constantly nags him on a very hackneyed topic “you pay little attention to me”, all his exploits are appropriated by “friends” at work, but he himself is not which no one believes at all - and this despite all his skills. Honestly, this cliche completely bothered me back in American action films of the 90s, and not only me. Couldn't it have been done more seriously?
But back to the story - it all ends naturally: the hero detains dangerous robbers, but almost destroys the police station, along the way, of course, being late for a date, after which he breaks up with his wife. Having forgotten about all his exploits, the hero is transferred to paperwork amid the hooting of his comrades, and at this moment I would have turned off the film (I really despise such tropes in film scripts), if not for a very cool fight with a crowd of gopots in the car.
Having given the film a chance, I began to look further, and there the main character, sitting on paper work in some pissed-off basement with evidence, begins to eat stress and turns into a fat bass. Then his “friends” remember him and give him a simple task - to deliver a witness to some crime to Japan, where the evil Yakuza are evilly planning something against the backdrop of classic Yakuza scenery. Of course, as expected, the hero fails the task due to a setup, but a local fat-ass emigrant (also a former cop), his wife and her nephew come to his aid. Together they cross the path of the yakuza and a big fat arctic fox is waiting for everyone!
The film is uneven, to be honest, very uneven. The feeling that it was either done in a hurry, or that Ian or someone else decided to raise money due to inertia from Ip Man, will start approximately from the second half of the film... No, even a little earlier. Up to this point, the film, despite the boring moronic cliches I stated, is not bad:
- A very good opening fight with a chase and signature Chinese acrobatics. The whole movie would be like this. I'm glad that the Chinese haven't lost their skill in this regard.
- Cool references to "Hot spot", "Stars of Destiny" and films from Bruce Lee.
- Humor. And how the hero’s stupid wife broke down. Simply from the heart.
But in the second half a slow decline began:
- An abundance of unnecessary characters, such as the translator and the nephew. And, to be honest, of the hero’s assistants, I would only keep the restaurant owner (Teresa Mo), she turned out to be a very good character.
- A trashy main villain and an equally trashy fight with him. No, the fight is fine for such a film, but by the end, with the appearance of the hero’s wife, it slides into some kind of non-comedy slag. The appearance of the helicopter also looks out of place and is sewn on with white thread.
- Very rough installation. I honestly don’t get it, maybe someone can clarify for me why fights used to look great with low budgets, but now, when you can have Vysotsky or Tarkin from "Star Wars" to revive, the editing and the camera suddenly became worse and jerkier? Hiding a stunt double? There were doubles like that before, and they were much more inconspicuous.
- By the way, about them. Here, it seemed to me, Ian had doubles everywhere in this film. They could have sat over this moment so that it would not be so noticeable, although it is clear that Donnie is no longer young, and most likely, in this film he “rests” more than he strains.
- In the end, none of those who mocked the hero will receive karmic recoupment. Alas.
- The thickness of the Dragon is almost not played out in any way, and there are few moments where the hero uses weight - before us is simply Donnie Yen, just fat, that's all.
Despite all this, the film did not slip into complete trash and thanks to the abundance of fights, the simple plot and the charisma of Ian and the restaurant owner, it looks easy and simple, but alas, only once. However, three moments stuck in my memory - spoilers ahead: the first, when two journalists, who were quarreling among themselves, went to help each other; the second - actually, references and the third - the murder of his godfather by the main bastard. Cool, cruel and from the bottom of my heart, I really believed the actor at this moment, and even if this moment was somewhat inappropriate in its cruelty. And by the way, I’m wearing a yellow suit Bruce Lee I never saw him. Or maybe I didn’t remember - if so, it’s not my fault, but the film’s.
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To sum it up: the new film is better than the old one. Even though Jen’s plumpness doesn’t suit him either externally or in battles (he didn’t show anything new), even though in this aspect he is inferior to Sammo, but Sammo couldn’t do anything original in his film, and this is especially evident against the background of his other works: how later, and jointly with Chan and Biao. The new film is more interesting, it sags less, there is less stupidity in it, the old one can only weigh in on the fights, which are mounted and filmed better than in the new one, with a minimum of fluff and clumsy editing.
That's all, Uranus was with you, peace to all and goodbye!
Sorry, of course, but I would like to run the text through an editor.
Unfortunately, the catastrophically small FFI editorial staff does not have the strength for detailed editing.