Among the kung fu child stars, there are two very special existences.
The first is Semyon.
Discovered by Wang Jing at the age of 9, he played the father and son with Jet Li in "The Five Ancestors of New Shaolin" and "Letter to Dad", and was once known as "Jet Li's successor".
But after acting in "Peter Pan" in 1995, he followed Chow Yun-fat's advice, returned to the mainland to study, and returned to the film and television industry as an adult, and the era of kung fu movies has passed.
The second is Shi Xiaolong.
At the age of 5, he appeared on the Henan Taiwan Children's Spring Festival Gala, and in the same year, he partnered with Lin Hao Shaowen and starred in the "Xiaolin Boy" series directed by Zhu Yanping, followed by "Dragon in Shaolin" and "Ten Brothers". At his peak, he appeared on the stage of the Hong Kong Film Awards with Hao Shaowen and presented awards to superstar Jackie Chan.
In 1999, he participated in "Youth Bao Qingtian", and Juvenile Zhanzhao has become the childhood memory of countless people.
In 2003, 15-year-old Shi Xiaolong left New York to study, and returned five years later, but he also fell into a bottleneck.
The fates of the two strongest kung fu child stars always seem to be similar.
For more than 20 years, from the protagonist to the supporting role, from the peak to the bottom, during which kung fu films have been declining, the last sparks of these two kung fu films will either "spark the prairie fire" or "completely extinguish".
Semyon made the change first.
There is no market for kung fu films in theaters, so let's shoot the Internet. At the age of 38, Semyon finally filmed "No One in My Eyes".
An online movie with an investment of 8 million yuan and a length of 74 minutes, but with its heart-wrenching martial arts and heart-wrenching chivalry, fans can experience a long-lost martial arts flavor.
Coupled with the "Northeast Police Story" series, Semyon has created a world in the big rivers and lakes of the Internet, and has been returning to the big screen.
His new film is "Anger Spreading" with Nicholas Tse and this Sha, and "Rage" created by Jiang Zhiqiang and Kenji Tanigaki of Zhen's class, Xie Miao is really out.
Looking back, everyone looked at the 36-year-old Shi Xiaolong.
first directed and acted in a self-directed and self-starred "Truant Detective", with a box office of 19.5 million, and a sequel has been arranged.
Next, a "Knife Catcher", a "No One in My Eyes: Rebirth", and a "Fight the Black", all directed by the directors of the "Northeast Police Story" series and the action director of two "No One in My Eyes" - Qin Pengfei.
Obviously, the path that Xie Miao walked, Shi Xiaolong also had to go through.
But the new film will take time. Shi Xiaolong first teamed up with Qin Pengfei to play a kung fu comedy, "A Punch After Drunk".
The only signature character on the poster, Shi Xiaolong himself, is surrounded by familiar faces: Hao Shaowen, Yin Ziwei, Zhang Shi, Weng Hong, Yuan Qiongdan, Che Paul, plus the young Chen Xinwei.
Needless to say, the ambition hidden in the title will certainly remind people of Jackie Chan's famous work, "Drunken Fist".
It seems that Shi Xiaolong is going to pick up a long-lost genre: kung fu comedy. After Xing Ye's "Kung Fu", this type is really a long time gone.
Is the audience buying it? 2 hours to soar to the second place on the list.
But to evaluate a movie, we also have to look at the quality itself.
Is it possible for this new film to become Shi Xiaolong's "transformation work" like "No One in My Eyes"?
It depends on Shi Xiaolong's fight this time.
1. The story is equal to "Drunken Fist" + "Su Qier"? This plot style is nostalgic enough
Let's first see what kind of story director Shi Xiaolong told us this time.
"Punch After Drunk" puts the story in the Republic of China, the story is very simple, and the opening minutes go straight to the theme.
Compared with "No One in My Eyes", which takes the road of martial arts, and "Northeast Police Story", which shoots police and bandits, Shi Xiaolong plays kung fu + comedy that is still missing.
The opening is to fight in the ring.
Lin Yao (played by Shi Xiaolong), the richest second generation in Changle Town, likes to practice martial arts since he was a child, thinking that he is very powerful, and he competes with people in the town every day and wins a bunch of trophies, but he gradually feels bored.
Such a stupid boy is destined to suffer a lot.
This is also the first setting of his character.
But such a loser story is too old-fashioned.
So Shi Xiaolong added a second layer of setting to his role-
Suffered from a serial scam.
The eight generals of Qianmen first used Qin Shuang (played by Chen Xinwei) to lure him into the game, and then used Qin Shuang's deed of sale as bait to lure Lin Yao to the gambling table, dragged him into the quagmire, and lost 100,000 taels in one go.
But that's just the first game of a serial scam.
At this time, the master Li Baimei (played by Yin Ziwei) came out to mediate, suggesting that the two sides should compete with each other, and Lin Yao won, not only won back 100,000 taels, but also won Qin Shuang's deed of sale.
If you lose, you will lose the Lin family's property.
At this point, the story enters the third layer of the character's setting-
The ring was beaten.
Although Lin Yao's kung fu is not all fake, he has not met a real master over the years, just like Su Qi'er, the martial champion before he practiced Luohan Boxing.
Once he encounters a master of eagle claw skills like Li Baimei, he will immediately collapse.
In this battle, Lin Yao lost all his family wealth, and even lost the rented house, but what he didn't expect was that what Li Baimei cared about was not money, but the gold buried under his house.
If the male protagonist wants to be ashamed, he must meet a master on the road and re-cultivate, this kung fu that can allow him to defeat Li Baimei is drunken boxing.
From the film, I saw a lot of similar scenes to classic movies.
For example, the plot of the loser boy and the loser property comes from Yuan Biao's old Hong Kong film "The Loser";
The plot of finding a master from outside the world to learn kung fu and being forced to eat and drink every day is like "Drunken Boxing";
And the male protagonist was repaired by a master for a woman and rose again, reminiscent of "Wu Zhuangyuan Su Qier";
was betrayed by a beautiful woman, which seems to come from Dawn's "Young God of Gamblers".
The eldest young master was betrayed by the housekeeper played by Hao Shaowen, from "Idiot Birthday".
The name Qin Shuang clearly shows the "Nine Sesame Officials" that pays tribute to Xing Ye.
However, the most exciting part of the movie is always the part of the boy's kung fu counterattack.
After experiencing the transformation in the later stage, and the love with the heroine who reformed the evil and returned to the right, the male protagonist finally fought with Li Baimei, who colluded with the Japanese to dig for gold and wanted to destroy all the gold diggers, sublimating the theme of the young true hero fighting for justice.
We can see that Shi Xiaolong deliberately integrated a large number of classic Hong Kong film scenes in the plot design.
coupled with ingredients such as juvenile anti-fraud and "kung fu beauty", there are also some comedy baggage.
But the drunkard's intention is not to drink, the plot is not the most critical for Shi Xiaolong, the key is drunken fist.
Second, it is also an action scene, Shi Xiaolong's "Punch After Drunkenness" or Xie Miao's "No One in My Eyes", which is more advanced?
The above are the characteristics of the plot and character settings of the movie, and the biggest advantage of the movie is still in the action design.
Shi Xiaolong's fighting scenes have always been excellent, his movements are smooth and elegant, and they are all together, which is both fast and ornamental. Among this class of kung fu students, only Xie Miao can compare with him.
Their action design is naturally not the same as the "slow-motion martial arts" in domestic martial arts dramas.
But being able to play doesn't mean that you can play well.
Comparing Shi Xiaolong and Xie Miao's current play, you can see the high and low. In particular, the action director of this film and Xie Miao's "No One in My Eyes" is the same person: Qin Pengfei.
In "No One in My Eyes" and "Northeast Police Story", Xie Miao used two styles of martial arts, the former extracted a pair of wrong hands from the ancient army's tactics, a knife to listen to the wind, and a move to slash Loulan.
The latter incorporates mixed martial arts moves.
In contrast, Shi Xiaolong is much more "simple", on the basis of the original fist and foot kung fu, plus traditional martial arts such as drunken boxing, and then add certain move innovation.
There are as many as 9 large and small action scenes in the film, most of which are hand-to-hand combat, not hanging Weiya, and the opening scene is a quick edit to set up four fights in the ring.
But if you look closely, the fights in Shi Xiaolong's film can be divided into four categories:
The first type is fist and foot kung fu with a sense of joy and fists to the flesh;
For example, the opening ring duel, the crisp and sharp movements, and skillful moves like muscle memory not only make the film full of visual impact, but also bring out a familiar atmosphere of kung fu comedy.
the second type is action scenes that use various "weapons";
is still the opening ring scene, in order to show off his kung fu, Lin Yao first played the stool skill, and a stool was played by him in thousands of changes, which can not only resist the enemy, but also attack.
Attack and defend freely, and win a game easily.
Then the camera turned directly and switched to a scene of fighting in the rain, this time, the stick on the street became a weapon to take advantage of.
The rain, the streets, the sticks, make for a peculiar visual effect.
the third type is the action scenes that constantly switch scenes;
The most representative is that after Lin Yao completed his studies, he found Li Baimei to collude with the Japan to dig gold cellars.
The Japanese ronin besieges with a Japanese sword, and he meets it with a drunken fist move. The two sides fought each other in a narrow cellar.
It is precisely because the legs and feet cannot be unleashed, the restricted legs and feet, every movement is accurate, and it is obviously carefully designed.
The two waves of people fought and extended the space vertically, and finally the two ronins were knocked away by Lin Yao and fell into the wine cellar at the very end.
It is here that the fourth type of kung fu scenes of this film appears: kung fu fights, new drunken fists.
This is a one-on-one PK, Li Baimei faced Lin Yao, the defeated former subordinate, and once again used the eagle claw skill, and had the upper hand at the beginning.
And even if Shi Xiaolong's side used a grappling in free fighting, he smashed into the wine vat, but he still couldn't defeat the other party.
Until Lin Yao, who was knocked to the ground, suddenly had an epiphany, and finally used an innovative drunken fist - "You don't even drink alcohol, how can you get drunk?" "Who said you have to drink when you get drunk?"
It seems that Shi Xiaolong's innovation this time is to distinguish it from Jackie Chan's classic version of Drunken Boxing, in "Drunken Boxing 1", Jackie Chan drinks alcohol, and in "Drunken Boxing 2", Jackie Chan drinks industrial alcohol, and he fights fiercely every time.
And Shi Xiaolong in this film did not drink, but his boxing skills showed his drinking, and his boxing skills were precise and powerful, which made Li Baimei confused.
In this battle, there are so many changes in action and so much power in the scenes, which is really dazzling.
Third, it is not enough for Shi Xiaolong to find Hao Shaowen in the same frame, the 5 supporting roles, all of them are powerful
Like Shi Xiaolong's last directorial work "Truant Detective", he found his old partner Hao Shaowen again.
Although Hao Shaowen still doesn't know martial arts at all, he and Shi Xiaolong are responsible for literary drama and fighting, and they still cooperate with each other in literature and martial arts.
Compared with the last time, Hao Shaowen's housekeeper this time obviously played more, from betraying the male protagonist to the discovery of conscience on the cliff, and finally helping the male protagonist to kill the villain.
Especially in the film, after Hao Shaowen wets his pants and extinguishes the explosives lead, he meets Shi Xiaolong and laughs, which really successfully brought me back to the years when I watched those two little sweep the film industry more than 20 years ago.
There are also five supporting roles, all of which are worth mentioning.
The first is Yin Ziwei, who plays the villain.
The character of Li Baimei is both arrogant and conceited, but also scheming, with a confident smile on the corner of his mouth, full of confidence in controlling the situation.
I have to say that it is impossible for Yin Ziwei to play such an evil villain. looks evil, and the play is there.
second place, Zhang Shi.
Of course, Zhao Gao was old back then, but his acting skills were not old, especially the father-son relationship scene with the male protagonist after he was down, he still made people feel related.
The third place, the cameo Sister Pomegranate.
Yuan Qiongdan's painting style in this film focuses on nostalgia.
is still playing the old bustard, and its chief beauty is called Qin Shuang.
Under her unique joyful performance, how can it not remind people of Jiupin Sesame Official.
Fourth and fifth, Weng Hong, Che Paul.
Many years have passed, and one of them is still so beautiful,
One is still so top.
The addition of these old Hong Kong film bones itself represents the "Hong Kong flavor".
Finally, there are the male and female protagonists.
We are accustomed to calling Shi Xiaolong a "child star", but we often ignore that he is already a 36-year-old "old" uncle.
But compared with Semyon's "uncle type", his appearance still maintains a vigor. This is Shi Xiaolong's exclusive label, but it is also a certain restriction that makes it more difficult for him to break through his past image and challenge more different types of roles.
Of course, it's man-made.
Finally, I would like to mention the heroine of this film, Chen Xinwei,
People are really beautiful, and they play beautifully.
4. Finally, let's talk about "flaws are not hidden", Shi Xiaolong will become the first person to eat kung fu comedy crabs in 2024
As Shi Xiaolong's second directorial work, "Punch After Drunk" is not without shortcomings.
The presentation of the footage is too skillful; The grasp of the rhythm is also immature, the opening rhythm is a little slow, and the level of storytelling needs to be improved;
The length of the movie is 87 minutes, but the character creation is still weak, which makes the personality traits presented by many characters too facial. Of course, the biggest problem is that there are too many tributes to classic Hong Kong films, and this audience may not be useful.
But, it's still the same sentence, and the flaws are not hidden.
"Drunk Punch" does not have gorgeous pictures or gorgeous special effects, and it looks very "plain" from the inside out.
But Shi Xiaolong spent the most effort on kung fu, integrating martial arts, comedy, action, Republic of China drama and the current popular anti-fraud elements, and it can be seen that he has really worked hard.
In particular, this film has made a kung fu comedy of the Republic of China that has not been seen for a long time, the fight scenes are never sloppy, and the opening scenes are extremely silky and clean.
The innovative use of drunken boxing in the kung fu duel at the end can see the ambition of the main creator, and the actual effect should satisfy male audiences who love kung fu movies.
Of course, Shi Xiaolong, who is still fighting, also carries another meaning.
I once watched an interview with Semyon.
He said: One of the main reasons for the regression of the production level of action movies is that there are always so many action stars, resulting in a lack of freshness in the genre.
Indeed, the era of action stars shining is long gone.
Whether in the mainland or Hong Kong, kung fu stars have been seriously discontinued.
The youngest self-deprecating action star Wu Jing is 50 years old, and Wu Yue is 49 years old.
Donnie Yen is 60 years old in Hong Kong, behind him is 47-year-old An Zhijie, Wu Yunlong, who became popular with "The Siege of the Kowloon Walled City", is also 46 years old, and Nicholas Tse is also 43 years old.
40-year-old Xie Miao and 36-year-old Shi Xiaolong were the most capable kung fu child stars back then, and now that a generation of kung fu stars is aging, they have become the last hope for kung fu movies.
recalled that Jackie Chan met Yuan Heping and filmed "Drunken Fist", and since then he has become a first-line star.
Now that kung fu movies are no longer in the limelight, today's Shi Xiaolong cannot have the opportunity of Jackie Chan in the past.
But because of this, Shi Xiaolong and his kung fu comedy, who are still fighting, are even more serious and scarce.
The milk baby of the year has grown up, and Gong Xi and Sister Pomegranate have also grown old.
In this era when kung fu movies are buried, there are still people who are willing to invest in such movies, and some people are willing to make such movies, and the taste of the film is still the same as before, which is already worth cherishing.
As for whether Shi Xiaolong can turn over with the film, I want to say don't worry, leave it to time.
Xie Miao didn't shoot "No One in My Eyes" as soon as he came up, he only found his own moves after many bad movies.
Then wait for Shi Xiaolong, also find his own, and punch him when he is drunk.