Ip Man: The Final Fight | |||||||||||
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Chinese name | |||||||||||
Traditional Chinese | 葉問:終極一戰 | ||||||||||
Simplified Chinese | 叶问:终极一战 | ||||||||||
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Directed by | Herman Yau | ||||||||||
Screenplay by | Erica Li | ||||||||||
Story by | Checkley Sin | ||||||||||
Produced by | Checkley Sin Albert Lee Cherry Law Catherine Hun | ||||||||||
Starring | Anthony Wong Anita Yuen Jordan Chan Eric Tsang Gillian Chung | ||||||||||
Cinematography | Joe Chan | ||||||||||
Edited by | Azrael Chung | ||||||||||
Music by | Mak Chun Hung | ||||||||||
Production companies | Golden harvest Pegasus Taihe Entertainment | ||||||||||
Distributed by | Lark Films Distribution | ||||||||||
Release date |
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Running time | 102 minutes | ||||||||||
Country | Hong Kong | ||||||||||
Language | Cantonese | ||||||||||
Box office | HK$8,494,894 [1] |
Ip Man: The Final Fight is a 2013 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film directed by Herman Yau, starring Anthony Wong, Anita Yuen, Jordan Chan, Eric Tsang and Gillian Chung. [2] It is based on the life of the Wing Chun grandmaster Ip Man. This film is the sequel of The Legend Is Born: Ip Man [3] but has no connection to the earlier Ip Man films, such as Wilson Yip's Ip Man and Ip Man 2 , and Wong Kar-wai's The Grandmaster . [2]
In 1949, Ip Man, who has been suffering from chronic gastric pain, travels alone to Hong Kong. He starts teaching Wing Chun on the rooftop of a building which houses a hotel staff's general association. He meets and accepts new students, including Tang Shing, Leung Sheung, Wong Tung, Lee King and Chan Sei-mui. During that period of time, Ip Man's wife, Cheung Wing-sing, also comes to Hong Kong to join her husband, but returns to Foshan shortly after because life in Hong Kong is hard. The couple never saw each other again because Cheung died not long after returning to Foshan. His son Ip Chun comes from Foshan to Hong Kong to join him.
Ip Man struggles against the vicissitudes of life and has to cope with his gastric pain. He also insists on having a relationship with the singer Jenny after his wife's death, even though his students strongly object to it. He also gets into conflict with Ng Chung, a White Crane master, but they become friends later. When Wong Tung gets into trouble with a mob boss called Local Dragon, Ip Man and his students show up and rescue Wong. Ip Man also defeats Local Dragon in a fight, captures him, and hands him over to the police. After the fight, he briefly meets Bruce Lee and Lee's two students. The film ends with Ip Man practising Wing Chun on a wooden dummy while Ip Chun records it on a camera, followed by actual footage of the real-life Ip Man doing the same thing.
Anthony Wong said in an email interview with Singapore's The New Paper that he was drunk when director Herman Yau called him and asked him if he would like to portray Ip Man in his movie, and he replied "yes". [4] Although he regretted his decision later, he eventually agreed after reading the script. To prepare for his role, Wong went on a diet and started practising Wing Chun on a wooden dummy given to him by producer Checkley Sin. [4]
Ip Man's elder son, Ip Chun, who played Leung Bik in Herman Yau's previous Ip Man film, The Legend Is Born – Ip Man (2010), makes a cameo appearance in Ip Man: The Final Fight as the shop owner who lets Ip Man use the phone in his shop. Kevin Cheng, who played the titular role from the 2013 television series Ip Man , made a guest appearance as young Ip Man.
The story of Ip Man: The Final Fight was written by Checkley Sin (one of the film's producers), who is a student of Ip Chun. [5]
Checkley Sin invested over HK$100 million for the construction of the Xiqiao DreamWorks film studio in Mount Xiqiao, Foshan, Guangdong, recreating sets that imitate colonial Hong Kong of the early 1950s. Principal photography took place in August 2012 at the studio. Anita Yuen remarked that she felt like she had travelled back in time after entering the studio. [6] [7]
Ip Man: The Final Fight was the opening film at the 37th Hong Kong International Film Festival on 17 March 2013. [8] It was released in mainland China on 22 March 2013, and in Hong Kong theatres on 28 March. [9] Ip Man: The Final Fight was chosen for the 2013 San Diego Asian Film Festival. [10]
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 67% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 18 reviews, with an average rating of 5.64/10. [11] At Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 55 out of 100 based on 10 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". [12]
Deborah Young of The Hollywood Reporter wrote:
... Herman Yau's Ip Man – The Final Fight is an enjoyable if far less sophisticated tale that nostalgically taps into Hong Kong cinema of yesteryear, while still delivering considerable excitement in the fight scenes. Offshore, it may hitch a ride with dyed-in-the-wool martial arts fans on the coattails of The Grandmaster , but more likely will get lost in the shadow. [13]
Yvonne Teh of South China Morning Post wrote:
And while veteran writer Erica Li Man's treatment of the Ip Man story can at times feel like it's been stretched too thin, her script helps to flesh out the principles of wing chun and provide an added layer to the martial art whose moves action choreographers Li Chung-chi and Checkley Sin Kwok-lam have captured to great effect in this movie. [14]
Hong Kong film director Patrick Kong commented in Headline Daily :
The most exciting part is actually Anthony Wong's vivid performance. He brought Ip Man's emotions to life. That is not acting, it's a way of getting along swimmingly [with his character], something that cannot be described in words. Only through watching can we feel it and discover that it's breathtaking. [15]
Hong Kong film critic Sek Kei, writing for Ming Pao , said:
One of the advantages of Ip Man: The Final Fight is that it has a good mix of culture, martial arts, nostalgia and realism. However, disappointingly, it avoids the actual political situation of that era. It does not mention the civil war nor the riots in Hong Kong during Ip Man's time, so it fails to reflect the truth in history. [16]
Samuel "Sammo" Hung Kam-bo is a Hong Kong actor, martial artist, film producer and director, known for his work in martial arts films, Hong Kong action cinema, and as a fight choreographer for other actors such as Kim Tai-chung, Jackie Chan, Yuen Biao, and Yuen Wah.
Ip Man, also known as Yip Man, was a Chinese martial artist. He became a teacher of the martial art of Wing Chun when he was 20. He had several students who later became martial arts masters in their own right, the most famous among them being Bruce Lee.
Leung Ting is a Hong Kong martial artist, publisher, choreographer, screenwriter, director, and former actor. He is also the founder of International WingTsun Association. He was a student of Leung Sheung and later become the last student of grandmaster Yip Man.
Foshan is a prefecture-level city in central Guangdong Province, China. The entire prefecture covers 3,848 km2 (1,486 sq mi) and had a population of 9,498,863 as of the 2020 census. The city is part of the western side of the Pearl River Delta Economic Zone whose built-up area was home to 65,694,622 inhabitants as of 2020, making it the biggest urban area of the world.
Chan Wah-shun, nicknamed Money Changer Wah (找錢華) and Money Clutcher Wah (爪錢華), was a student of the Wing Chun grandmaster Leung Jan (梁贊). He is noted for being the martial arts teacher of Ip Man.
Leung Jan was a Chinese martial artist and Wing Chun practitioner from Heshan, Guangdong. He was known in Foshan as Mr. Jan of Foshan and King of Wing Chun Kuen.
Ip Chun, also known as Yip Chun or Yip Jun, is a Chinese martial artist and actor in the style of Wing Chun. He is the elder of two sons. Chun's father, Ip Man, was the Wing Chun teacher of Bruce Lee.
Sum Nung or Cen Neng (岑能) was a Peruvian-Chinese martial artist. He was a Grandmaster of the Wing Chun style and the only disciple of martial artist Yuen Kay Shan. At the age of 18, he became famous in Foshan, and is now considered the father of Wing Chun of Guangzhou.
There are at least eight distinct lineages of the martial art Wing Chun. These are mostly little-known outside of China, and each has its own history of origin. In the West, Wing Chun's history has become a mix of fact and fiction due to the impacts of early secrecy and modern marketing. Additionally, there are competing genealogies within the same branch or about the same individual teacher.
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Wong Shun-leung[a] was a Hong Kong martial artist who studied Wing Chun kung fu under Yip Man (葉問) and was credited with training Bruce Lee. In interviews, Wong claimed to have won at least 60, and perhaps over 100, street fights against martial artists of various styles, though these numbers cannot be independently confirmed. Due to his reputation, his students and admirers referred to him as 'Gong Sau Wong'. Wong recorded one instructional film entitled Wing Chun: The science of in-fighting.
Ip Man is a 2008 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film based on the life of Ip Man, a grandmaster of the martial art Wing Chun and teacher of martial artist legend Bruce Lee. The film focuses on events in Ip's life that supposedly took place in the city of Foshan during the Sino-Japanese War. The film was directed by Wilson Yip, and stars Donnie Yen as the titual character, with martial arts choreography by Sammo Hung. The film co-stars Simon Yam, Lynn Hung, Lam Ka-tung, Xing Yu, Hiroyuki Ikeuchi, and Tenma Shibuya. The film was a co-production between China and Hong Kong, and was the last film to be distributed by Mandarin Films.
Ip Man 2 is a 2010 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film loosely based on the life of Ip Man, a grandmaster of the martial art Wing Chun. A sequel to the 2008 film Ip Man, Ip Man 2 was directed by Wilson Yip and stars Donnie Yen, who reprises the leading role. Continuing after the events of the earlier film, the sequel centres on Ip's early life in British Hong Kong. He attempts to propagate his discipline of Wing Chun, but faces rivalry from other practitioners, including the local master of Hung Ga martial arts, Hung Chun-nam, and later the British boxing champion Taylor "The Twister" Miller.
Ip Ching was a Hong Kong martial artist, co-author for various short books, and a technical consultant for most movies related to him. He was one of five Grandmasters of the Ip Man family of Wing Chun Kung Fu.
The Legend Is Born: Ip Man is a 2010 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film based on the early life of the Wing Chun grandmaster Ip Man, directed by Herman Yau and starring Dennis To in the title role. The film was followed by a sequel in 2013, Ip Man: The Final Fight. Though not made in collaboration with Wilson Yip's Ip Man or Ip Man 2, The Legend is Born features several actors who appeared in Yip's films, including Sammo Hung, Louis Fan, and Chen Zhihui. The film also features a special appearance by Ip Chun, the son of Ip Man. Released as Ip Man Zero in German and Dutch-speaking areas.
The Grandmaster is a 2013 martial arts drama film based on the life story of the Wing Chun grandmaster Ip Man. The film was directed and written by Wong Kar-wai. It was released on 8 January 2013, in China. It was the opening film at the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival in February 2013. The film was selected as part of the 2013 Hong Kong International Film Festival. The Weinstein Company acquired the international distribution rights for the film. The film was selected as the Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards, making the January shortlist, but ultimately did not receive the nomination. Despite this, the film was nominated for Best Cinematography and Best Costume Design.
Ip Man is a 2013 Chinese television series romanticizing the life of Ip Man, a Chinese martial artist specialising in Wing Chun.
Ip Man 3 is a 2015 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film directed by Wilson Yip, produced by Raymond Wong and written by Edmond Wong with action choreography by Yuen Woo-ping. It is the third film in the Ip Man film series based on the life of the Wing Chun grandmaster Ip Man and features Donnie Yen reprising the title role. Ip Man's pupil Bruce Lee is portrayed by Danny Chan and Ip Man's fellow Wing Chun expert and rival Cheung Tin-chi (張天志), also known as Sum Nung, is portrayed by Zhang Jin. The film also features Mike Tyson. Principal photography commenced in March 2015 and ended in June of that year.
Ip Man 4: The Finale is a 2019 Hong Kong-Chinese biographical martial arts film directed by Wilson Yip, who also produced with Raymond Wong, and Donnie Yen, who also stars as the title character. It is the fourth film in the Ip Man film series, which is loosely based on the life of the Wing Chun grandmaster of the same name.
Cheung Wing-sing was the wife of Wing Chun master Ip Man.
《終極一戰》最精采其實是黃秋生活靈活現的演出,他把葉問的喜怒哀樂完全立體化,那不是演技,而是一種水乳交融,非筆墨所能形容,唯有看到才能感受,才會歎為觀止。
有文有武,有懷舊有寫實,是《葉問:終極一戰》的優點,可惜仍然迴避政治實況,不提葉問時代的國共惡鬥與香港右派左派暴動,難以重現歷史真相。