Tai Chi Master
Director: Yuen Wo-ping
Year: 1993
Rating: 8.0
This period kung fu film directed by Yuen Wo
Ping is primarily a Jet Li vehicle with a smaller but excellent role for
Michelle Yeoh. It's considered a classic by many, but disliked by many others
as well. In a sense, both camps have good reasons to feel this way. The film
has some incredibly sublime and astonishingly creative action moments but
others that go ludicrously overboard to the point of cartoonish exaggeration.
The film is extremely wire enhanced - and as the film progresses one gets
the sense that the filmmakers kept trying to up the ante by making the wire
work grander and grander. But by the final showdown, it has almost reached
a point of silliness. For the first 60-minutes of the film though, I think
much of it is simply brilliant.
The plot revolves around two boyhood friends (Jet and Chin Sui Ho) who grow
up together in a Shaolin temple learning discipline and kung fu until they
are kicked out (by Yu Hai - Jet Li's sifu in the Shaolin Trilogy) for fighting
(and beating) the entire student body. This action scene never fails to amaze
me. Yu Hai calls out "Luo Han Pole Formation" and the student body surrounds
the two young men with long bamboo poles and attack them in perfect unison.
Jet and Chin fight back with even more brilliant tactics. After leaving the
temple and going out into the real world they soon come into contact with
the oppressive forces of the Royal Eunuch and some opposing rebels. One of
these is Fennie Yuen and Chin takes a large liking to her.
They also chance upon a wandering minstrel, Michelle Yeoh, who is looking
for her husband who has disappeared. She finds him now married to the sister
of the Royal Eunuch - and after a lovely fight - even using stilts at one
point - she joins the rebels as well. Chin though is an ambitious lad and
soon takes a different path that brings him into tragic conflict with his
life long friend. I found this part of the film to be moving - neither friend
really wanted to go against the other - but fate had a different song to sing.
One of the most poignant and powerful action scenes in HK film is when the
rebels find themselves betrayed and surrounded by an overwhelming force and
they fight valiantly on - but get killed off one by one. It's heart rendering
and tragically choreographed.
After the disaster, Jet Li loses his mind and becomes a simpleton, but by
discovering Tai Chi and with the help of Michelle, he regains his sanity and
goes back to face his former friend. This "losing his mind" section has never
been one that I liked - though it lasts for only ten minutes or so - it stops
the film in its tracks and it never quite regains the momentum it had going.
So though the film has its weaknesses - it still possesses enough fabulous
moments and some tremendous wushu work from Jet that it is highly recommended.
Though Michelle is certainly a secondary character, she still has two solo
action scenes and is involved in a few group ones. The film also has a wonderful
sound track.
