17:20 For those that were curious to know how that was filmed, there was a hole in the ground where the stuntman had his real leg hidden in. The fake leg was on his upper thigh which Donnie Yen then grabbed and pretended to break. The stuntman, with his real leg in position, dropped into the hole when they called action.
My favorite part of your channel (besides Simone's shocked reactions) is George giving us rundowns about China during viewings. It is so good, thank you.
Thats why Crazy Samurai: is the best , story is not messing with action , 400 vs. 1 an unedited 77-minute long single-take action scene. You can see the actors getting tired and how they start to recycle the ones that were beaten .
Fun fact! The actor playing general Miura, Hiroyuki Ikeuchi, had never done a fight scene before this movie. You wouldn't believe that, would you? That's what you get when you have Sammo Hung directing your fight scenes.
@@Clockwork427 Being a martial arts practitioner and having done a movie fight scene are very different things. Movie martial arts are heightened for entertainment.
Yes, I was impressed even more because my only memories of him as an actor was his role of Murai in GTO (the 1998 TV serie, which I recommend) (imagine watching a new (hypotetic) Expandables movie and realizing that the badass villain used to be Jim in American Pie ^^). I'm glad he evolved in martial arts 🙂
Recommendation: I don't know if either of you guys has seen this, but Jet Li: Hero is an amazing film. It is a great story but visually it will blow you away.
It’s actually a story told from various view points, like rashamon. Each colour scheme follows a particular storyteller. As a non fan of extreme wire-fu, I didnt like it the first time I saw it. But with each subsequent viewing you can see the beauty of the directors intent. in the end you realize each fighters sacrifice just give hero a chance to kill the villain king. And then even hero’s own sacrifice for a world of subjecated peace is better than a world of constant fighting.
My dad and I both learned wing chun (my dad actually trained at Ip Man's school in Hong Kong, at the same time Bruce Lee was there). We love this movie, the wing chun kung fu that Donnie Yen uses is so recognizable. Every time he goes into chain punches I'm like 'yep, I was taught to do that' ;)
That's crazy how his wife knows he isn't fighting back. She know it would be over fairly quick; that's why lil man says basically start fighting or everything will be broken. That's when you know your a boss martial artist. The original IP Man was a boss. And so is my man Donnie Yen. I've seen this movie, tons of times and never get tired of seeing it. Great movie all around.
It's so good to have a reaction video with someone who can comment little cultural things and historical backgrounds. Makes this content much richer. Really appreciate it.
Another Donnie Yen movie you may want to check out is "Iron Monkey" released in 1993. In it, Donnie plays Wong Kei-Ying, the father of legendary Chinese cinema figure Wong Fei-Hung.
The escalation of the fights shows so much about Ip Man’s character. His first match was friendly, barely touching his opponent. The next was less restrained. Then, when he fought the 10 black belts and later the general, he tore them to pieces. It says so much about how the events of the movie affect the man.
@@CineBingeReact Ah I really hope you guys enjoy Ip Man 2. While I like the overall message Chinese cinema really like to crank the "Western Imperialists'" thing to an 11.
One of my favorite wuxia films. Fun fact: Donnie Yon did not know Wing Chun before he started this film, but he trained so hard to master it that actual practitioners of the style assumed he'd been doing it for years.
Yeah he trained WC for only 9 months before filming which is crazy. He's a genius when it comes to martial arts. He used so many different styles in his movies and it always looks like he never trained anything else.
This is not a WuXia（武侠）film. The outfit what they wearing can tells. 武侠 mostly happens in old times or ancient China. Ip man more like a National hero's movie .
This is not a wuxia bro. A wuxia is much more further timeline back with clans and such. Wuxia is a 'tale'. U know..those kungfu movies with hocus pocus swords skills and weird weapons. With characters that full of egotism and weird self philosophy. In short...a wuxia is like Lord Of The Ring, Conan The Barbarian in the western story telling. (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Hero, Swordsman, Seven Swords.. etc). If u want donnie's wuxia...watch 13 Blades.
I love all of George’s info on the background of the Chinese it’s really great, & seeing these movies then looking up how IP man’s life went is crazy like he was such a great humble guy
I think the important thing to get from this is how he did the same moves without hurting the first teacher who challenged. So, in kung-fu, there are techniques that can be used of no effect can be of significant affect.-Ernie Moore Jr.
If they do, I'd recommend starting with "Snake In Eagle's Shadow" and "Drunken Master". They were filmed around the same time, with some of the same cast. They were also the movies that launched Jackie to stardom in the east.
Brings back memories of why I trained wing chun when I was younger, my arms still remember the ache from the thousands of punches. Donnie does such a good job in this film portraying Ip Man.
Unpopular opinion: My favorite Ip Man film is actually The Legend is Born: Ip Man (from 2010). It has Ip Chun (Ip Man's real life son) playing in it. It's not a masterpiece but the fight choregraphy is pretty good. And it's got Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao in it.
@CineBinge React If you guys would consider reacting to this film, you can do it at pretty much any time. "The Legend is Born: Ip Man" is disconnected from the Ip Man film series.
the movie reminds me of the bruce lee movie from lee's wife, or at least it plays like that way cuz of the foreign exchange and international travel. I have to say, The legend is Born: Ip Man is another of my favorites as well.
Ip Man and other Hong Kong martial arts movies were my childhood staple growing up because the national channels would air them on weekends every Sunday morning. Thank you for reacting to it. I really hope that the good folks in Patreon can suggest Kung Fu Hustle. Its an all time classic.
A fun fact: My father actually learn Wing Chun from Grandmaster Ip Man's second son, Ip Ching. And I learn from my father. Ip Ching had talked about his father beating some Japanese, that he heard from Ip Man, but definitely not 10 of them at the same time, that would be crazy
The movie does that for dramatization and the "cool factor". And while the fight scenes are amazing, there is another reason the movie stands out to me: The way they portrayed Master Ip's manners and honor. He literally embodies the spirit of martial arts.
@@ninjavigilante5311 its had such an impact on how i look at cinema, especially at my age at the time i saw it. Reason i love it so much is because it gave me a indepth view at how spectacular a scene can be portrayed in terms of writing, music, and acting. Still 10 out of 10 to me.
@@mrbard1 Not saying it isn't a great fight scene, even though it was the great Donnie yen doing the fighting the action was sammo hungs mastery of wing chun.. besides Donnie and lam ching yin being the best wing chun practitioners of screen, sammo did the greatest wing chun movies ever.
If you guys do want to see a doctor breaking down the fight scene, look up the channel Dr Hope's Sick Notes. He does fight scene break downs for a lot of films, including this one.
20:40 - The Ip Man training montage was what got me to lose weight from around 215 to 160. I started weights and running 5K every day since 2020, and I remember at the start I was like “wtf am I doing”. Only 6 months in I started feeling stronger, and then everything just took off after that. Kung Fu really is about mastery of anything - could be running, could be cleaning. It’s part muscle memory and part determination of your spirit.
Hi Simone and George, I also highly recommend seeing the Wuxia epic Hero (2002) by Zhang Yimou. Donnie Yen has an impressive supporting role, while Jet Li and Tony Leung are fantastic as the leads.
13:15 A grain of rice expands more than double when boiled. You say a small bag of rice, since I boil rice and pop unpopped popcorn, I have a mention. The amount of rice in a bag that size, might be enough to feed a family of four to six people fair to good portions twice a day for eight days.-Ernie Moore Jr.
The flurry of punches is called the 'Chain Punch'. It is not a full strength impact, but lands with enough strength to keep the opponent disoriented, but hits at such a frequency that once one connects it becomes highly difficult to defend against it. The interesting aspect about Ip Man and the whole of Win Chun (don't ask, there are dozens of ways to transcribe it, and as many different schools of thought of how it should be taught) is that it teaches you NOT to fight if you can avoid it. Fighting should always be a last resort, never the first solution. Running away is completely acceptable if no-one is put in danger through that action. I was lucky enough to study under a second generation student of Ip Man, ie a student of a student of Ip Man. It was long before the schism among the many schools of what is now considered to be a martial art so fractured by now that no-one can claim to be in full understanding of the original teachings of the original nun Ng Mui that created this fighting style. Ip Man himself was also not a direct student of her, but also recieved the traditional information by his teachers, IIRC.
Ip Man was born as Ip Kai-man (葉繼問) to Ip Oi-dor (葉靄多) and Ng Shui (吳瑞) as the third of four children. He grew up in a wealthy family in Foshan (Fatshan), Guangdong (Kwangtung), and received traditional Chinese education, alongside his elder brother Ip Kai-gak (葉繼格), elder sister Ip Wan-mei (葉允媚) and younger sister Ip Wan-hum (葉允堪). Ip started learning Wing Chun from Chan Wah-shun when he was 9 or 13. Chan was 57 at the time, and Ip became Chan's 16th and last student. Due to Chan's age, he was able to train Ip for only three years before suffering a mild stroke in 1909 and retiring to his village. Ip learned most of his skills and techniques from Chan's second most senior student, Ng Chung-sok (吳仲素). At the age of 16, with help from his relative Leung Fut-ting, Ip moved to Hong Kong and there he attended school at St. Stephen's College, a secondary school for wealthy families and foreigners living in Hong Kong. Six months after moving to Hong Kong, a classmate of Ip's named Lai told him that a friend of Lai's father who was an expert in Kung Fu techniques was living with them and had offered to have a friendly sparring match with Ip. At the time, Ip was undefeated, so he eagerly accepted the challenge. He went to Lai's house on a Sunday afternoon and, after exchanging brief pleasantries, challenged the man to a duel. The man was Leung Bik and he easily overwhelmed Ip Man. Incredulous at the speed with which he had been countered, Ip requested a second duel and was beaten again, just as soundly. Discouraged by his defeat, Ip left without a word and afterward was so depressed that he did not dare mention that he knew Kung Fu. A week later, Lai told him that the man he had fought was asking after him. Ip replied that he was too embarrassed to return, at which point Lai told him that Leung Bik had highly praised his Kung Fu techniques and that he was the son of Leung Jan, who trained Ip's master Chan Wah-shun. Ip proceeded to train with Leung Bik, until Leung's death in 1911. Ip returned to Foshan in 1916 when he was 24 and became a police officer there for the Nationalist government. He taught Wing Chun to several of his subordinates, friends and relatives, but did not officially run a martial arts school. He married Cheung Wing-sing and they had several children: sons Ip Chun and Ip Ching and daughters Ip Nga-sum (葉雅心) and Ip Nga-wun (葉雅媛). Ip was a member of the Kuomintang, and according to rumors, he joined the Central Bureau of Investigation and Statistics in its academy in Guizhou in 1938, after which he would have returned to Foshan as an undercover intelligence officer. However, the veracity of this has been disputed. Ip went to live with Kwok Fu during the Second Sino-Japanese War and only returned to Foshan after the war, where he resumed his career as a police officer. Ip found some time to train his second son Ip Ching during the year 1949. At the end of 1949 after the Chinese Communist Party won the Chinese Civil War, as Ip was a member of the Kuomintang, Ip, his wife and their elder daughter Ip Nga-sum left Foshan for Hong Kong. Life in Hong Kong Ip, his wife Cheung and their daughter arrived in Hong Kong through Macau in 1950. His wife and daughter would later return to Foshan to retrieve their identity cards. However, due to the closure of borders between China and Hong Kong in 1951, Ip and Cheung were separated for good, with the latter remaining in Foshun until her death. Initially, Ip Man's teaching business was poor in Hong Kong because Ip's students typically stayed for only a couple of months. He moved his school twice: first to Castle Peak Road in Sham Shui Po, and then to Lee Tat Street (利達街) in Yau Ma Tei. By then, some of his students had attained proficiency in Wing Chun and were able to start their own schools. They would go on and spar with other martial artists to compare their skills, and their victories helped to increase Ip's fame. Around 1955, he had a mistress from Shanghai, who was referred to by his students simply as Shanghai Po (上海婆). Ip and this mistress also had an illegitimate son named Ip Siu-wah (葉少華). Meanwhile, in Foshan, his wife Cheung died of cancer in 1960. Ip never formally introduced his mistress to his other sons, who eventually arrived in Hong Kong to reunite with him in 1962. In 1967, Ip and some of his students established the Ving Tsun (Wing Chun) also pronounced as "Wing Chun" Athletic Association (詠春體育會). The main purpose of the Ving Tsun Athletic Association was to help Ip tackle his financial difficulties in Hong Kong, which was due to his supposed regular use of opium. One of his former students, Duncan Leung, claimed that Ip used tuition money to support his opium addiction. Ip's mistress died of cancer in 1968, and their son later became a Wing Chun practitioner like his half-brothers.
Another great Donnie Yen movie (there are so many!) is Dragon/Wu Xia, also starring Takeshi Kaneshiro. It's a period piece, a film noir, and a martial arts film all rolled into one. So good.
Hands down my favorite Donnie Yen movie, but if you guys ever react to it (or watch it on your own) I recomend not watching the trailer or reading the summary, I think it's way more interesting to try and discover the answer to "the big secret being investigated" rather that know it before hand.
I always love the way these kinds of films weave together history with fiction and action. Once Upon a Time in China is another great one that does this. The first two in particular are my favorites. I like how they touch on the Westernization of China. Plus seeing Jet Li in his prime is amazing. I hope you cover those films in the future.
many countries would have their own martial art. mine from barbados has one we call "stick licking" like the feather duster used in a fencing style. the last great master passed away and a few of my friends studied under him so maybe it will live on
Open handed strikes to the head and ears are some of the worst. You can rupture ear drums, break cheekbones, completely upset your opponents equilibrium. They are highly effective and there is a combat sport from Ancient Greece called Pankration and in the modern equivalent you can't punch so you throw open handed strikes. The long pole IP Man used is known as a dragon pole in Wing Chun and is usually between eight and thirteen feet long. It requires a lot of strength and control to use effectively. That first instance you asked about where the guy knocks the master down and he comes right back up is doable without wires and is called a "kip up". It's fairly standard in many martial arts and acrobatics because it's the fastest way to go from supine to standing in the shortest amount of time.
_Ip Man_ and its sequels are so good, and another thing that I love about the first two is that the legendary Sammo Hung did fight choreography (anyone who has seen him and/or his choreography will instantly know that they are in for a treat!). In fact, in the second film you get to see Sammo play a role and, if you’re not familiar with him, you will be amazed at what he can do. When it came to the third film Sammo was replaced by Yuen Wo-Ping for action choreography, which is a bit of a shame but it and the fourth film are still worth watching.
Did anyone else catch what happens at about 17:53 ? Not sure that was part of the movie. I actually had to go back to see if what I saw was actually there.
I would definitely enjoy a reaction to Ip Man 2 and 3. As you said, it definitely gets more and more fictional as the movies go on, but the martial arts are still great to watch.
Definitively recommend the Gand Master as one of my favorite movies of all time, cinematographically speaking, not a mass consumption movie, but just mesmerizing to look at.
OK, if you're into Chinese films, you should really watch the filmography of Zhang Yimou. He made Wuxia films *Hero* and *House of Flying Daggers.* But he also made controversial and banned films such as *Raise the Red Lantern* and *To Live.* My own favorite filmmaker is Hong Kong Director Wong Kar Wai, who made indie classics *Days of Being Wild,* *Chungking Express,* *Fallen Angels* and *Happy Together.* And lastly, one of the most relevant mainland filmmakers today is Jiang Wen, who made the controversial World War II film *Devils at the Doorstep* and the roaring commercial success *Let the Bullets Fly.* And puzzling to me, very few of these movies have gotten any attention on the RU-vid reactosphere.
I think the thing that gets me the most about the fight with 10 men is that it is truely the first time we see IP Man get upset. Up to then he was quite easy going but when finally pushed over the edge he unleashes hell!
You guys should react to the rest of the Ip Man films! All 4 of them (in total). This is the first reaction video where one of the person knows what's going on, so I'm really looking forward to it! Pretty please? I believe a lot of people would love to see it!
Placing the yam down by the bloody rice bag was also to show the whole "not much, but came from honorable work", in contrast to the more plentiful, but blood stained rice you get from selling out your country The yam is more honorable
To add to the stories of oppression and spill of blood from the JP invasion: 1) women were gang raped of course, where a katana had its tip pointed at the throat of woman being raped so she'd skewer her throat if she bends down. 2) its common for women and children to hide in closets. However JP soldiers would shoot into the closets without even checking if there's anyone in there 3) In the Ip Man movie, when they explained the JP invasion, the subtitles missed mentioning Ip Man's home was taken over by the JP military as a base for headquarters. The Chinese Communist Party also did the same to their own people. They still owe many properties to the people to this day including to my family. Nothing is worse than war from your own people compared to foreign powers in my opinion. 3.5) The subtitles say pride too much but that's not a word they bring up that much, Ip man doesn't want to owe favors would be a more accurate statement than him having pride. 4) My dad's also born in 1959 so I'm prob close to age to you guys lol 5) only those of my grandparents' generation have a grudge against JP but that stuff is lost on me for diff reasons
George you have a gentle spirited light that glows every time emotion overflows in you. You are a person I would love to sit and have a beer or prayer and a general chat with about life. Love your content and reaction to this movie as I am a huge Donnie Yen fan. Please don’t change as I will look forward to more…
Old Jet Li stuff would be great too. Once Upon a Time in China, Fist of Legend, or newer stuff like Hero or Fearless. Fearless is definitely in the same vein as Ip Man.
FYI…The Grandmaster is the more accurately depicted film of Yip Man aka IP Man. Also, fun fact…Yip Man’s son actually taught Donnie Wing Chun for this film.
I’ve read Iris Chang’s Rape of Nanking. It’s heartbreaking, but there were a few heroes. There was even a Nazi diplomat who helped protect Chinese civilians from the atrocities. I can’t imagine the demons Chang had that would drive her to suicide. China and the Soviet Union suffered the most casualties of any nation in WW2.
One thing that is definitely noticeable in the later films with Donnie Yen as Ip Man actually will reveal is his emotional and physical control over his strength. Kind of like how Steve Rogers as Captain America held back otherwise if he went all out, he would kill normal humans with his superhuman strength. In the next films, you really can see that Ip Man demonstrates more control and has a certain modesty to his Wing Chun form. The one versus ten men scene is probably the only time we ever see his character lose absolute emotional control and it's probably one of the only times we ever see his rage take over and completely annihilate his opponents.
Interesting fact....Donnie Yen's mother had a kung fu school that was located around the corner from my work in downtown Boston when I started my job 10 years ago. I would occasionally see social media posts from him where he'd take a picture outside of her school and location tag it. Unfortunately, I never saw the posts until a few hours after the fact! It used to drive me nuts that I missed the chance to meet him.
