Drunken Master

Drunken Master is a Hong Kong martial arts comedy from 1978, directed by Yuen Woo-ping for Seasonal Film Corporation. It followed his earlier film Snake in the Eagle's Shadow from the same year; Jackie Chan stars in both. The film works with a fictionalised version of the young Wong Fei-hung, who is raised by the old hermit Beggar So, a master of drunken fist, and the comedy revolves around his training. Beggar So is played by Yuen Siu-tien, the director's father. The rival Yim Tit-sam, known as Thunderfoot, is played by the Korean Hwang Jang-lee, who shows off striking high taekwondo kicks in the film. At the centre of the film is zuiquan, a collective name for Chinese styles imitating the movements of a drunk. The film presents the set of the Eight Drunken Immortals; according to English Wikipedia, it was probably created by Yuen Woo-ping on the basis of routines from other systems. The real Wong Fei-hung (1847–1925) from Foshan practised Hung Ga and drunken fist and was also a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine; according to the same source, the film presents a fictionalised version of him. Together with Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, the film, according to English Wikipedia, kicked off the trend of comedy in martial arts films. Akira Toriyama, according to the same source, named it as one of the main inspirations for the manga Dragon Ball. Its direct sequel is Drunken Master II (1994), directed by Lau Kar-leung.

Martial arts in this work

Fight choreography

The director himself, Yuen Woo-ping, choreographed the fights; he studied for a year as a day pupil at the China Drama Academy under Yu Jim-yuen. Jackie Chan, a member of the group Seven Little Fortunes, learned acrobatics and martial arts at the same school from 1960 for about ten years; he later earned a black belt in hapkido under Jin Pal Kim. According to the sources used, he did not practise zuiquan as a style of its own. Yuen Siu-tien, who plays Beggar So, also trained in Peking opera in the role of wusheng, that is, a martial character. The kicks of the character Yim Tit-sam are performed by Hwang Jang-lee, who trained in taekwondo from 1957 and in 1965 was an instructor of the armies of South Korea and South Vietnam. According to Chan's autobiography I Am Jackie Chan: My Life in Action, as cited by English Wikipedia, Chan nearly lost an eye during filming after an injury to the brow ridge.

Fact and fiction

Zuiquan is a real group of Chinese styles. The oldest written mention of drunken fighting is in the novel Water Margin (the character Wu Song), and the 18th-century manual Boxing Classic describes Shaolin monks practising the eight drunken immortals. The Taoist branch uses the eight immortals, for example Lü Dongbin or Li Tieguai, as archetypes with distinct traits (sword, staff, kicks). According to English Wikipedia, the film's set of the Eight Drunken Immortals was probably created by Yuen Woo-ping from routines of other systems. Both Wong Fei-hung and Beggar So are fictionalised in the film. English Wikipedia, in its article on the film, lists Beggar So as a real figure of Chinese folklore and one of the Ten Tigers of Canton; the article on Wong Fei-hung places his father Wong Kei-ying among the Ten Tigers and names So Chan among his teachers. We have not been able to establish whether they are the same person.

People and martial arts

• Yuen Woo-pingDirector
• Yuen Woo-pingFight choreographer
• Jackie ChanActor — as Wong Fei-hung· Zui Quan (Drunken Boxing) (portrays the art on screen)
• Hwang Jang-leeActor — as Yim Tit-sam· Taekwondo (real practitioner)

Series