Fearless

Fearless (Chinese 霍元甲, in pinyin Huo Yuanjia) is a 2006 film directed by Ronny Yu, starring Jet Li. It premiered in Hong Kong on 26 January 2006 and was released in cinemas at a running time of 105 minutes; the original cut ran about 140 minutes, and the director's cut came out on DVD in Hong Kong in January 2007. In Britain and the US it was released as Jet Li's Fearless, in Japan as Spirit. The film is loosely inspired by the life of Huo Yuanjia (1868–1910), a fighter who challenged foreign opponents in the last years of the Qing empire. Against a background of Western, Russian and Japanese imperialism, it presents him as a symbol of Chinese self-confidence. It also shows the founding of the Jingwu association and Huo's companion Nong Jinsun, its first president, played by Dong Yong. The fights were choreographed by Yuen Woo-ping and stylised as wushu. Huo Yuanjia faces opponents from other martial traditions: the Irish wrestler Hercules O'Brien (Nathan Jones), a Spanish fencer (Anthony De Longis) and the Japanese fighter Anno Tanaka (Nakamura Shido II). In promotion, Jet Li called the film his last wushu film and clarified that he would not stop making action films. Yuen Woo-ping won a Hong Kong Film Award for the choreography and was nominated for a Golden Horse award for the same work. Jet Li received the Hong Kong Film Critics Society Award for best actor for the lead role.

Martial arts in this work

Fight choreography

The fights were choreographed by Yuen Woo-ping and stylised as wushu. The opponents of Huo Yuanjia, played by Jet Li, are partly played by actors with martial training of their own. Nathan Jones, who plays the Irish wrestler Hercules O'Brien, is a powerlifter and strongman; in October 1997 he fought in MMA at the first Pride FC event, and from 1998 to 2005 he worked in professional wrestling. Anthony De Longis, who plays the Spanish fencer Anthony Garcia, is a professional stuntman, fight choreographer and weapons master; he masters Spanish fencing, Destreza, and teaches work with the whip and the rapier and dagger. The Japanese fighter Anno Tanaka is played by the kabuki and film actor Nakamura Shido II. A scene of Jet Li with Somluk Kamsing that was missing from the theatrical cut was restored to the Thai release in March 2006.

Fact and fiction

The real Huo Yuanjia was born on 18 January 1868 in Jinghai County near Tianjin, died on 14 September 1910 in Shanghai and practised Mizongyi. With Nong Jinsun he co-founded the Chin Woo (Jingwu) association in 1909–1910, China's first civic martial arts organisation not tied to one school or style. The fight with Hercules O'Brien is historically disputed: according to sources, O'Brien preferred to leave rather than fight. Huo died of complications including jaundice and tuberculosis. At the 1989 exhumation, arsenic was found in his bones, but it cannot be determined whether this was poisoning or treatment, because arsenic was used in traditional Chinese medicine; various adaptations of the legend tell of poisoning by foreigners. Huo's grandson Huo Shoujin sued Jet Li and the producers for defamation in March 2006 over the portrayal of his grandfather as a violent fighter. A Beijing court dismissed the suit in December 2006: in its view the film is not defamatory, though an exaggerated, fictional portrayal.

People and martial arts

• Huo Yuanjiathe real person the work is about· Mizongyi (Lost Track Boxing) (real practitioner)
• Ronny YuDirector
• Yuen Woo-pingFight choreographer· Kung Fu
• Jet LiActor — as Huo Yuanjia· Mizongyi (Lost Track Boxing) (portrays the art on screen)
• Nathan JonesActor — as Hercules O'Brien· Wrestling (portrays the art on screen)
• Anthony De LongisActor — as Anthony Garcia· La Verdadera Destreza (real practitioner)

Awards

• Nominated · Golden Horse Awards, Nejlepší akční choreografie (2006) — Yuen Woo-ping
• Won · Hong Kong Film Awards, Nejlepší akční choreografie (2007) — Yuen Woo-ping
• Won · Hong Kong Film Critics Society Awards, Nejlepší herec (2007) — Jet Li