Movie Review: Fearless/霍元甲

Ronny Yu directed Fearless/霍元甲, and it was his return to Chinese film after spending time in Hollywood.

This was also Jet Li’s first ‘last’ martial arts movie.

Fearless/霍元甲 tells a fictionalized story based on the real-life character Huo Yuanjia, a renowned martial artist at the turn of the 20th century.

In the beginning of Fist of Fury, Bruce Lee’s character returns to Shanghai to find that his sifu is dead. His sifu is Ho Yuanjia.

Jet Li plays Huo, the son of a martial artist who wants his son to make his way in life with his head instead of his hands.

If that happened, we’d have no movie.

Huo’s father is played by Collin Chou, and he makes the most of the small role.

Huo Yuanjia learns martial arts and becomes famous for it, even as it does nothing for his personal, or emotional growth.

The film opens with a rather clumsy prologue set in the modern day, with Michelle Yeoh delivering a presentation in favor of adopting wushu as an Olympic sport.

Cue the ultra-stiff white guy asking a question, and pretty soon we’re racing back through time to the start of the actual narrative.

The movie meanders a bit, and the Director’s Cut can sometimes feel a little bit long-winded.

This is partially due to the addition of a number of scenes to the theatrical cut.

These scenes are both long and short, including the Michelle Yeoh prologue and a scene involving a trip to a neighboring village where Jet Li gets into a duel with a character played by Thai kickboxer Somrak Kamsing.

I think there’s a good reason why a lot of these extra scenes were left out of the theatrical cut, but some of them do contribute to the story.

Fearless/霍元甲 is essentially a morality tale about redemption, but it’s a very well-acted story, and that makes all the difference.

The other thing that makes the difference is Jet Li. He really impresses in this film, as both a martial artist and an actor.

Unlike other aging (not Asian), action stars, Jet Li has become a good actor.

It helps that he gets to speak Mandarin and isn’t dubbed into Cantonese.

His portrayal of Ho Yuanjia is nuanced, complex, and convincing. His ability to convey emotion and meaning with his facial expression make the impact of the character, and the story, that much more impressive.

Jet Li is surrounded by people who also turn in very notable performances.

Dong Yong plays Ho’s lifelong friend, and makes the most of a small role. He can almost be called the moral center of the film, being a kind of polar opposite to Huo Yuanjia, yet always the best kind of friend.

Betty Sun plays a blind woman who takes care of Huo at one point in the film.

It’s always risky to portray people with physical challenges, because the temptation is to overplay them, and it can get ugly.

But Betty Sun turns in a really great performance by doing just the opposite. Like Jet Li, her facial expressions say more than her dialogue.

It had to have been extra hard for her because when you play a blind person, you have to maintain a very neutral gaze. Most of our emotional affect is shown with our eyes.

So again, I think she did a great job with the role.

I also liked the way the film showed exactly how she coped with being blind, and neither valorized her nor made her out to be a victim.

Speaking of valor and victims, one thing I really appreciate about Fearless/霍元甲 is the way that it makes the very reasonable point about the Chinese, and China, not being inferior to foreigners or foreign countries.”

Like Fist of Fury, it makes this point implicitly, showing Huo Yuanjia defeating his opponents, but without dehumanizing them or making them caricatures, as was done in True Legend.

It takes a nuanced, even approach to a very real and very thorny time in China’s history, and does it in a way that is both entertaining and thought provoking.

I don’t mind national pride. I do mind simplistic, cartoonish portrayals used to advance national pride.

Thankfully, there is little to none of that here.

These are nuanced, complex characterizations that advance both the story and the principles that hold the story together.

There is certainly some overstatement, but it’s balanced by a much more human depiction than we often see in movies like this.

One of the Japanese characters is a bad, evil person. But another one of them is shown to be honest, kind, and admirable.

It was nice to see characterizations of Japanese people that wouldn’t embarrass the ghost of Mickey Rooney.

It’s the kind of thing that gets some directors in hot water up above Lo Wu.

But I was really, really glad to see such an even-handed treatment of the issue.