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With their distracting English dubs, their quirky comedy, and their frequent steeping in ancient Asian folklore, martial arts films are, admittedly, an acquired taste—like black coffee, I suppose. You see, when I first started drinking coffee, I started light—mixing the bitter black sludge at a nearby coffee shop with a packet of hot chocolate and a tub of cream. From there, I gradually cut back on the extras until I was left with plain old coffee.
When it comes to martial arts movies, then, Jackie Chan’s classic, The Legend of Drunken Master (a.k.a. Jui Kuin II, or Drunken Master II to die hard fans), is a lot like my early coffee concoction: sweet and enjoyable and pleasantly palatable—even for the uninitiated.
While accompanying his father (Lung Ti) on a trip to buy remedies for his patients, Fei Hung (Chan) accidentally ends up switching his father’s box of ginseng for a similar box containing a jade seal. When the ambassador’s men try to retrieve it, Fei Hung learns the truth: that the British ambassador is trying to smuggle it (along with other valuable Chinese artifacts) out of the country, to sell them to a museum abroad.
Meanwhile, Fei Hung has a few problems of his own at home. His father learns of the missing ginseng—and, to make matters even worse, he catches Fei Hung practicing the controversial (and forbidden) fighting style, drunken boxing. He sends Fei Hung away, but he only gets into even more trouble while drowning his sorrows.
While Fei Hung’s father may not appreciate his drunken boxing, though, the legendary Master Fu (Lau Kar-Leung) does—and he asks Fei Hung for help in stopping the artifact-stealing ambassador.
If you’re new to martial arts films, The Legend of Drunken Master is a good place to start. It isn’t particularly heavy in symbolism or ancient folklore, so you won’t need to do any research before you watch it. In fact, despite its various subplots (including a steel mill revolt—which, at first, seems somewhat irrelevant), the story is quite simple and straightforward—just a precocious young fighter (played by a not-so-young Chan) teaming up with a legendary warrior to fight against a money-hungry foreigner. The rest of the film, then, is filled with the usual action sequences and zany physical comedy—the best of which involves Fei Hung’s mischievous step-mother, who’s brilliantly portrayed by the late Anita Mui.
But while the story is entertaining and relatively easy to follow, it’s not the highlight of the film. The highlight, of course, is the fighting. Chan’s drunken boxing is spectacular—so much so, in fact, that even if you tend to tire of extended action sequences after a while (as I do), the fight scenes in Drunken Master are so jaw-droppingly remarkable that they’ll easily hold your attention. Each move is carefully choreographed and expertly performed—with plenty of comedy thrown in to keep the entertainment value high.
Of course, The Legend of Drunken Master is still a wacky, slapsticky action movie—Jackie Chan wouldn’t have it any other way. But if you enjoy ass-kicking action that’s seasoned with a laugh or two, you’re sure to love this kung-fu favorite.
