Review of Ip Man 4: The Finale (2019) by Player2-Water — 29 Dec 2019

E-Value: 9.

Acting: 9.

Plot: 8.

Ip Man film series is finally coming to an end with the fourth and final instalment. True to the movie title, it is also the final time for Donnie Yen to reprise the role of the legendary Wing Chun grandmaster.

In the year of 1964, Ip Man (Yen) learnt that he has a throat cancer due to many years of smoking. Life is not easy for him after his wife passed away because he has a strained relationship with with younger son, Ip Ching, whom he disapproved of his son wanting to be a martial artist like him. After Ip Ching got expelled from school for fighting against a bully, Ip Man decides to travel to San Francisco, California to find a school for his son.

Around the same time, he receives an invitation from his student, Bruce Lee, to attend a karate tournament in the same place as well. He also finds out from Master Wan (Yue), the president of Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association that Bruce Lee have taught martial arts to the Americans and they are totally against it. The association offers to write a referral letter for Ip Man to find a school for his son if he tells Bruce to stop teaching martial arts to Americans but he rejects the offer because he believes that his student is doing the right thing.

Meanwhile in the Marines boot camp, Staff Sergeant Hartman Wu tried to convince Gunnery Sergeant Barton Geddes (Adkins) to incorporate Chinese martial arts into their hand-to-hand combat training but he refuse because he believed that the current karate training is superior. Hartman later managed to convince his commanding officer to let him do some research on Chinese martial arts in the upcoming Midsummer Festival. Not happy with the outcome, Barton gets Marines karate instructor, Colin Frater, to fight the Chinese martial artists at the festival.

Just like the last three Ip Man movies, Ip Man 4: The Finale is amazing and heartwarming conclusion to series. Donnie Yen is really great and charismatic in his role. He never lost his touch on playing the role of the Wing Chun grandmaster. Scott Adkins is not bad either. He is really good in playing bad guys just like some of his similar roles in his previous movies. Adkins also did very great job in displaying his martial art skills and I really love the fight scene between him and Donnie Yen. Both of them gave each other the best fight on the big screen.

However, there is a minor drawback on this movie. First of all, Bruce Lee didn't have many scenes just like in the third instalment. His relationship with Ip Man was not deeply explored which would have made the movie even greater and better. The good thing is I'm glad this movie still have him show off his fighting skills. Speaking of fighting, all of the fighting scenes are very well shot and executed. Kudos to Yuen Woo-ping for making the fighting scenes great.

Finally, the storyline is simple to understand and easy to follow. It is nothing special or unique but it is still good enough and entertaining. The ending is very emotional and extremely sad. It's not because it is the final instalment but it also a fitting end to Donnie Yen's portrayal of Ip Man and the fate of the Wing Chun grandmaster at the end of the movie. I won't spoil it but I think you already know what it is. As for Donnie Yen and Wilson Yip, thank you for making Ip Man movies the greatest martial arts movies of all time.