Review of Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen (2010) by Dean M — 20 Feb 2011

Amazing and very thrilling fighting sequences with Donnie Yen I ever saw - so quickly.

Chen Zhen's first big-screen incarnation was the Bruce Lee classic Fist of Fury and forty years since then, the part of the fictional martial arts hero most famous for resisting the Japanese occupation of Shanghai has been played by many actors including Jet Li and Yen himself. Last year marks the 70th years of Bruce Lee's birth, arguably the best martial artist the cinematic world has ever seen.

While aspects of the Chen Zhen character were toned down probably because the character has to continue staying under the radar, gone are the high shrieks when he fights in the beginning, and got replaced by plenty of what I thought was MMA executed in brilliantly brutal fashion, starting with the prologue action sequence which had Chen Zhen being that one man soldier, followed by yet another nod in Bruce Lee's direction when dressed in a deliberate Kato costume. This is your standard over-written hero character defined by Yen's flamboyant and self-conscious acting. Yen has earned solid acting cred in recent years, but only because he's been able to find the right role: Ip Man.

For what he falls short in the martial arts sequences, Andrew Lau tries to make up for in flashy visuals and lush cinematography. As with his other films, the director who started out as an acclaimed cinematographer takes up lensing duties here and his photography of 1920s Shanghai is grand and opulent.