#danny chan

[kdram-chjh]

Cmovie: Shaolin Soccer (2001) | dir. by Stephen Chow

Glorious rescue | Shaolin soccer | Kamin • EMIN & JONY #edits #shorts #shaolin #soccer

Watch this video on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/becnRacC3Z0

[theersatzcowboy]

An Autumn's Tale 秋天的童話 (1987)

This undeniably sweet New York Love Story from Hong Kong New Wave filmmaker Mabel Cheung (who studied film at New York University) stars a particularly adorable Chow Yun-fat as a streetwise guy who comes to care for his (distant) cousin (a beautiful Cherie Chung) after she moves to New York City for school and struggles to adjust to her new environs. Their romance unfurls against a texturally rich city landscape, making it a true love letter to the Big Apple from an outsider's perspective.

Director: Mabel Cheung

Cinematographers: David Chung and James Hayman

Starring: Chow Yun-fat, Cherie Chung, and Danny Chan

[ponderingrandomthings]

Oh man. Found some more beautiful insights to this already lovely movie! (One ad comes in between, skip it.)

[artstationable]

Danny Chan 陳志偉

BAFTA Nominated & Concept Artist at Just Won't Die

artstation twitter instagram dannychan.carrd.co linkedin

More from «Artstation» here

[ojcobsessed]

oliver out clubbing with friends danny chan, emily beecham and poppy corby-tuech at the after party for the london premiere of the film "how to have sex." shared by danny, emily and poppy on their instagram stories on 4 november 2023. oliver followed and was followed by both the lead actress and the director of the film this week.

[adamwatchesmovies]

Kung Fu Hustle (2004)

At first, Kung Fu Hustle looks like one kind of comedy: a spoof of period-piece martial arts films. You know the ones. They have these wildly exaggerated villains with demonic martial art skills, heroes with abilities that defy gravity but can only be unlocked once they achieve inner peace - while craving revenge -, a small population of hopeless wretches that need a savior and wild stunts - all of which are taken very seriously. At lampooning this genre, it’s masterful. We get many big laughs. And then, something changes. Suddenly, the movie becomes something else that recontextualizes everything you saw before…

In 1940s Shanghai, the notorious Axe Gang have the police in their pocket and everyone cowering. The only people who escape their attention are those linving in slums too poor to be worthy of their attention. In Pigsty Alley, petty crooks Sing (Stephen Chow) and Bone (Lam Chi-chung) attempt to extort the residents. To their surprise, everyone from the Landlady (Yuen Qiu) to her husband (Yuen Wah) to the tailor (Chiu Chi-ling) to the baker (Dong Zhihua) and the labourer Coolie (Xing Yu) turn out to be master martial artists. Humiliated, the Axe Gang retreats but it’s only a matter of time before they re-appear.

I listed the Landlady and her husband as expert fighters but this might not be the accurate description. This movie abides by its own set of rules, rules that seem to have been inspired by the Looney Tunes. Maybe the Landlord of Pig Sty Alley has super special skills. Maybe it was just funnier to have someone survive a fall from the top floor and shrug off being pummelled by their wife. When characters run, their legs turn into spinny circles with feet on the border. These slapstick laughs are a match made in heaven with kung fu movies. Sometimes, director Stephen Chow goes for the crass and juvenile jokes but most of the time, the writing is clever and subversive. The first scene has Sing attempt to pick an opponent from a crowd to show how tough he is. He keeps choosing someone who could obviously beat him and it's so good.

Kung Fu Hustle leaves you wanting to see more. What I mean is that it contains obvious references to popular film you’ve definitely seen - The Shining, Spider-man, The Matrix Reloaded - and others you haven’t because you’re just getting started with the martial arts genre. You’ll hear a line, you’ll see a detail in the background that makes you go “I bet you that’s a nod to something”. Sometimes, these Easter eggs can come off as the director showing off. Here, it displays a love for movies, an invitation for you to check out other pictures Chow loves so you can come back to "Kung Fu Hustle" and get the joke. You’ll want to, particularly once you see the big revelations this film has in store during the conclusion. You thought Kung Fu Hustle was just a parody but it’s also an homage. It loves the films its referring to and while making fun of them - in a way that’s never cynical - it also is one of those films. There’s so much to like.

If there’s one criticism to mention, it’s the special effects. Several have not aged well and look quite fake. Almost… cartoony. In a more serious film, it would be a big deal. Here? It’s almost part of the joke to have stunts no one could ever do in real life look completely unconvincing. At times, I even wondered if this was deliberate. Probably not but this movie is smart enough that it may have recognized its limitations and found a way to turn them into strengths.

Kung Fu Hustle is consistently hilarious, imaginative, lovingly crafted, thrilling and smart. I didn’t know what to expect going in but it blew me away. (Original Cantonese with English Subtitles, January 1, 2021)

[paulo35lee]

[365days365movies]

January 9, 2021: Kung Fu Hustle (2004) (Part 1)

OK, before we even get started: watch this movie. This movie is a HELL of a lot of fun, holy shit. I’ll gladly go into it, in another two-poster, but you really should watch this movie.

BUT, before you watch it, you also need to know what to expect from it. And so, let’s talk about kung-fu movies.

I’ll actually be going to martial arts films as the next sub-genre of action, so this is a great primer for it. But I’m a big fan of the genre, even though I haven’t seen a lot of it. If you’ve seen Kill Bill, especially Part 1, then you have an idea of how martial arts films work, from an American lens. However, kung-fu movies are one of China’s big contributions to the action genre. The tropes are recognizable, as are the directorial flourishes and themes. And, of course, there are the fights.

OHHHHHH, THE FIGHTS. Glorious, crazy, over-the-top, dramatic, engaging, just...I love the fights in martial arts films, so very much. So, how do you balance that with comedy? Enter Kung Fu Hustle, and I’m just gonna jump right in. I’m excited to talk about this movie.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!! You’ve been warned.

Recap

The Axe Gangsters have taken over Shanghai, in the year 1940! Their leader, Brother Sum (Danny Chan Kwok-kwan), rules the city with an iron fist. All except for Pigsty Alley, which is lorded over by the Landlord (Yuen Wah), and his wife, the Landlady (Yuen Qiu), who watches an otherwise peaceful settlement. She’s...

...something, alright.

Visiting Pigsty alley are two thugs, named Sing (Stephen Chow) and Bone (Lam Chi-chung). The former is a schemer, claiming to be a part of the Axe Gangsters. They try to blackmail a barber to providing a free haircut. This leads to Sing challenging anybody in the village to a one-on-one fight. He challenges this short man...

...and then a child.

That eventually leads up to him facing the Landlady herself, which goes as well as you’d think. 

He grabs a firecracker and throws it, claiming that it will summon the Axe Gang that he’s definitely in. Instead, he accidentally throws it at one of the Axe Gang, and manages to convince them that someone in the Alley threw it. The Landlady retreats from the challenge.

OooooooK. The gang threatens the barber from earlier, and is IMMEDIATELY DESTROYED. But not by the barber, I don’t think. That shot’s a little misleading. Anyway, they call for backup using an axe firework, and the Axe Gang invades Pigsty Alley. Just as the leader’s about to set a woman and her child on hire, a guy pops up and starts kicking ass.

And then, as this scene’s happening, a thug gets into a laundromat, where a kindly tailor from earlier…

Yeeeeeessss...

WHAT. YES. MORE.

YEAH BABY LET’S GO

I, uh...I’m a sucker for kung-fu fight scenes. They’re cool. They’re REALLY cool.

When the dust literally clears, standing together are our three martial artists, Coolie (Xing Yu), Tailor (Chiu Chi-ling), and Donut (Dong Zhihua). Awesome. More please.

Might get it, as the two guys from earlier, Sing and Bone, are captured by the Axe Gang. Turns out, yeah, they aren’t members of the gang after all, and just posed as such with a desire to join them. Sing’s also an expert lockpick, freeing them both before they’re executed by axes. Brother Sum tells that they may join if they kill someone, although he doesn’t seem to be on the up-and-up. 

The guys scheme to take revenge on the Pigsty Alley residents, with Sing claiming that he’s a natural kung-fu genius, something he’s believed since childhood when a guy on the street told him he was a natural. This is obviously a scam, which is hilarious. But he took it seriously, and used the pamphlet to train himself.

It didn’t go well.

Apparently, this event drove him to desiring a life of crime. And stolen ice cream. 

The surprise kung-fu masters are berated by the Landlady for bringing trouble to the Alley, but the villagers appear to appreciate it. Also, the tailor is pretty heavily queer-coded. And I didn’t mention it earlier, even though it’s shown, but...let’s just say the way they treat that fact didn’t age well. Like...at all. Remember, this is in 2004. Even in China, there was a certain...style of joke.

Anyway, uncomfortable elephant in the room addressed, Sing and Bone arrive, resulting in Sing getting stabbed by three separate knives and bitten by cobras. I refuse to reveal how that happens, because it’s amazing. They’re discovered by the Landlady, who…

This is a cartoon, huh. A literal live-action cartoon. I can dig it.

That brings something up, by the way. There’s a surprising amount of CGI in this film, and it didn’t age amazingly, sorry to say.

Sing heals from the stabbing and the bites VERY quickly, much to my (and his own) surprise. Meanwhile, Brother Sum hires a couple of guys who are top killers, setting them against Pigsty Alley’s three fighters. Speaking of the fighters, they’ve been kicked out of the Alley. But as they’re getting ready to leave, they decide to test each other. By fighting.

I might get more, as Coolie passes the two killers, one of whom is playing a guanzheng, a traditional Chinese harp. Unfortunately for me, however, the harp appears to be magical, and kills Coolie with its melodic rhythm, beheading him. Tailor goes up against them shortly after, where we see that the harp seems to create invisible mystical swords, fists, and force. WHICH IS RAD AS HELL

Tailor and Donut go against them, and the Harpists both work together to take them on and…

I...just...it...they…

Well, never mind, since the last two martial artists are down for the count at this point. Damn. That was a VERY cool scene, holy shit. It was legitimately awesome, and I can’t wait for the

...The Landlord and Landlady are martial artists, too. WHAT. YES. HOLY SHIT YES.

And while the effects certainly aren’t the greatest here, I don’t care. LOOK AT THIS SHIT.

Then, when I think the action can’t get any cooler...the comedy comes back with a vengeance.

This movie. This movie rules. AND I AM ONLY HALFWAY IN GODDAMMIT

Speaking of, let’s break this up into two parts! Part 2 later today!