Fridae

The eponymous character of this movie is the grandmaster of modern Wing Chun, and this is the second instalment of the life story of the man who would up end teaching young Bruce Lee martial arts in Hong Kong. This is loosely speaking a biopic, meaning that it has far more to do with the telling of tall tales and the creation of a folk hero who seems to have leapt out from the fiercely nationalistic “Chinese men in trouble” genre (Fist of Fury, Once Upon a Time in China).

As it turned out, the highlight of the first Ip Man movie was not its pseudo-Marxist premise of martial arts sifus as dilettantish gentlemen of leisure and male tai-tais with a kungfu and yum-cha hobby, but Donnie Yen’s turn as a Chinese Steven Seagal who mouths pithy speeches about the dignity and non-violence of Chinese kungfu while beating up and maiming opponents in one-sided matches – all with a straight face.

Despite how campy this sounds, even Wilson Yip realises what a great concept he now has on his hands – hence the sequel, despite the fact that after single-handedly incapacitating the Japanese occupation forces in Canton, everything else is a mop-up operation. The movie felt like it just couldn’t get out of the shadow of its predecessor.

As with the first Ip Man film, the follow-up features two villains in each half. Sammo Hung is a Hung Gar master who is such a bad-ass, he collects protection money from all the other dilettantish martial arts masters in Hong Kong. What does Ip Man have to cough up in order to teach his Wing Chun? Iranian Darren Shahlavi is oddly cast as a British boxer and ultimate challenger whom Ip Man has to defeat. Sadly, this time round, the ultimate villain is a vaudeville caricature, a stock white supremacist boxer type.

Action-wise, Sammo Hung and Donnie Yen’s sparring is a showcase of Hung Gar and Wing Chun techniques, while the boxing fight scenes offer nothing visually exciting in terms of boxing or wrestling. Script-wise, this sequel has the same weakness as the original film: as a character, Donnie Yen’s Ip Man is really a Chinese Steven Seagal who doesn’t face any real tests of character, skill, or hardship. But boy, does he make pithy speeches!