Hero (1997)

A rare post studio closure kung fu spectacular from the Shaw Brothers. Even Mona Fong is involved. Longtime kung fu actor and director, Corey Yuen, has the reins.The plot follows the exploits of a refugee from Shangdong province, Ma Wing Ching, and his brother as they try to climb the ladder of success in the chaos of colonial Shanghai in the 1930's. Ma Wing Ching is a super kung fu fighter although it's never explained how he got so good. He gets involved with the local king pin Tam See, played by Yuen Biao and falls in love with a beautiful singer at one of Tam See's nightclubs. After fighting off a rival gang, Ma Wing Ching is given a chance to work for Tam See but he refuses and proceeds to build a criminal empire of his own. But it's a nice criminal empire as Ma is sympathetic to the plight of the exploited Shanghai coolies! All doesn't go well as Ma becomes the target of the rival gangs.The first thing I noticed was the excellent recreation of Shanghai and all the period trappings. This is a well designed film. The martial arts are as expected from Corey Yuen and well done. When the action is going it's very entertaining. Unfortunately Mr. Yuen's cartoonish style seems at odds with the very realistic sets. The fights are absolutely fantastic in both senses of the word. Things happen that are completely unrealistic and that sort of hurts the film. Mr. Yuen also has no sense of epic scale and many of the great sets are never shown very well. The camera-work is good but not anything to raise the film up above a dozen other martial art films of the last twenty years. The story treats the characters very superficially and that causes boredom to set in at times.Fun but not among the greats.

There is a terrific fight between Kaneshiro and Yuen early in the picture, one of the best I've ever seen, and nothing that follows it can quite match up to it (not even that hilarious anachronistic snippet near the end); it also eventually overdoses on violence for no good reason, in my opinion, but the whole film still makes for an involving experience. The audience I saw it with just loved it.

This movie (German title:"Shanghai Hero") is one of the best HK- movies I´ve seen for a long time. It has cool fighting action a clear plot and dramatic and funny moments. It has everything a good HK-movie needs. I mean there is nothing bad or ridiculous about this movie. I will give that movie 8 1/2 stars.

If anybody remembers the Shaw Bros., this revived version of early 70's classic movie, originally heroed by Kwan-Tai Chan, would suffice their expectation. Except for the absence of Chan's legendary charisma in old version (I never could have found it from Kaneshiro), this movie is full of satisfactory style and high-stunt action which are originated from Chang Cheh's works in Shaw Bros. in early 60's. Very stylish and meticuliously taken in main China, taking full consideration of old fans' taste for Biao Yuen's fantastic agility and John Woo's blood-spirting gunny action. Plot and performance are just so-so, but the music and art design are very luxurious. As an old fan, I would prefer the old one since no young-generated star like Kaneshiro could not fit for the character of Ma Wingjing,nowadays. However, as a standpoint of the renaissance of Shaw Bros.' golden age in 70's, this movie shed a confident light on their future industry, not in Hong Kong any more but in mainland China.