Ip Man
moves to Hong Kong where he fights rival martial arts masters and corrupt
officials.
Ip Man 2
builds on the foundations laid out by the first iteration delivering a better,
smarter product on almost any fronts.
The story
is still spot on and also, very refreshing. The quiet, unassuming, Ip Man is
light years away from the conflicted heroes of Hard Boiled cinema or the
slapstick protagonists of Jackie Chan fame. It’s strange how martial arts
movies still have to get Ip Man as a character.
Although
they swiftly produced, not one, but two copycat movies about Ip Man in less
than two years. This prompted Donnie Yen, our titular Ip Man, to declare that
Ip Man as a subject is over saturated therefore shelving any prospect for Ip
Man 3. Please think about that Donnie! We need some more Ip Man!
Pleads to
Donnie yen aside, let’s get back to the movie.
The
narrative is more coherent, the story may be very tiny, it can be summarized as
“Ip Man is looking for a job”, but it works well. The various characters just work,
with a stand up in Sammo Hung as a rival martial arts master.
Speaking of
Hung, who also choreographed the fights, the martial art in this movie is just
spectacular. The mid movie fight between Hung and Yen is the material of
legends, is the kind of fight that can convert a non believer into martial arts
cinema.
The ending
fight, although still nice, is comparatively a letdown. Maybe it resonated with
the Chinese but for us westerners martial arts vs boxing isn’t that
interesting.
Conclusion:
A masterpiece, so good in his genre that it transcends it.
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