The lovely Michelle Yeoh plays Wing Chun, a brilliant martial artist who lives in a tofu shop in a small village, with her aunt, Abacas Fong (King-Tan Yuen). Wing rescues a beautiful woman, Charmy (Catherine Hung), and her sick husband from a gang of bandits that plague the locals. Unfortunately, the husband dies, so the young widow goes to work in the tofu shop, where she attracts many new customers, including local scholar Wong (Waise Lee).
Enter Leung Pok-To (Donnie Yen), a fighter who has returned to the village after many years in order to marry his sweetheart, Wing Chun. He believes Charmy to be his wife-to-be and Wing Chun to be a man (because of the clothes she wearsa common plot device in Eastern movies) and this sets the scene for several farcical moments involving mistaken identities and sexual innuendo (including one in which Wong is tricked into bedding Abacus).
After much lame smutty comedy, the film returns to the action, with nasty bandit, Flying Monkey (who also has a thing for Charmy) attempting to abduct the pretty tofu girl. However, Wing Chun foils his plot, burning off his tallywhacker in the process!
When bandit leader Flying Chimp sees what Wing Chun has done, he kidnaps Charmy and challenges Wing to a duel. Wing wins and Charmy is released, but Wing must return three days later for another bout. If she loses, she must stay in the bandit lair where Flying Chimp hopes to 'tame' the beautiful fighter.
With its talented cast and proficient director (Yuen Woo-Ping), I had high hopes for Wing Chun. Unfortunately, the film didn't live up to my expectations, ending up as a pretty average mix of silly comedy and over-the-top martial arts sequences that rely far to heavily on clever editing and Woo-Ping's trademark wire-fu trickery.
I do not deny that Wing Chun is pretty inoffensive fun and there are worse ways to spend your time, but with a film starring two of my favourite HK stars, Michelle Yeoh and Donnie Yen, I was really hoping for something special.
Enter Leung Pok-To (Donnie Yen), a fighter who has returned to the village after many years in order to marry his sweetheart, Wing Chun. He believes Charmy to be his wife-to-be and Wing Chun to be a man (because of the clothes she wearsa common plot device in Eastern movies) and this sets the scene for several farcical moments involving mistaken identities and sexual innuendo (including one in which Wong is tricked into bedding Abacus).
After much lame smutty comedy, the film returns to the action, with nasty bandit, Flying Monkey (who also has a thing for Charmy) attempting to abduct the pretty tofu girl. However, Wing Chun foils his plot, burning off his tallywhacker in the process!
When bandit leader Flying Chimp sees what Wing Chun has done, he kidnaps Charmy and challenges Wing to a duel. Wing wins and Charmy is released, but Wing must return three days later for another bout. If she loses, she must stay in the bandit lair where Flying Chimp hopes to 'tame' the beautiful fighter.
With its talented cast and proficient director (Yuen Woo-Ping), I had high hopes for Wing Chun. Unfortunately, the film didn't live up to my expectations, ending up as a pretty average mix of silly comedy and over-the-top martial arts sequences that rely far to heavily on clever editing and Woo-Ping's trademark wire-fu trickery.
I do not deny that Wing Chun is pretty inoffensive fun and there are worse ways to spend your time, but with a film starring two of my favourite HK stars, Michelle Yeoh and Donnie Yen, I was really hoping for something special.