Kung Fu culture and Kung Fu movies

Kung fu culture in general is much more influenced by Hong Kong cinematography than most people are willing to believe. While some of the things we see in those movies have some loose historical foundations, most things are actually invented by movie industry. Complete Kung Fu history, culture, practice, everything is tremendously influenced by popular action movies. I will give some clear and easy traceable examples of this influence.

Drunken fist and Golden Fenix. In one of the last interviews, one of the most influential people in Kung Fu movie industry, Lau Kar Leung, an actor, director ,choreographer and Hung Gar style master, admitted that he actually invented Drunken kung fu style. This newly invented “style” became so popular that people started to believe it is a real, historical style and many teachers started to teach it as the part of their systems or separately, notably Leung Ting who is after Yip Man probably the most well know person in Wing Chun circles. Late master Lau Kar Leung also stated that he invented Golden Fenix style as well as bunch of others. Some became popular and people started to “teach’” those “styles”.

Shaolin Wooden Men is a 1976 Hong Kong action film, directed by Chen Chi-Hwa, with Jackie Chen playing main character. It was made at Lo Wei's studio at Golden Harvest. The film was also released internationally under several alternative titles, including: "36 Wooden Men", "Shaolin Chamber of Death" ,"Shaolin Wooden Men - Young Tiger's Revenge" ,"Wooden Man" (Germany). One of the main points in plot is test of the Shaolin Wooden Men Alley, a narrow hallway containing thirty-six Shaolin Wooden Men, which are mechanical wooden dummies that attack anyone who enters the hallway. Exactly same story appears in several Wing Chun “histories” as a source of Wing Chun Wooden Dummy, notably older versions of history in William Cheung’s books. He expanded the story saying that due to the historical circumstances all those mechanical dummies were combined in one standing dummy well used in Wing Chun today.

The 36th Chamber of Shaolin, is a 1978 Hong Kong kung fu film directed by Liu Chia-liang and produced by Shaw Brothers, starring Gordon Liu and having Lau Kar Leung as a martial choreographer. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin is widely considered to be one of the greatest kung fu films of all times. Movie plot introduces Shaolin’s temple 35 chambers of martial arts training   , in each of which the temple's novices are trained in one aspect of the kung fu fighting arts. This story was taken as foundation for some Wing Chun “histories” where it is claimed that there were different “halls” for different martial styles raining in the Shaolin temple and one of the halls was “Wing Chun Hall”. At the time when this movie was made, real Shaolin temple was completely empty and Shaolin Kung Fu if there was ever such a thing was dead and forgotten for decades. In later years, when Chinese government realized how much money they can actually earn from Shaolin brand they brought fake monks( Modern Wu Shu teachers and Champions) and organized the training in the temple that completely resembles to the movie. Important part of the today’s temple kung fu are features of extreme strength like breaking hard objects with various body parts , being immune to cuts or stabs with various weapons, seemingly immune to pain ect…all the skills shown in the movie. In reality such a trickery was part of street performers and was considered the lowest skill set in kung fu, such set of skills would never been practiced in such an important and highly regarded place such was Shaolin temple before cultural revolution even is some kung fu was practiced there.  

Yip Man movies. In the movie, Yip Man is fighting a master from the north who challenged and won over all other kung fu teachers in Foshan. Right after the movie this exact story started to appear in some “historical” accounts and Yip Man’s biographies although the story is just a part of the movie plot and it is complete fabrication. Similar thing happened after second movie about Yip Man  in which he fought Japanese general. Shortly after the movie “historical” accounts and Yip Man biographies started to point out his engagement in fight against Japanese occupation forces although that is completely opposite from the truth. 

In Shaw Brothers movies everyone knows martial arts.  Every Shaw Brothers martial arts film, particularly all of them set in generalized 1800s period, tend to feature hundreds of extras and townspeople who are all apparently skilled martial arts practitioners. Noodle shop keepers, doctors, ladies who sell vegetables, street shoe cleaners, rickshaw driver, even children. This led to believe that everyone in China “knows” kung fu. The truth is just the opposite, during the Ching Dynasty when the most people in history China practiced kung fu, less than one percent of the population actually was involved in martial training. Today, baseball, tennis, basketball and soccer are way more popular than kung fu. Young people do not have real interest in kung du and Chinese martial arts are really dying .

Master of the Flying Guillotine is a 1976 Taiwanese wuxia film starring Jimmy Wang Yu, who also wrote and directed the film. The film follows one-armed kung fu master being by an imperial assassin whose  weapon, the "flying guillotine", which resembles a hat with a bladed rim attached to a long chain. Upon enveloping one's head, the blades cleanly decapitate the victim with a quick pull of the chain. After this movie, flying guillotine slowly started to enter history accounts as a real weapon and there is even Wikipedia article about it although there is no historical evidence what so ever , not even a mention of this weapon before the movie was made.

Sticky legs or Chi Gerk, almost every old kung fu movie has a fight scene where tremendous sticky legs skills are demonstrated. That is where Leung Ting probably got inspiration for his chi gerk (sticky legs) techniques incorporated in his system. Interestingly, Leung Ting did work as martial choreographer in movie industry.

The Shaolin Temple filmed in 1982 famously launched the career of martial arts superstar Jet Li. But perhaps less widely known is that it also essentially reinvented Shaolin kung fu.  The Shaolin Temple is now a Unesco World Heritage Site and the heart of tourism in Henan province in central China. Scores of martial arts schools lie on a mountain; ticket sales bring in tens of millions of dollars each year; the temple is now a commercial empire operating more than 40 overseas companies; and international media has even dubbed its abbot, Shi Yongxin, “the CEO monk”. But in 1982 , Shaolin was a complex of empty buildings left to the elements and time to destroy it. The Shaolin temple  was the first martial arts film made in China and the first filmed on location at the Shaolin Temple, an ancient Buddhist monastery that is revered as the birthplace of China’s most famous kung fu style. Film became very popular and tourists and martial artists started to come in great numbers. Soon Shaolin became one of the biggest companies in China. Interestingly , Shaolin kung fu today looks exactly the same as we can see it in old movies.

Wong Fei Hung movies are made since the era of silent movies and cemented the place of Wong Fei Hung as the greatest kung fu hero of all times. Maybe there are better fighters in Chinese mythology, or stronger people, or heroes with more fights, or more compassionate people but no one had it all , not one besides Wong Fei Hung, he has a perfect balance of skills, strength, intelligence, empathy, moral, ethics, wealth and luck.  There are literary hundreds of movies and TV series about life and adventures of the famous hero. He became an architype of Chinese martial hero who embodies all the positive traits of Chinese culture. Although he was quite the opposite in real life, Wu Xiao novels later translated into films made his name immortal putting him above all other heroes.

This is just a small example how Hong Kong and Taiwan cinematography influenced Kung Fu culture. Almost every aspect of Kung Fu culture and even training was impacted by these movies. Kung Fu movies influenced and changed Kung Fu culture in general, on West as well as on the East, on such a scale that is hard to believe that such influence is even possible.