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For Donnie Yen, 2005's "Slaying the Wolf" is undoubtedly an extremely important work.
First of all, this is the first collaboration between Donnie Yen and director Wilson Yip, and the combination of Wu Zhen (Zidan) and Wen Ye (Wilson) has become the most successful action partner in the Chinese film industry in the past two decades.
Taking this as an opportunity, the two worked together and successively contributed masterpieces such as "Dragon Tiger Gate" and "Fuse", and joined hands to start the legend of the "Ip Man" series.
From this point of view, Ye Weixin can be regarded as the second nobleman in Donnie Yen's career after his master Yuan Heping. And "Fuse" can also be called Donnie Yen's turnaround. In the case of Jackie Chan getting older and Jet Li gradually entering semi-retirement. Starting from "Fuse" and until the "Ip Man" series was sealed, Donnie Yen accelerated his pace of catching up, and finally ushered in his heyday of "the strongest in the universe".
Secondly, the success of "Fuse" has also spawned masterpieces such as "Fuse" (prequel), "Slaying the Wolf 2", "Slaying the Wolf: Greedy Wolf", which has become one of the most successful series of action films in recent years.
Furthermore, returning to the film, as an action film, "Slaying the Wolf" itself is one of the rare classic works in the history of Hong Kong action films.
The action style of the whole film strives for realism, not only is it fast and fierce, but also punches to the flesh, and many action scenes are even more adrenaline surge.
The first to bear the brunt of course is the best street fight in the history of action movies that fans are talking about. In this close-quarters battle between the stick and the short knife, Donnie Yen and Wu Jing did their best, and the fight was full of sparks.
When shooting this martial arts drama, due to the pressure of funds and schedule, the crew only had a few hours of shooting time. Taking into account the skills and experience of Donnie Yen and Wu Jing, director Yip Weixin simply suggested that the two should play freely. Therefore, this scene was mainly done in a half-assed way, and many actions came from the improvisation of the two on the spot.
Different from the traditional action design method of seeing and dismantling moves, when the two fought, there were many tentative false moves, and even many "empty" miss moves.
As a result, the designed action looks more real and closer to street combat, so the visual effect is extremely shocking, which makes many fans call it "enjoyable".
The little details of flipping the knife and changing hands are even more genius creations.
It is worth mentioning that: as a supporting role, although Wu Jing doesn't make many appearances in this film, his performance is extremely amazing. The killer in white clothes looks so handsome.
In addition to street fighting, the N combo of sniping Ale is also "crazy and cool".
Sammo Hung, who plays the ultimate villain BOSS, is Jackie Chan's senior brother, known as "the most flexible fat man" in the film industry, and is a veritable big brother in the Hong Kong film industry. Although Sammo Hung was 53 years old when the film was filmed, his aura was still strong, and his shots were still swift and fierce.
Sammo Hung's action style also tends to be fierce and realistic, so the duel between Donnie Yen and Sammo Hung this time is quite a bit like a spark hitting the earth.
Hong Fatty is a power player, and he has an advantage in physique and strength when he fights with Donnie Yen.
Donnie Yen can only rely on flexibility and moves to win. It can be seen from this film: Donnie Yen has begun to consciously increase the elements of MMA (mixed martial arts), which is more clearly reflected in the follow-up prequel work "Fuse" of "Slaying the Wolf".
Triangle lock.
Fall back.
Human bomb.
Cross solid.
Hug and counterattack.
In addition, like the previous "Zhen-style action films", Donnie Yen still brazenly "shows off" his various leg techniques on the screen.
High kick.
High volley kick.
Volley side kick.
The iconic volley triple kick.
At the Hong Kong Film Awards in 2004, "Slaying the Wolf" won the best action design, which shows that the industry is quite certain about Donnie Yen and the film.
In addition, compared with other works in the same series, another success of "Slaying the Wolf" is that its literary drama is relatively complete. Ren Dahua, Hui Tianci and other veteran actors performed well, among which Liao Qizhi was the most dazzling, and was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor at the Academy Awards for this film.
Of course, I have to mention Zhang Zhiyao, one of the candidates for the "Four Beauties in the End of the World" who was brutally murdered by the poignant beauty.
The success of "Slaying the Wolf", to a certain extent, has saved Donnie Yen's acting career that has always been half-red and not black, especially the encounter with director Ye Weixin, which can be said to have officially opened the "Zhen's Kung Fu Era" (Jackie Chan After Jet Li) prelude. Since then, Donnie Yen has finally embarked on the journey of becoming a legend.
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