BACK IN THE KILL ZONE WITH SEVEN SWORDS STAR DONNIE YEN.
Last Friday, I got the call to arms from Donnie Yen, star of our very first Dragon Dynasty release, the high impact Hong Kong cop actioner Kill Zone, and our recent period martial arts hit Seven Swords. Donnie is currently hard at work on another contemporary thriller, currently entitled Flashpoint.
He and I have been friends for almost 20 years, and many’s the time he’s summoned me into the fray. Most memorably, he called on me to play the Russian boxer Petrov in his TV remake of Bruce Lee’s Fist Of Fury. This time, he asked me to put together a magnificent seven ‘hip hop’ pugilists to appear in a scene set in a boxing gym. My hip having hopped off some time ago, I was happily out of the running myself, but did my best to round up some unusual suspects: Min Yoo, a former national taekwondo champion… who now runs a pizza parlour and pool hall.
Zen Berimbau, a former club DJ… who now teaches the Brazilian martial art of Capoeira. These are the kinds of offbeat characters who, like myself, reinvent themselves here in Hollywood east. It’s been a while since Donnie and I worked on a set together. I actually brought him back to Hong Kong from LA to action direct the film Twins Effect, on which I was a producer, but our career paths have diverged since.
Donnie’s long been a fan favourite as a martial arts movie star, but it’s only in recent years that his skills as a director have come to the fore. With Kill Zone, he proved that he understood how to film every range of combat, from weapons to kicking to punching to grappling and groundwork. Watch how, in the finale of Kill Zone, his choreography closes the distance from his armed encounter with Wu Jing to his jujitsu-themed throw down with Sammo Hung. For the scene in Flashpoint, Yen’s tough cop storms a Triad boxing gym and takes to the ring to arrest a burly gangster. He and Flashpoint co-director Wilson Ip previously directed Kill Zone and the fantasy actioner Dragon Tiger Gate together and now seem to be perfectly synced action movie machine. The shot sees Donnie’s character stalk the length of the gym, and I had fun positioning my guys according to their respective abilities. Damian Green, a martial arts maniac from Hartlepool England, punched his knuckles bloody on the ‘uppercut bag’ for take after take.
The nearest I came to watching Donnie choreograph Kill Zone was commentating on the DVD’s behind-the-scenes documentary feature with him. It was fascinating to see him painstakingly assemble a complicated scene, without the aid of storyboard or shot list. The brief, brutal encounter saw Donnie Yen the actor jump out of the ring to check the playback monitor as Donnie Yen the director, and then leap back into action. At one point, Donnie moved Zen Berimbau, in the ring as the bad guy’s trainer, to one corner. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ve just jumped five shots.” We finally wrapped at around 1am, and I emerged into the night air, simultaneously excited and tired. If, as the critics say, Hong Kong action cinema really is a shadow of its former self, it can still be an electric shadow.
Comments
- Brian, Toronto | 2007-03-12 20:53:37
- Beat, Sweden | 2007-03-17 18:40:40
- PERRY, BRONX,N.Y. | 2007-03-19 20:41:00
- kington, china | 2007-03-19 22:10:52
- someone, anywhere | 2007-11-09 11:02:21
- Scott, Scotland | 2007-03-13 14:20:03