Brent A
40% rating ... A slightly below average Jackie Chan film in my opinion.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
05/01/24
Full Review
Carlos T
Minha opinião: Este é um dos últimos trabalhode Jackie com o estilo de filme de Kung-Fu a moda antiga. Onde em um ano chegavam a fazer quase 1 filme por mês. Utilizavam os mesmo atores e coadvantes de um filme para outro e até com roteiros parecidos. Deste perÃodo o mais famoso de Jackie foi Drunke Master. E este momento de transição com filmes atuais a época e onde ganha além das lutas muita comédia. Com os parceiros Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao, Richard Ng, Eric Tsang, nesta época de Detonando em Barcelona e Projeto A. Depois vem uma nova fase com Police Story que é mais um marco em sua vida. Depois vem vários filmes em Holywood com parcerias com atores americanos, Chris Tucker, Owen Wilson, Schwazwneger, Johnny Knoxville, Burt Reynolds, Roger Moore. E várias atrizes; Michele Yeon, Maggie Cheung, Brigitte Lin, Lola Forner, MAdeline Carroll, Françoise Yep, Jennifer Love, Chrlie Yeung, Kumiko Goto, ... Neste filme Jackie faz o estilo do inicio de sua carreira, considero este filme também bem feito, pelo baixo orçamento e com o roteiro e enredo pobres onde aqui a boa atuação e boa luta teria de prevalecer para fazer sucesso. Com uma boa dose de humor que tras o filme consegue executar um bom serviço. Onde tem um matador que esta a procura de sua presa. E quem aparece para atrapalhar, Jackie.
Vale apena assistir? Sim
Nota: 7
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
08/03/23
Full Review
Joel C
As usual true entertainment. Jackie's Mickey Mouse Kung Fu style and Charlie Chaplin Martial Arts creates comedy and impressive show of strength and agility. The Leader of the antagonist gang is incredible with aggressive timing and power that out shines Jackie. Of course Jackie's true power is resilience and the ability to adapt.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
04/27/21
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Audience Member
A very funny Jackie Chan Kung fu movie. You can see the start of the Jackie style taking shape in this film but it still has that 70’s Shaw brothers Kung fu stylized choreography. All in all an entertaining film.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/24/19
Full Review
Audience Member
Considered one of the better entries into Jackie Chan's early collection of kung-fu films, The Young Master sounded like it promised old-fashioned martial arts fun.
Low-budget Kung Fu films are a huge market in their native land, so there is a huge quantity of competition that a production like The Young Master is going to face. As a means of becoming memorable, such a film must offer something to separate itself from the crowd. The Young Master has the potential to achieve much more due to the presence of notorious star Jackie Chan, but that proves to be wishful thinking in the end. The Young Master easily falls into the same category as countless other low-budget Kung Fu films of the era. The problem however is that it fails to take an individualistic stand. The film has the better and worse elements of the majority of generic films that it matches up to, but the problem is that it lacks any kind of special distinction. There is no kind of clever hook in The Young Master, no distinctive style of comic relief or differential fighting style exhibited, it is merely the same basic story and decent martial arts choreography burdened by the many flaws that befall essentially every film of the same basic style.
For one thing, the feature is no great visual experience. One common trope among low-budget Kung-Fu films is a flaw which burdens them all: poor resolution. The Young Master is not an exception to this issues and so the film looks rough and has a monochromatic colour scheme which seems to have a grim edge of sepia to it. It's bad enough that the potentially appealing scenery of the film has its life and colour removed as a result of this. Yet the action is not too much of a visual experience either.
Many shots in the action scenes make use of slow-motion which proves to benefit them as it makes things that are occurring significantly more clear. The choreography doesn't churn out any specific techniques or fights that stand out in memory, but it is decent and the slow-motion ensures that it is captured as best as possible within its limitations. However, it does not match Jackie Chan's iconic style of fighting. In contrast to a martial artist such as Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan's technique is to fight at a fast rate yet take a momentary pause after each technique as if he is presenting his fights as a kata. The slow-motion in The Young Master proves to work against the action scenes in multiple ways, and it ultimately leaves the viewer to be stuck with more time in front of the screen. Considering that the action should be the one thing that makes The Young Master worth watching, the fact that it has this many problems even though it has Jackie Chan to headline it really takes the film into an extremely low standard of territory, beyond the limitations it was already facing to begin with.
The way that the intended drama of The Young Master translates into its English-language dubbing makes the pretentious nature of it seem all the more ridiculous and as a result everything is a lot funnier. The attempts by the film to take itself seriously simply get in the way of The Young Master's potential to be a fun action experience and drags the film on for a lot longer than is necessary. The story is clearly a very generic one which the dialogue is not capable of saving, but that hardly matters since the film doesn't intend to be an insightful exploration of martial arts. It's just another half-assed feature which lightly touches upon familiar themes explored in essentially every Kung Fu film. And like the action, the script works against Jackie Chan's natural performance style because he has a talent for performing in Kung Fu films which he gives a humourous edge to, yet he is forced to take this one completely seriously despite the fact that there is nothing all that intelligent or challenging about The Young Master. The only humour in the film comes from the quality of the dubbing which is surely something that the filmmakers had not intended. It turns the melodrama of the film into ludicrous camp which effectively adds ridiculously over-the-top comic relief to the film. It would almost make the feature slightly more entertaining if it wasn't such a problematic production in the first place, but it just doesn't have the power to do that. The Young Master is not so bad it's good, it's just such a generic and cheap production that fails to capitalize on the talents of its star and falls into cliche story points and production flaws everywhere.
Really, the problems in The Young Master centre around the fact that it does nothing to live up to the credibility of its main star, Jackie Chan. The accomplished martial artist many credit as filling the void left by the untimely death of Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan has the legacy of starring in many kung fu films such as Snake in the Eagle's Shadow (1978) and Drunken Master (1978). Both these films predate The Young Master by two years and provide a powerful showcase for the true talents of Jackie Chan, but the difference is that he is in the director's chair this time. His debut as a director was the preceding year with The Fearless Hyena (1979), a mediocre story made unforgettable by its distinctive style of action which included a fight scene executed entirely with chop sticks. The Young Master is a step down for him because it is far more conventional and lacking in any of the man's distinctive charms. By the point of The Young Master, Jackie Chan is yet to define his path as a film director.
The Young Master offers a lack of distinction among a crowd of low-budget Kung Fu films: poor quality resolution, generic choreography, a weak story which takes itself too seriously and minimal use of Jackie Chan's distinctive charms.
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
01/27/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Review:
It was weird watching this film again because it brought back old childhood memories. I remember the epic ending completely amazed me and I thought that the whole thing was real. The movie came out on VHS when I was 7 so I didn't get to see it until I was around 9 years old so I really thought that Jackie Chan was in pain towards the end. Anyway, this is definitely what I was looking forward to when I started this Jackie Chan season because it's extremely authentic and full of epic action. In some of the scenes it did seem like they were fighting for no reason and the plot did get a bit confusing in the middle but the epic showdown near the end was excellent. Watching Chan take some formidable punches whilst gearing up to kick butt near the end, still gave me goosebumps but like most of his movies, he just has to add a comedy element to the intense situation. For that time, the stunts were amazing and the choreography was spot on. I just hope that the rest of his earlier movies are just as good. Great Film!
Round-Up:
This movie was also directed by Jackie Chan, who gives you an in depth insight into his methods behind the camera, on the bonus features of the DVD, which are definitely worth a watch. I must admit, I did miss all that "You Killed My Master" type of concept but it's still worth a watch if your into you vintage Kung Fu movies.
I recommend this movie to people who are into their action/adventure/comedy, Kung Fu movies, which came out on VHS during the 80's. 7/10
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/18/23
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