On 5th April, Wang Yu, the iconic martial arts movie star passed away in Taipei, Taiwan, after a prolonged illness. Jimmy Wang Yu, as he was known to his North American fans, was 79 years old. Whilst the name Wang Yu will probably draw a blank look from our younger generation, at the same time it will evoke broad smiles and awaken memories of the good old days and the anticipation of Thursday’s opening show of the latest Chinese martial arts film at the Globe Cinema at Church and Waterloo streets.
Like a lot of Hollywood films of the 40s and the 50s, Hong Kong’s movie production in the 50s and 60s was projected towards women audiences. In fact, unlike its Japanese counterpart, Hong Kong’s film industry was bereft of male action stars like Ken Takahura and Toshiro Mifune, and its biggest movie star was actress Ivy Ling Po, who played both male and female roles. In one fell swoop, this scenario was completely revamped with the release in 1967 of the “One-Armed Swordsman” starring Wang Yu.
It was the beginning of a seismic shift in the Hong Kong film industry and in the appetite of cinema goers around the world. A former Hong Kong swimming champion, Wang Yu, who had embarked on a film career four years prior, then, along with film director, Chang Cheh revolutionised the genre of martial art films.
The “One-Armed Swordsman” was the first Hong Kong film to make over one million dollars at the box office, and it catapulted Wang Yu, young and handsome, to the zenith of movie stardom not only in Hong Kong, but several Asian countries. The film was more along the lines of a Japanese samurai-themed movie of vengeance and filled with limb slashing and blood spewing violent sword fighting, a far cry from the usual feminine oriented Hong Kong film.
Wang Yu took the world’s cinematic audience by storm, and achieved an unprecedented record, yet to be broken, setting box office records for four consecutive years in Hong Kong. In 1968, he starred in “The Golden Swallow”, opposite the first Kung Fu queen Cheng Pei-pei (best known for “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” [2000]), in the sequel to the 1966 game changer, “Come Drink with Me”. The next year, martial arts fans were presented with the “Return of the One-Armed Swordsman”, another swashbuckling affair.
In 1970, the groundbreaking film, “The Chinese Boxer (aka Hammer of God)” was released. In addition to starring in the film, Wang Yu also wrote and directed it. It was the first martial arts film not to focus on wuxia (sword fighting) and fantasy, but instead featured open-hand fighting and kicking. The hand-to-hand combat escalated in intensity with every fight, and exploited the pitting of martial art techniques; Chinese Kung fu versus Japanese karate. A significant change with long lasting consequences on the genre of martial arts films had taken place, and Wang Yu was now the highest paid film star in Hong Kong, and wanted out of his exclusive contract with the Shaw brothers’ studio to make films elsewhere. The Shaw brothers, Hong Kong’s equivalent of the big Hollywood studios, sued Wang Yu and won. Wang Yu, banned from the Hong Kong film industry, then shifted his base to Taiwan where he continued to act, write, direct and produce martial films for studios such as Golden Harvest and First Films & Union Film Company.
In 1971 and 1972, Wang Yu, working at a phenomenal pace, released 23 movies, but found himself being displaced on the totem pole of the highest paid actor with the emergence of the rising young star Bruce Lee. Lee, who had been working in television in Hollywood, returned to Hong Kong, where he had been raised. Lee burst onto the scene in 1971 in “The Big Boss” and rose to stardom in the 1972 film, “Fist of Fury”, which shared a similar plot to “The Chinese Boxer.” Although Lee made only two more films before his untimely young death, their short-lived rivalry had been very intense.
Unlike Lee and the rest of stars who followed in his wake, such as Ti Lung, Fu Shen, Jackie Chan and Jet Li, Wang Yu was not actually a trained martial arts expert in the same vein. Thus, although he played a significant role in jumpstarting the popularity of the kung-fu genre film, it became increasingly difficult for him, despite his reputation, to remain the number one star. However, he continued to play leading roles in sword-fighting films and appeared in more than 70 of them, working regularly until the mid-nineties. His other significant films included “Zatoichi meets the One-Armed Swords-man” (1971), “One-Armed Boxer” (1972), “Beach of the War Gods” (1973), “The Man from Hong Kong” (1975), “Master of the Flying Guillotine” (1976), “Wu Xia” (2011) and “Soul” (2013).
Wang Yu’s off-screen life seemed as turbulent as the action-packed films he acted in. Twice married and divorced, he was charged with murder in Taiwan in 1981, but the charges were later dropped. During his film career in Hong Kong he had developed a reputation as a street fighter and was often in brawls.
After a long hiatus, Wang Yu, who was also known as the Steve McQueen of Asia, returned to the silver screen in 2011 and appeared in four films in two years. At the 15th Taipei Film festival, in 2013, he won the Best Actor award in his last film, “Soul.” He received lifetime achievement awards at the 2014 New York Asian Film Festival and at the 2019 Golden Horse Awards.
Although the legend and the myth of Bruce Lee may cast a shadow over Wang Yu in the debate as to who was the best martial arts star ever, Wang Yu’s body of work over six decades as an actor, screenwriter, director and producer is second to none. Wang Yu, the One-Armed Swordsman, will be best remembered as the man who provided the template for the modern martial arts film and spawned a worldwide interest in martial arts.
