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Dragon Fist
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray B - United Kingdom - 88 Films Review written by and copyright: Eric Cotenas (10th March 2025). |
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The Film
 Chuang San-tai (When Taekwondo Strikes' Hsu Hsia) of the Tang Shan school of martial arts is just about to celebrate his championship in competition when Chung Chien-chun (The Young Taoism Fighter's Yen Shi-Kwan) of the Patience Clan crashes the festivities and demands a match to truly decide who is the best. Despite the attempts of his star pupil and adopted son Hao-yun (Armour of God's Jackie Chan), his wife (Hong Kong Emmanuelle's Ou-Yang Sha-Fei), and daugther (Fist of Fury's Nora Miao) to intervene, Chuang agrees to the match and is thrashed by Chung's superior skill. Not content to simply beat Chuang, however, Chung inflicts mortal injuries on him and then destroys his school's banner before departing. Chuang does not know the reason for Chung's vindictiveness but dies after making Hao-yun swear to look after his wife and daughter as well as to wipe out the shame brought to the Tang Shan school. Returning to his home, however, Chung's own opportunity to celebrate his victory is also cut short when daughter Chiu-ping (Im Eun-Joo) discovers that her mother has hung herself and only Chung knows the reason when he reads her suicide note. Three years later, Hao-yun has perfected the Dragon Fist technique and he arrives with his mistress and sister to seek vengeance upon Chung, demanding his leg as redress. On the journey, they are harassed by members of the Wei clan who have killed many local fisherman to prevent their smuggling operation coming out into the open. Chiu-ping and her little brother come to their aid only to be given the cold shoulder by Hao-yun when he learns their surname. Chiu-ping and Chung's star pupil Fang-Kang (A Man Called Tiger's James Tien) learn that Chung has been expecting Hao-yun and are bewildered when he orders them to welcome him and not fight him for any reason. Of course, Fang-Kang goes to Hao-yun demanding an explanation and is beaten so Chung redirects the attentions of Fang-Kang and fellow pupil Nan-ching ('s Kim Yeong-Il) to tracking down Fatty Hsu (Choe Jae-Ho) of the Wei clan who a witness has accused of the murders of several of his fellow fishermen. Master Wei (Magnificent Bodyguards' Kao Chiang) has been waiting for a provocation as an excuse to wipe out the Patience Clan when he discovers that Hao-yun may just do his dirty work for him. When Chung's widow and daughter discover the degree of Chung's remorse for his wrongdoing, they forgive him. Hao-yun feels cheated of revenge, however, rendering him vulnerable to the manipulation of Master Wei to whom he is indebted when his mistress needs an expensive medicine developed by the Wei clan (not realizing that Wei has engineered her illness in the first place). One of the last finished (but not last released) Jackie Chan/Lo Wei productions just following Chan's taste of creative freedom when Wei loaned him out to Seasonal Films to make Snake in the Eagle's Shadow and Drunken Master, Dragon Fist is starts out like another dull Lo Wei pseudo-Bruce Lee revenge film but throws a number of twists into the mix as well as some better than usual fight scenes that just about make up for all of its other deficits including deathly slow pacing, uninvolving melodrama, the thorough wasting of Miao who pretty much just stands around looking decorative while Chan interacts more meaningfully with Im Eun-Joo, and the humorless characterization of Chan's lead (during his subsequent Golden Harvest days, Chan himself along with fellow "brothers" Biao Yuen and Sammo Hung proved that the revenge plot could be done with laughs). The plot has some complexity in conception but it is muddled in execution and generally requires that everyone is so gullible and incapable of questioning people who have already demonstrated questionable behavior. The climax is brutal but the overall experience is simply a bit more novel in the context of Chan's early filmography, and it was ultimately Chan's success elsewhere that got some of his shelved Lo Wei films eventual release. 
Video
Dragon Fist was released stateside theatrically by Terry Levene's Aquarius Releasing shorn of roughly fifteen minutes followed by the usual tape releases of dubious legality and in the U.K. by Sino Cine trimmed by about five minutes (the VHS releases were uncut). The DVD release history was rather convoluted with Columbia/TriStar getting an anamorphic widescreen release of the shorter cut for their DVD while the U.K.'s first DVD release from Eastern Heroes took a 4:3 fullscreen master and matted it to 1.78:1 while the subsequent Hong Kong Legends DVD was OAR and uncut but barebones compared to other titles in their line. 88 Films' first released the film on Blu-ray in 2018 from a 2K scan which was also presumably the source for the U.S. Blu-ray in Shout! Factory's The Jackie Chan Collection Volume 1: 1976-1982. 88 Films' new 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 2.35:1 widescreen Blu-ray – concurrently released in a limited edition 4K UltraHD/Blu-ray combo (itself also available in a standard edition 4K UltraHD edition) – comes from a newer 4K scan of the original camera negative. The 2K master was pretty good for the time, and the 4K master reveals virtually identical framing. The real difference is in the visible shadow detail and the grading. After the opening credits opticals – which encompass a lengthy fight competition – detail perks up but the confrontation between Chung and Chuang looked to be taking place under an overcast daylight whereas here with the brightness comes a senses of sunny warmth to go alongside the deeper blacks of the shadows cast by this same light. The presentation is brighter throughout while still sporting deeper shadows and the colors of costume and décor are richar but also perhaps more correctly hued as the blues of Fang-Kang's costume remain somewhat subdued rather than the expected royal blue given the other saturation changes. 
Audio
88 Films' 2018 Blu-ray featured Cantonese, Mandarin, and English 5.1 and mono options – the surround tracks being source from Fortune Star's DVD-era remixes – while their 4K-mastered editions dispense entirely with the multichannel tracks in favor of clean Mandarin, Cantonese, and English LPCM 2.0 mono tracks along with an alternate home video Cantonese mono mix. Although the Mandarin track is the first choice in the setup menu, Frank Djeng in the commentary states that the film was released theatrically in Hong Kong in Cantonese as the industry had started changing over from Mandarin to Cantonese a few years before and that the Mandarin track was used for other Asian territories. Everyone is dubbed on all of the tracks so it may be a matter of personal preference which track the viewer chooses. The alternate Cantonese track has some variations in music but the main difference appears to be that the music track is just louder overall (Djeng cites the music sources including Jerry Goldsmith's theme for The Sand Pebbles and the high end of the music makes one question whether the tracks came from tape masters or the soundtrack vinyls given their unauthorized use). The English track was presumably sourced from lesser materials but it does sound cleaner than Shout! Factory's streaming version so 88 Films may have done a bit of digital cleanup of the audio themselves. Separate optional Engilsh subtitles are available for the Mandarin and Cantonese tracks while a third track is enabled with the English mix for onscreen text. 
Extras
88 Films has commissioned a new audio commentary by Frank Djeng (NY Asian Film Festival) & FJ DeSanto who reveal that the film was number fifty-two at the box office while the Chan/Lo Wei Fearless Hyena was number one, motivating this film's release and the former film's notorious sequel cribbed together from existing footage, recycled footage of Chan, and doubles. DeSanto notes that this chronology clears up the mystery to fans as to why Chan followed up his two Seasonal Films comic hits with this serious film while Djeng also notes that Chan's earlier comic experiments Spiritual Kung Fu and Half a Loaf of Kung Fu had been shelved and were not released until later. The pair speculate that in spite of the success of the Seasonal Films titles, Lo Wei simply did not know what to do with Chan other than trying to make him into the new Bruce Lee with plots like Dragon Fist and this also seems true of the memorable cast members he reused in these films including Miao who they are both of the opinion is not particularly well-utilized here. DeSanto does compliment the fighting and Djeng notes that this is one of the first films on which Chan is credited as action director (under his earlier stage name) as well as noting that Hsu Hsia had been one of the action directors on the Seasonal Films titles as part of Chan's evolution in terms of fighting style for the camera. They also discuss the supporting cast, noting that this was one of the last Chan collaborations with Tien where he played something more than just a villain or supporting role.  Ported from the 2018 disc is "A Dragon's Rules" (21:52) in which writer/journalist David West who also suggests that Lo Wei was rather one note as a producer/director with his recycled revenge plot through the efforts of Bruce Lee, Jimmy Wang Yu, and Jackie Chan and that it was Chan who was evolving under other influences including the success of The Spiritual Boxer and Seasonal Films producer Ng See-Yuen who had given chances to a young Tsui Hark and Yuen Wo-Ping. The disc also includes the film's Japanese opening credits (2:30), Japanese TV spot (0:14), Japanese theatrical trailer (1:52), Hong Kong theatrical trailer (3:58), lobby card gallery (1:04), and a then & now gallery (4:07). 
Overall
The last finished (but not the last released) Jackie Chan/Lo Wei collaboration Dragon Fist introduces some novelty but may feel a bit "too little too late" for Chan fans who prefer his bigger and funnier Golden Harvest works.
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