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| All Images Courtesy: Arrow Video/Fortune Star |
Arrow Video has been on a serious roll lately, releasing swanky new limited editions of the classic martial arts films of director/fight-choreographer/actor Sammo Hung: Knockabout, Warriors Two, Heart of Dragon, The Iron Fisted Monk, and Millionaire’s Express (that last one is less of a classic than a weird misfire that sounds fun on paper, but I digress – the rest are classics anyway). Now they have given us a new 2K-restored limited edition of one of his most influential early films, 1981’s The Prodigal Son: his love-letter to the Wing Chun martial arts form, which stars Yuen Biao as a fictionalized younger version of real-life martial arts legend Leung Tsan. Showing his trademark blend of slapstick comedy and straight-faced, impressively kinetic and intense martial arts action, and showcasing Wing Chun in a way that proved highly influential in Hong Kong cinema, this was a pretty pivotal film in Hung’s career, making it very ripe for the Arrow limited edition treatment.
THE FILM:
The Prodigal Son begins with the young Leung Tsan as a spoiled rich kid who is a local celebrity in his small hometown: a famous street-fighter who has never lost a fight. But little does he know that the real reason for his perfect record is that his overprotective rich parents have paid his martial arts instructors to stroke his ego while going easy on him, and have bribed all of his prospective challengers to throw the fights and let him win, so he and his pride can’t get hurt; he has never been in a fair fight, let alone won one. When he actually encounters a real challenger and gets immediately trounced, the illusion all comes crashing down, and he leaves town on a pilgrimage to redeem himself by learning Wing Chun for real and become the great fighter he thought he was. The journey brings him into training with two very different Wing Chun masters (Lam Ching-Ying, of the Mr. Vampire series, and director Sammo Hung himself), and takes him through a whole lot of brawls and intrigue.
Hung, Biao, and Ching-Ying are a powerhouse trio of martial artists and actors, not only starring in the film, but collaborating as the film’s fight choreographers. With this film they set out to make one of the most impressive Wing Chun focused martial arts films ever made, and by most accounts they succeeded, filling it with fantastic fight scenes. Hung also really expanded his own style as a filmmaker with The Prodigal Son, embracing a kinetic shooting style which would soon become his trademark, and which would be further developed by peers of his like Jackie Chan. Technically this is an extremely impressive film, and it is immediately obvious why it is an influential and well-loved classic.
It is, however, also a very uneven film, for reasons that once again all reflect on Sammo Hung as a filmmaker. Combining more serious and intense martial arts with deeply goofy slapstick comedy is very much a Hung trademark, but The Prodigal Son feels very divided in terms of tone. The slapstick in this film is incredibly broad and goofy, even by Sammo Hung standards, employing highly theatrical techniques like giving comic-relief characters exaggerated, caricature-esque prosthetics and makeup, like bulbous red noses, protruding jowls, and Alfred E. Newman-ish freckles, as if to triple-underline “this is a comic relief character.” I understand how he was trying to tap into theater traditions, since classical Chinese theater plays an important role in the plot, but it feels more odd and awkward and pantomime than actually funny, and stands out as a deeply bizarre choice. There is also a chunk in the middle where the movie slows the plot to a halt to engage in much more slapsticky comic relief than we need, involving Hung’s character and his awkward daughter. Hung has combined martial arts and slapstick comedy much more effectively in other films, and his friend and protégé Jackie Chan does it even better, but for the most part it just doesn’t work well for me in The Prodigal Son. The tone just doesn’t feel well-balanced, and the movie ends up feeling quite uneven as a result.
Fortunately this ceases to be a problem every time the martial arts becomes the focus. The movie becomes a good deal more serious when it does, and the tone coheres into one that works. And fortunately this is the majority of the runtime: this is a very martial-arts-forward movie, and Hung puts the combat (or the training in the philosophy of Wing Chun) front and center every chance he gets. The action in this movie is absolutely thrilling: physically spectacular, expert martial arts, mostly delivered in tense long brawls, photographed beautifully with kinetic 2.35:1 camerawork. Hung does not mix his slapstick with the fighting in this film; there is very little in the way of Chan-esque prop comedy, big stunts, or gimmicks. The film treats the Wing Chun combat almost reverently, and the focus is all about capturing the skill and physical power and craft of it in the most thrilling way possible. The choreography is amazing, and the fights have a tangible weight and impact to them. The Prodigal Son has the reputation of having some of the best Wing Chun fight scenes in all of Hong Kong cinema, and it is obvious why. The volume of fight scenes is impressive as well: this isn’t the sort of movie that makes you wait for the best action scenes, but one that has outstanding ones all throughout.
Ultimately The Prodigal Son is a very uneven movie, which I would say is good but not great as a result of that unevenness, but the action scenes and fight choreography are absolutely incredible, and the film earns its reputation based on those strengths alone. It may not be as accessible and as consistently great as other period-set classic Hong Kong action-comedies like Drunken Master II, and for those who are newer to classic Hong Kong action it might not be the best place to start. But for serious fans of martial arts action, especially those who care most about the craft of the martial arts scenes, this is pretty essential viewing in spite of its flaws. It absolutely is a very important film in Sammo Hung’s career, and a great choice for an Arrow special edition.
THE ARROW BLU-RAY:
There is one big thing to note about this blu-ray right off the bat, which is also true for most of Arrow’s recent stateside Sammo Hung releases: this is basically a region-A equivalent of the region-B-locked Eureka UK blu-ray from 2022, featuring the same 2k restoration and the same extras. So if you are a region-free collector who already has the Eureka disc and you’re wondering if it’s worth upgrading to the Arrow, the answer is a clear-cut no. However, many/most collectors are not region-free, so bringing an equivalent to Eureka’s already very good disc to the region-A territory is absolutely a good thing, and that is absolutely not any kind of a criticism.
The disc features a 2022 2K restoration of the film, done by its Hong Kong distributor, Fortune Star. It is an excellent transfer: detail is very sharp, colors and contrast are very good, and it has a very filmic look to it, with a healthy presence of grain and no problematic DNR use that I could see. I didn’t notice any scratches or print damage of that kind, and the restoration work done on the image looks great. Again, this is not a new transfer specifically for this disc: if you have the Eureka blu-ray (or I suspect a recent Hong Kong blu-ray from Fortune Star themselves likely uses the same transfer), then you can expect the same here. But it is a great transfer that looks pretty definitive until/unless a 4K transfer for UHD happens.
The film comes in two versions on the disc: the theatrical version, and the home video version. However, these are not different cuts of the movie – they have the exact same runtime and no alternate scenes – they merely have different on-screen credits. In a somewhat odd choice, the theatrical version gives each actor their on-screen credit not in the opening credits, but when they first appear in the film – so, for example, when Sammo Hung’s character first shows up about halfway through the movie, “Sammo Hung” pops up next to his face. The home video version loses these staggered-throughout-the-film credits, opting instead for the conventional opening and closing credits structure we’re used to. Both cuts use the same 2k restoration, just with seamless branching to drop in the alternate shots with on-screen credits in the theatrical version, so there is no technical difference between the two. I found the home video version to be a better viewing experience, but the difference is so minor that there is no clear right or wrong way to watch. It’s just a matter of thoroughness that Arrow has included both.
The extras on the disc aren’t great, but they’re pretty good – although they do lean much more into the history and practice of Wing Chun as a martial arts discipline than they actually have to do with the film, so whether or not they are of interest will greatly vary from viewer to viewer. Case and point, the only extra that actually appears to be new is an interview with a Wing Chun instructor at his New York City school. There are also two commentaries ported over from the Eureka disc, both by either film or martial arts scholars, and another older featurette with a real-life Wing Chun master from a previous DVD. The only extra that actually involves anyone who worked on the film, although in fairness it is a very good extra, is a half-hour short doc from a mid-2000s DVD featuring interviews with Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao, and co-star Frankie Chan. I would have loved some new extras featuring people from the cast and crew – maybe a new interview with Sammo Hung, since this one is about 20 years old – but alas, it was not to be. As it is, if you’re very interested in Wing Chun, this disc will have great extras for you. If you’re interested in the making of the film, as someone who isn’t specifically into martial arts outside of movies, the extras are just ok.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
In the end, this is not the best Arrow limited edition I’ve seen, although it is still a solid disc. The extras predominantly being about the martial art at the center of the film, and not about the film itself, I wasn’t crazy about, as someone who loves Hong Kong cinema but isn’t particularly into martial arts outside of movies. They are good extras for what they are, and the film scholar commentaries are always a good listen, but I found it to be a bit of a bummer that the only extra actually involving the filmmaker and actors was a 20-year-old short doc from a long-ago DVD. However, that is decently counterbalanced by the transfer being excellent, and Arrow’s limited edition packaging as always being pleasantly fancy and cool. The Prodigal Son itself I found to be a mixed bag that was good but not great, but when it is on its game – ie, any time there is fighting or martial arts sequences – it turns pretty electric, and is fantastic in its best moments. I wouldn’t recommend this as a film or a disc to try and get someone into Hong Kong cinema, but if you’re a fan of classic HK martial arts movies, then you will absolutely love The Prodigal Son for its top-tier action and fight choreography, even if you do find the rest to be a mixed bag as I did. And if you’re a fan of this film or this type of cinema, this is a solid but not amazing disc that is well worth picking up.
- Christopher S. Jordan
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