Tony Ching Siu-Tung

[DrNgor]

For many years, Ching Siu-Tung was one of the premier action directors in Hong Kong cinema. He helped modernize Wuxia films and take the action in those movies to fantasy heights that helped gain Hong Kong cinema legions of fans during the 90s. When CGI effects began to become commonplace in martial arts movies, his movies initially seemed to strike the perfect balance between the digital and the real (and wire-assisted). 

Ching is the son of director Cheng Kang, best known for his work at the Shaw Brothers on films like Sword of Swords (1968) and The 14 Amazons (1972). Incidentally, the latter turned out to be the second (and probably first important) choreographing gig for a Northern Kung Fu-trained Ching Siu-Tung. After a few less notable works, Ching got a few opportunities to both choreograph and fight onscreen in cult classics like Stroke of Death (1979) and The Master Strikes (1980). Ching was as acrobatic as his contemporaries at the Shaws, The Venom Mob, and had just as good an eye for shapes-based fighting as Sammo Hung and the Yuens did, but it didn't take long for Ching to decide that Wuxia, fantasy-oriented fighting, and wire-assisted stuntwork was what interested him most. Early films of his like The Sword (1980) gave viewers a good hint of what was to come.

In the early 1980s, Ching more or less had set acting and stuntwork aside to focus on directing and action direction. Many of his movies became box office smashes, critical darlings and scored special places in the hearts of HK Cinephiles. When not doing fantasy films, he proved equally adept at choreographing gunplay in classics like A Better Tomorrow 2 (1987) and The Killer (1989). When the period piece became popular again in the 90s, Ching's award-winning work on The Swordsman (1990) essentially dictated the rules by which Wuxia movies would be made for the rest of the decade, what with its increasingly-elaborate wire stunts, dynamic camerawork, creative use of quick cuts, balletic swordplay, and "Qi blasts" that would make objects (and later people) explode. It was this over-the-top approach that made him a shoe-in to direct video game-inspired action in Wong Jing's City Hunter (1992) and Future Cops (1993) that same decade, and similar films during the aughts.

By the early 2000s, when CGI was becoming ever the more present force in onscreen action, Ching Siu-Tung proved that one could do a reasonably good job at pulling it off in films like Shaolin Soccer (2001) and The Duel (2000). The 2000s also saw Ching teaming up with famed Mainland director Zhang Yimou to oversee choreography duties on Hero (2002); House of Flying Daggers (2004); and Curse of the Golden Flower (2006). Ching's last credited movie as director and/or action director was the 2011 fantasy Sorcerer and the White Snake, starring Jet Li, Eva Huang, and Charlene Choi. His final credit is as producer of a Mainland film called Tang Dynasty's Mystery Map (2012) starring Gong Li.

 

Movies of Ching Siu-Tung that have won the HK Film Award for Best Action Design:

The Witch from Nepal (1986)

Swordsman (1990)

Hero (2002)

 

Movies of Ching Siu-Tung that have been nominated for the same award:

Duel to the Death (1983)

Peking Opera Blues (1986)

A Better Tomorrow 2 (1987)

A Chinese Ghost Story (1987)

A Chinese Ghost Story 2 (1990)

A Terra-Cotta Warrior (1990)

A Chinese Ghost Story 3 (1991)

Swordsman II (1992)

New Dragon Inn (1992)

Royal Tramp 2 (1992)

The Heroic Trio (1993)

Dr. Wei and the Scripture with No Words (1996)

Shaolin Soccer (2001)

My Schoolmate, the Barbarian (2001)

Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)

The Warlords (2007)

Sorcerer and the White Snake (2011)

Edited March 1, 2017 by DrNgor
Formatting

[AlbertV]

Tony also did the choreography for Invincible, a made for TV movie starring Billy Zane and was executive produced by Mel Gibson and Jet Li. David No, Bren Foster, Kyle Rowling, and Ray Anthony play the evil Shadowmen in this clip.

 

 

 

[DrNgor]

On 01/03/2017 at 10:38 AM, AlbertV said:

Tony also did the choreography for Invincible, a made for TV movie starring Billy Zane and was executive produced by Mel Gibson and Jet Li. David No, Bren Foster, Kyle Rowling, and Ray Anthony play the evil Shadowmen in this clip.

I've come close to buying this several times, but never got around to it. 

Does anyone know why he dropped off the radar suddenly?

[Iron_Leopard]

Can't believe there isn't more activity in this thread. 

When it came to new wave action there were two guys and then there was everybody else. Ching Sui Tung and Yuen Woo Ping.

[AlbertV]

Ching recently trained Tiger Shroff for his upcoming sequel Baaghi 2.

http://www.dnaindia.com/entertainment/report-tiger-shroff-packs-in-a-punch-with-the-help-of-tony-ching-for-baaghi-2-2284462

[MaoShanWang]

Duel to the Death is one of my absolute favorites. I love showing it to friends and seeing their jaws drop. It's a perfect distillation of Hong Kong's weird, inimitable mix of slapstick comedy and grim tragedy. And lots and lots of ninjas.

[AlbertV]

Here's an interview  Ching did with the Hollywood Reporter this past March:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/dialogue-tony-ching-siu-tung-107241

[DragonClaws]

 

I know someone has made a post about this elsewhere, but felt it was relevant here too.

 

 

[Cognoscente]

Here are some things that Wong Jing had said about Tony Ching in his memoir...

Surprising relation: "Wong Yue was Ching's brother-in-law and worked on Swordsman II as an assistant but soon quarrelled with the staff, and found himself without a job."

The summer of 1992: “I found myself as the director of two Stephen Chow movies and one Jackie Chan movie. Those productions overlapped, but it was bearable because Ching Siu-Tung was the main action director on all three movies. However, there were times when neither of us could work on City Hunter, so Jackie found himself to be directing a fair amount of it on his own."

A specific example: "One day, I was working on Royal Tramp II from 6 p.m. to 1 a.m. then I would go to the Nanyang Theater in Hong Kong to film City Hunter until 11 a.m. the next day. Although I had liver disease, I was still vulnerable by being fat. I really don't know how I survived it. Maybe it was sheer force of will. The biggest life-saving benefactor was Ching Siu-Tung, because he became the director of Royal Tramp II after I shot all the non-action scenes. This allowed him to not only work consistently but more contextually since he was able to look at my footage to see how his jigsaw pieces fit. When he took over to do his second unit work, this allowed me to start work on Millionaire Cop and Fight Back to School III in September."

[Cognoscente]

The first two images are taken from Wong Jing's autobiography.

In the first image, Tony is with his father.

In the second one, Tony is on the set of The East is Red.

Finally, I have incorporated a shot of Joey Wong that I found on the Chinese web so that you can make comparisons.

[DrNgor]

Not sure where to post this, but I put a short review of Flying Dagger (1993) on the site today:

https://abeautifulfilm.blogspot.com/2022/10/flying-dagger-1993.html

[Yihetuan]

Tony with Steven Spielberg. No idea where, when and why they are together here.