3 New Early Jackie DVD'S From HKL. A First Look.

[Guest David G Rees]

Just got through copies of 3 Lo Wei Jackie films, Shaolin Wooden Men, Snake And Crane Arts Of Shaolin and New Fist Of Fury from Hong Kong Legends.

Have just scanned through them at the moment but they all look like ok releases.

All anamorphic widescreen, good picture quality , remastered but it looks like the negatives were in bad shape to start with so not pristine prints by any means.

Not sure if the prints are complete, the opening scenes from both Shaolin Wooden Men and Snake And Crane are complete (i think these were missing from some releases), The audio is 5.1 Mandarin and English and original Mandarin Mono (dont sound like downmixes).apart from Shaolin Wooden Men which is Cantonese (thought this was supposed to be Mandarin?)..also sound like original dubs to me.

No extras to speak of, except an alternate opening for New Fist Of Fury.

Will look at the discs in detail later but if there are any questions about these releases just post them here and i will try and answer them as it is a long time since i have seen all 3 films.....

[Guest morgoth]

Running time for Shaolin Wooden Men?

[Guest David G Rees]

1 hour 42 minutes (PAL)

[Guest silver hermit]

screen caps????

[Guest killer meteor]

Running time for New Fist Of Fury please

Shaolin Wooden Men should be Mandarin. According to a friend of mine, the HKL DVD is a downmix only. Can you confirm that and also confirm the other two are genuione mono and in-sync

[Guest Markgway]

Just to confirm... the original language for all of the Lo Wei movies SHOULD be Mandarin except The Fearless Hyena. It seems HKL are just taking whatever they're given and don't know or care about the difference.

[Guest dager in the cotton]

Dragon fist , Spiritual kung fu and fearles 2 should also be orig cantonese lang.

The Madrarin vers for Dragon fist is called "Sun Chuen "(God's fist)

no orig canton for snake and crane , new fist, i think half a loaf and wooden men have proper cantonese dubs.

[Guest killer meteor]

No, Dragon Fist and Spiritual Kung Fu are Mandarin films

[Guest chen lung]

I contacted them months in advance of the releases, and they only replied a few weeks ago to another email saying that they're more-or-less not in a position to do anything else (economically e.t.c). Requesting Mandarin mono for the films (and the original English dubs in mono) that are the same length as the visual presntation they get, should only take a few seconds as FS already have them. Not hard at all.

Our only hope now is Dragon Dynasty to see what they'll do.

[Guest Markgway]

Dragon Fist and Spiritual Kung Fu were released in Hong Kong with Cantonese dubs because they were released after Jackie's success at Seasonal with SITES and Drunken Master (both original Cantonese). The market had changed and so Lo Wei accepted that local fans wanted to see Jackie in their own language. But these movies had already been shot in 1977/8 with Mandarin spoken on set before Jackie went to Seasonal. And they were released in Mandarin in Taiwan. Only Fearless Hyena was originally Cantonese because it was made in 1978/9 and by that time Jackie had been given control to do what he wanted with the film. I've never seen the sequel which had little to do with Jackie anyways so can't offer any knowledge on the language; I would presume it would be Cantonese, because, as I said, Lo Wei switched to using Cantonese by the time it was released and did so for the remainder of his films up until Blade of Fury.

[Guest luckystars]

Fearless Hyena II is Cantonese too. It wasn't released til 1983.

The only way it would've been started as a Mandarin production would be if it had been made before the first one. Unlikely I think

Re: HKL. I posted to the chatroom and emailed them about the dialects a month ago. Both were either ignored or 'lost'.

[Guest dager in the cotton]

But these movies had already been shot in 1977/8 with Mandarin spoken on set before Jackie went to Seasonal.

this is incorrect information

[Guest luckystars]

It's not. Jackie is clearly speaking Mandarin in all the Lo Wei films, and Cantonese in DM1, SITES, and FH 1 and 2. No question.

[Guest chen lung]

Wouldn't even matter what language the cast spoke (can't really determine 'original' language anyway), it's down to 'Lo Wei Productions' and the likes who determine the 'original' language.

[Guest luckystars]

Well that's academic. You could argue that any film was one or the other then.

[Guest chen lung]

Well that's academic. You could argue that any film was one or the other then.

Both points are true .

[Guest Markgway]

Spiritual Kung Fu and Dragon Fist were made whilst Jackie was in Korea (1977-78) and that was before he returned to Hong Kong to make movies with Seasonal. All his subsequent movies were made in Hong Kong (though he did go back to Korea in 1982 for Dragon Lord). As Lucky Stars says watch the lip sync and bear in mind that many of the performers in the Lo Wei films couldn't even speak Cantonese.

[Guest charpchoi]

HKL were crap once Contender took em over.

[Guest killer meteor]

I think they truly lost it when Brian White and Bey Logan left, but even with them they were a load of missed opportunities, with poor presentation of the films disguised by excellent menus and decent extras

[Guest The Running Man]

Shaolin Wooden Men should be Mandarin. According to a friend of mine, the HKL DVD is a downmix only. Can you confirm that

I can.

It is a downmix.

[Guest killer meteor]

I'm still waiting to here the running time for New Fist Of Fury

[Guest The Running Man]

I think they truly lost it when Brian White and Bey Logan left, but even with them they were a load of missed opportunities, with poor presentation of the films disguised by excellent menus and decent extras

Thumbs up killer meteor.

[Guest morgoth]

Thanks for the info David.

[Guest chen lung]

'Shaolin Wooden Men' DVD has Cantonese, not the correct Mandarin.

[Guest Markgway]

The BBFC have just passed two versions of NEW FIST OF FURY.

English Dubbed/Full Frame @ 105:28

Subtitled/Widescreen @ 79:05

I can only assume that HKL will use the longer of the two prints and then sync up what's available of the Chinese track.

Either way it ain't gonna be uncut.