Wednesday 23 November 2016

Ip Man 3

Because Donnie needs to fight Mike Tyson.

After surviving the Japanese occupation (in Ip Man 1) and establishing his school (in Ip Man 2), the humble Ip Man (played by Donnie Yen) is now pretty famous in his town and an as expected, gets involved in protecting it against gangsters and being challenged by another master. The sets are great and the action choreography fantastic as usual. As before, there is some wire fu, possibly a touch too much - more than in the previous two films I think, but it doesn't take too much away. While the group combat scenes are good they still suffer from the "six guys in the back, looking threatening but not doing anything" syndrome for keen eyed viewers. What really shines are the solo fights, especially the one with Mike Tyson!

Very cool.

While Mike's entire plot line of being there is quite flaky, I can overlook it since it is the best fight in the movie for me - which is a problem since the final showdown, while probably more technical and still impressive to watch, is simply not as interesting. Despite all that the story did keep me interested and made me tear up a bit. Maybe I'm just getting soft? I'll have to rewatch the first two someday to see if they managed to get that emotional thing going too.

All up I give it three and a half wooden dummies out of five, and highly recommend it to martial arts buffs or Donnie Yen fans - but only after you've watched the first two Ip Man films. They're just as good or better than this one anyway. :)

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