Genre: Action & Adventure    Year: 1980    Country:
IMDB Rating: 4.5 (22 votes)
Director: Yuen Woo Ping    Studio: 20th Century Fox
Starring: Sammo Hung, Fan Mui Sang, Kwan Tak-Hing, Fung Hark On, Lee Hoi Sang
Summary: Fans of "The Matrix" who exclaimed over the fight sequences staged by Yuen Woo-ping should get a load of what he can do when he's really in his element, deploying classic martial arts moves with an updated body-slamming intensity. In "Magnificent Butcher" you also get a sketch history of Hong Kong action cinema along the way. The plot is a mishmash about the kidnapping of the daughter of a local merchant; the fun is in the character turns and the electrifying combat scenes. Aging martial arts star Kwan Tak-hing returns to the role of real-life Cantonese nationalist folk hero Wong Fei-hung, a character he owned in the 1950s in a long string of B movies. Sammo Hung stars as Butcher Ah-wing, Wong's number one student, the character played by the even tubbier Kent Cheng in the "Once Upon a Time in China" series, to Jet Li's upright younger version of Wong. Kwan wisely leaves the hard action to his younger costars, but he does some deft, elegant tricks with furniture and calligraphy brushes, proof positive that he still has all the chops of a kung fu master, everything but the brute strength. (He actually makes mere strength look rather crass.) "--David Chute"