The otherwise frail-looking Master Ip imbued his instruction with a quiet dignity and a fierce pride in the ancient tradition he upheld; small wonder that his charisma drew reverence from students and respect from rivals. Ip was no saint, but here filmmakers use their fictionalized narrative to deliver deeper messages that go beyond his chops, strikes, grapples, punches, trips, and kicks.
Mutual Respect
Many teens and young adults take up martialInstead of contempt for one’s peers, one must cultivate mutual respect. Only then can one learn from each other’s strengths, leverage each other’s weaknesses, and nurture mutual learning and growth. A strutting bravado, however, boasts that one has nothing to learn. That’s how students become delinquents. Ip’s saying that only through a humble spirit of lifelong learning do some students grow to become teachers. It’s also how only some teachers grow from good to great.
To Ip, the secret lies in calming, even stilling, the mind. In this way, the body’s energy is conserved for the time when judicious exercise of that power delivers staggering results. A northerner, spoiling for a fight with Ip, mocks Wing Chun as too soft and feminine. Ip corrects him, “Good kung-fu does not depend on age or sex. It’s on you.”
Mature Personhood
Unlike Ip, Foshan’s southern kung-fu masters waste energy squabbling over who’s superior among them. They’re easily overpowered by masters-in-waiting who stride bossily in from the north. That’s a metaphor for mature personhood.If a person’s divided against himself and weighed down by envy, he’ll be unprepared when an external challenge arrives. This can be physical, mental, familial, or financial. It’s also a metaphor for mature nationhood. For all their bluster about patriotism and honor, the bickering kung-fu schools of Foshan fall to ruin when the Japanese invade.
A subplot involving Imperial Japanese soldiers challenging Chinese civilians to duels serves as a melodramatic call to restore not just lost national honor, but a lost unity of body and mind. This is where Ip towers above other masters. He overpowers as many misguided Chinese rivals as he does malicious Japanese soldiers.
His point? Physical mastery over others is within the grasp of most willing students. Spiritual mastery over the restless self, though, eludes even some of the best teachers.
Ip says that although martial arts involve the use of force, the Chinese martial arts are Confucian in spirit; they are more about balance. As he says, “The virtue of martial arts is benevolence … treating others as you would yourselves.” That isn’t just about economy of motion but grace, too. It’s not about effectiveness alone but elegance, and even beauty.
With the right technique, flexibility, and resilience, Ip knows he can overpower external enemies; here he single-handedly defeats as many as 10 men at once. But he knows something else. The challenge lies in conquering enemies within: his false pride, jealousy, low self-esteem, and selfishness. Watch how, with a gentle gesture and no more than a few words, Ip counsels a young man set on self-destruction.
