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The public spat surrounding the concurrent development of Yenâs Ip Man movies and Wong Kar-waiâs The Grandmasters â a long-anticipated take on the same Wing Chun icon that, as per the arthouse auteurâs usual custom, has been lingering in development and production limbo for years â has been well-documented; yet itâs still quite exciting to hear it from the actor himself. âA few years after [Jeff Lauâs project fell through], Wong Kar-wai announced that he wanted to [film] Ip Man,â he says. âBut of course, for many, many years, he never got to [make the movie]. Then I got a call from [veteran producer] Raymond Wong, who asked me to play Ip Man. [They] had [obtained] the proper rights from the [Ip] family.
He continues: âWhen I announced that I wanted to play Ip Man, there were so many controversies. There were a lot of doubts, a lot of badmouthing, even from Wong Kar-waiâs people. They said, [in a sarcastic tone], âAh, how can you compare [with us]? Weâre not on the same level, you know? You can never be successful. You may be good at fighting, but it would never be a successful movie. And you can never compare to Tony Leung [Chiu-wai, star of The Grandmasters,] to play Ip Man.â You know, thereâs a lot of this kind of pressure.
âBut of course, me and Wilson Yip, the director, we continued to believe in our mission. We made Ip Man, and it came out and was very, very successful. Then Ip Man 2 really just confirmed [that success].â At this point, Yen is barely able to hide his satisfied smirk. âOf course, after that, they didnât say anything else.â He momentarily breaks his image of consummate cool, bursting into hearty laughter for the first time during our interview. âSo sometimes, itâs just never say never, you know? Maybe I [was] just meant to play this role in the first place. [From] back in 1996 till now, [Iâve taken] a big circle. At the end, I played Ip Man, and Ip Man became so successful.â
You can tell how important a constant urge to improve is to Yen just by listening to him closely: he will use the word âsuccessfulâ 19 times in our 45-minute chat, having also reiterated four times his desire to âbreak groundsâ in the realm of martial arts cinema. Speaking with obvious excitement whenever he talks about his dual ambitions â to âbe a better actor in every movieâ, and to âelevate the standard of kung fu moviesâ â Yen may sound like an overzealous newcomer looking to calve out a career path if you happened across our chat without knowing who was speaking. In the end, however, it was hardly any surprise when the Hong Kong media crowned him with the nickname of, um, âUniverseâs Strongestâ.
Yen offers me a very dry âha haâ as I mention his winning moniker, before adding, âI donât reallyâŚâ He takes a brief pause. âYou know, itâs just a gimmick. I try my best in every one of my departments: acting, directing. And I always try to break grounds, try to improve. Every day I get up and say to myself, âOh, as a creator, as an artist, am I repeating what Iâve done before?â If I am, then I have a problem. All these years, Iâve never really stopped trying to be better. Everybody loved Ip Man â if you look at it I couldâve done 10 or 20 Ip Manâs, but I didnât. Because I feel as an actor, thatâs my responsibility to give back to the audience; after Ip Man, I took on different roles.â
As our cinemaâs current go-to action star, Yen has been participating in a range of intriguing projects in the past couple of years, including Peter Chanâs Swordsmen, a reimagining of Chang Chehâs 1967 martial arts classic The One-Armed Swordsman, and Soi Cheangâs The Monkey King 3D, in which Yenâs Monkey King battles with Chow Yun-fatâs Jade Emperor. Before either hits our screens, however, the actor will first star as Guan Yu in The Lost Bladesman, a title role that has baffled Yen no end. âBased on Records of Three Kingdoms, the real historical book, there was very, very little description of him,â he says. âIn the previous movies about the Three Kingdoms, like [John Wooâs] Red Cliff, the focus also wasnât on Guan Yu. Everyone has an image of Guan because [in daily life] we pray to him, we worship him, and we have temples for him.â
Yen is frank to admit that he didnât know much about the Three Kingdoms history before he took up the role. âTwo thirds of the film â Iâll be honest with you â I have no idea what I was doing,â he says. âI have no idea whether I was playing the role properly, because nobody really knows Guan as a person.â He does, however, get Guanâs signature long beard right. âAt first, it was very hard to do my lines,â he says, âbecause once [the beard] is glued to the lipsâ area, itâll fall off when you move [your mouth]. It took me a week or two to get adjusted [to it].â
The film itself, directed by Alan Mak and Felix Chong of Infernal Affairs trilogy and Overheard fame, revolves around the legendary generalâs loyalty to his sworn brother and lord Liu Bei, charting the time he spent inside the camp of rival warlord Cao Cao, as well as his death-defying journey back to Liuâs camp. âItâs kind of like a period costume version of Infernal Affairs,â says Yen of the battle of wits between Guan and Cao. While the revelled episode of âCrossing Five Passes and Slaying Six Generalsâ is easily the action highlight of the new film, itâs his verbal duels with illustrious Chinese actor Jiang Wen, who plays Cao, that should prove the most captivating.
Noting his subtle transition from an action star to an all-round leading man, Yen feels that the audienceâs expectation is different from before: â[in the past] all you need for an action guy is good action and not too much of [any] acting. But today, you cannot be a successful action star if you donât convince the audience with good acting.â As he has been doing for his two other recent films, Swordsmen and The Monkey King, Yen is also serving as action choreographer for The Lost Bladesman. âBut of course,â he says, âaction will always be part of my most marketable element. When you watch a Donnie Yen film youâve got to have a lot of good action [scenes], right? I want to make sure that they have to be as realistic as possible.â At least as realistic as his costume beard, we presume.
The Lost Bladesman opens on April 28.
Only two weeks away!
