Stuntman

武替道

Hong Kong, 2024, colour, 2.35:1, 113 mins.

Directors: Liang Guanyao 梁冠尧 [Albert Leung], Liang Guanshun 梁冠舜 [Herbert Leung].

Rating: 6/10.

Intended as an elegy for Hong Kong action cinema and the stuntmen who made it great, this first feature only partly fulfils its promise.

STORY

Hong Kong, sometime during the 1980s. While shooting a dangerous action sequence at night on a main thoroughfare in Jianshazui [Tsim Sha Tsui], stunt double Jin (Zou Wenzheng), standing in for actor Liang Zhiwei (Weng Weitong), is crippled for life. The stunt was under-rehearsed and everyone was under heavy pressure from ambitious action director Li Sen (Lin Yaosheng) to just do it. Some 20 years later, Li Sen is running his own small chiropractic clinic, having long retired from the film business. A veteran director friend, Chu Tianhang (Du Yange) persuades him to attend a dinner celebrating the 70th anniversary of the Iron Fist Martial Arts Association, where they remember a late member, Ma You. Everyone is finding work hard to come by, compared with the halcyon days of Hong Kong action films, and many have turned to teaching martial arts. Chu Tianhang tries to persuade Li Sen to be the action director on a film, Return to the Underworld 复出江湖, that he’s about to shoot, as the leading actor is Liang Zhiwei (now a major action star) and the investors want “an ’80s vibe”. Li Sen demurs, as he’s now retired, a widower, and happy running his small clinic; also, he wants to concentrate on the forthcoming marrige of his daughter Li Jingyi (Cai Siyun), who has an uneasy relationship with him. However, a chance meeting with ambitious young stuntman Li Shilong (Liu Junqian) – who’s being pressured by his elder brother (Zhang Dalun) to join his removal business instead – reminds him of his own younger days; he accepts Chu Tianhang’s offer, and Liang Zhiwei, despite having his own regular stunt team, reluctantly agrees for old times’ sake. Li Sen then hires the young Li Shilong as his assistant, which doesn’t please the head of Liang Zhiwei’s stunt team, Weizhao (Li Jiancheng). On the first day of shooting, Li Sen turns up late after trying to curry favour with his daughter by helping her choose her wedding dress. When he does finally arrive, he then maniacally shoots take after take of a stunt, annoying everyone, including Liang Zhiwei and Li Shilong. Gradually, however, his hardline approach rubs off on Li Shilong, who then earns the respect of Liang Zhiwei’s own stunt team. When the film’s budget is cut, the crew are forced to improvise. To save money, Li Sen comes up with a plan to stage a big action sequence on the streets with no shooting permits – just like in the old days. Everything goes well at the start, but then some bystanders are accidentally hurt and some real police turn up.

REVIEW

On the surface a tribute to Hong Kong’s stuntmen of yesteryear – and especially how it was their guts and daring that really made the golden age of the territory’s action cinema – this first feature by twins Liang Guanyao 梁冠尧 [Albert Leung] and Liang Guanshun 梁冠舜 [Herbert Leung] is actually more a personal drama about how to reconcile one’s film career with the demands of real life. The film keeps a level head about the golden age of the 1980s, not over-romanticising it; but with a story that’s almost totally set in the near present, when Hong Kong cinema is struggling to maintain an identity, Stuntman 武替道 shows – inadvertently – exactly why it’s no longer the force it used to be. The film has several good things – especially the lead performance by veteran stunt performer/action director Dong Wei 董玮, 71, as a retired master brought back for one last hurrah – but it’s also full of the same character types and plot devices that Hong Kong cinema has lazily relied on for half a century. Local box office last autumn was only a weedy HK$9 million. (With no big stars and very Hong Kong subject-matter, the film fared no better on Mainland release this spring, taking a tiny RMB870,000.)

Though they weren’t around during the golden years, the Leungs have some experience from working in action films (e.g. Twins Mission 双子神偷, 2007) before moving on to other things. Stuntman initially began as a script idea in 2013, based on their own experiences as well as stories from the golden age; and from 2017 Liang Guanyao re-entered the industry as a bit player-cum-stunt co-ordinator. But it was only when they called in a professional film-maker, Zeng Xianning 曾宪宁, to rewrite the script that it finally attracted some finance in late 2022. The film was shot in 19 days during Mar 2023.

Zeng herself directed and co-wrote A Light Never Goes Out 灯火阑珊 (2022), in which the decline of the city’s neon-sign industry was used as a metaphor for the city’s own slow eclipse, so she would seem to have been an ideal person to work on the Liangs’ project. But like Light, Stuntman never quite fulfils its potential as a slice of human drama. Not only are the characters familiar Hong Kong sterotypes but also there’s a perpetual pull in the film between being an elegy for the territory’s once-great film industry and a more personal portrait of the main character, who in turn is torn between an industry he once loved (but has now changed) and trying to rescue the few scraps of family life still left to him.

The opening five minutes – set some time during the 1980s, though even that is never made precise – follows the nighttime shoot of a dangerous stunt in Jianshazui [Tsim Sha Tsui], with a manic action director, Li Sen, pushing everyone beyond the bounds of safety. A stunt double is paralysed and Li Sen is pole-axed. Twenty or so years later – in other words c. 2010 – Li Sen is long retired (presumably after the accident) and happy running a small chiropractic clinic with action-movie posters on the walls. When an old director colleague tempts him back for a one-off job on an action movie that needs “an ’80s vibe”, he finally accepts after meeting by chance a young wannabe stunt co-ordinator who reminds him of himself years earlier. The problem is that, once on the set, the now self-deprecating, quiet-spoken Li Sen turns back into his younger alter ego as he starts taking the chances that were once seen as part of the job but are now frowned upon in the more PC 21st century. The film industry’s all-consuming demands also start to imperil the brittle relationship with his daughter, who’s about to get married.

Though second-billed to the more pin-uppy Liu Junqian 刘俊谦 (okay as the young wannabe), Dong anchors the whole film, cleverly handling the two sides (kindly, angry) of Li Sen’s character. It’s a memorable performance in the twilight of a rich career. Hong Kong-born, US-raised action director Wu Yunlong 伍允龙 [Philip Ng], with 20 years in the industry, is well cast as an action megastar, balancing ego with respect. The whole film has a professional look on an obviously modest budget, thanks to versatile widescreen photography by d.p. Zhang Dawei 张大伟 (Triviṣa 树大招风, 2016) that’s always well composed and focused on the characters, even in action sequences; and editing by the Liangs themselves is mobile but always smooth. Scoring by the popular team (a decade or so back) of Zhao Zengxi 赵增熹 and Zhang Renjie 张人杰 is effective but conventionally soupy, especially in the more emotional third act.

The main character, Li Sen, attributes the decline of the local industry, and the low esteem in which it’s now held, to a general lack of passion and commitment. In the old days, he says, stuntmen would always risk everything for a movie; nowadays that attitude is seen as self-centred and, as one character asks, is a stunt that costs a life worth it just for a movie? Significantly, the script never mentions the main reason for the Hong Kong industry’s decline – the rise of the Mainland industry and its far greater resources. It’s like the elephant in the room, and shows up the script’s general shallowness and lack of realism.

The film would benefit from 10-15 minutes tightening, especially in the final third. The ending does carry some emotional clout, cleverly tying up several plot strands, but overall Stuntman is a good idea (with excellent playing by Dong) that only partly fulfils its promise. Its Chinese title means “The Way of the Stunt Double”.

CREDITS

Produced by Stuntman Film Production (HK).

Script: Zeng Xianning, Ye Weiping. Story: Liang Guanyao [Albert Leung], Liang Guanshun [Herbert Leung]. Photography: Zhang Dawei. Editing: Liang Guanyao [Albert Leung], Liang Guanshun [Herbert Leung]. Music: Zhao Zengxi, Zhang Renjie. Art direction: Chen Miaoling. Costume design: Chen Miaoling. Sound: Huang Yongtai, Chen Zhiyang, Chen Huisi. Action: Jiang Daohai, Liang Bo’en. Visual effects: Zhang Yaohao.

Cast: Liu Junqian (Li Shilong), Dong Wei (Li Sen/Sam), Cai Siyun (Li Jingyi/Cherry, Li Sen’s daughter), Wu Yunlong [Philip Ng] (Liang Zhiwei/Wai), Zhang Dalun (Li Shijie/Kit, Li Shilong’s elder brother), Du Yange (Chu Tianhang/Cho, veteran director), Lin Yaosheng (younger Li Sen), Liang Yongting (Ying, Li Sen’s former wife), Zou Wenzheng (younger Jin), Che Wanwan (Juan, Jin’s wife), Wu Ruiting (Jin/Kam), He Yongshao (Jin’s young daughter), Xie Siyong (younger Li Jingyi), Huang Si’en (Zhou Shitu, Li Jingyi’s step-father), Liu Jiaqi (Liang Zhiwei’s female assistant), Zeng Zhongyuan (Yuan), Li Jiancheng (Weizhao/Chiu, leader of Liang Zhiwei/Wai’s stunt team), Weng Weitong (younger Liang Zhiwei).

Release: Hong Kong, 25 Sep 2024.