The Young Vagabond
Craig
Happy New Year! When switching calendars, one must be drunk. Let’s take a look at a film with one of China’s favorite inebriated folk heroes.
Release
IVL. This one is not so good for extras, and the subtitlers skipped over the credits and a lot of the signs and titles throughout the film. The images are all sharp, though. The name Su Chan has been romanized elsewhere as So Chai. Just so you know we’re talking about the same Beggar, whether we call him So or Su.
Starring
Liu Chia-hui, Pai Piao, Wang Yu, Wang Lung-wei
In Brief
Su Chan is a disgrace to his family. A drunk since he could walk, Chan is a dunce in class, and spends his time finding innovative ways to get cornered into fights. When his instructor, Liang, catches him drinking in class, Chan pretends it was just tea. Liang samples the “tea”, and tells Chan to deliver a pot of the same brew to his door that night.
When Chan and Liang are a little sloshed, the master shows a few drunken steps from the tiger and monkey styles. The next day in class, the master denies the whole incident.
Chan returns with more wine, and Liang gives him a more free-form lesson. As long as he has a technique to counter every attack, his enemies will see through his techniques, and he will be defeated.
We come to find out that Liang has not always made his living by teaching poetry. He once robbed banks and mansions with the notorious brigand Wu Gong. The two had a falling out over Wu’s ruthlessness. Liang was injured when they fought, and had to go into hiding.
Wu Gong shows up (shock), and begins fucking up Su Chan’s life in every way he can manage. When the insults have piled high enough, they go ahead with their inevitable fight to the death.
Buddah 2000!
Nice Shots
Jibao and Chan begin fighting in class, and doing a fine job of keeping it from the instructor until their bruises start to show.
There’s a nice character moment when Liang and Su Chan are a little drunk. Liang is used to drinking in rough company, where people dispense their own wine. Su, who takes lessons in both fighting and poetry from Liang, reflexively tries to pour.
Liang watches from the crowd as Wu flees an attempted bank robbery.
Best Stunts
When Su Chan takes on Wu Gong’s lackeys, the eight-against-one fight is all sorts of fun.
The final reel goes fully three dimensional, but with very little by way of wire assistance.
Best Song Lyrics
Cut running water with a sword
It will faster flow
Drink wine to drown your sorrow
It will heavier grow
Life is full of despair
Let’s sail away with our hair down
Well, it’s a poem, but I’m quoting it anyway.
Disappointments
Su Chan departs the scene of a murder. The emotional intensity is wrecked for want of a dolly or a steadycam. Come on, guys. It’s 1985. Contrasted with the rest of the camera work, especially the final fight, this scene just tanks.
Final Analysis
The comedy in the first act was fun, and the action scenes were energetic, but there were some problems with pacing as Wu Gong’s atrocities pile up. Su Chan’s character arc peaks midway through the film. With little room for the hero to grow, the final showdown lacks dramatic relevance. Two and a half stars.
If You Like This
If you like the evolution from formed to formless, see Way of the Dragon, a.k.a. Return of the Dragon.
The juxtaposition between the germphobic Wu Gong and the slovenly “Beggar” Su Chan reminds me of the closing fight in Sha Po Lang between the cop in black and the hit man in white. And I felt like throwing in another plug for SPL.
While I’m plugging my favorites: Liu Chia Hui and pots of wine? Drunken Monkey!
For the Donnie Yen portrayal of Su Chan/So Chai, see Hero Among Heroes.
Now, pardon me while I go get shit-faced.
January 5th, 2008 at 8:13 am
The hooch certainly does have its good side in fightin’ China. Why do you suppose that is? A reaction to the orderliness of Conficianism? I dunno.
January 5th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
In large part, yes. Note the strained, peculiar student-teacher relationships between drunken fighters in Drunken Master I-III, Swordsman, Drunken Monkey, Come Drink With Me, and, of course, Young Vagabond. And in another direction, we frequently see the drunken hero as an archetypal wuxia character, a man whose wisdom has grown to the point where he can no longer interact with square society on its own terms. The drunken hero grew up in the Jiang Hu world of betrayal and death; he becomes cynical, and retreats to the bottle, not just to drown his sorrow or forget his cares, but to exit the social system he has known, and become a hermit. Again, all the aforementioned titles hint at this, but Drunken Monkey is probably the clearest example. The drunken hero is often a closet intellectual, skilled in music or poetry, doling out a Buddhist philosophy of detachment from worldly concerns.
Another angle I look at, one hinted at by Drunken Master II, Hero Among Heroes, and Young Master, and hammered home in Last Hero in China, is that booze is a catalyst for violence. It loosens people up, increases their pain threshold, destroys their judgment, and lowers their inhibitions. This role blends into the polar opposite of the drunken hero, the drunken fool. This is Chan’s character in DMII when he is singing in the restaurant. See also the opening of Ten Tigers of Kwang Tung. These are drunks who make public asses of themselves, and wake up the next morning thinking they were charming.
There’s also the pure tactical view. Many fighting styles include a few “drunken” steps, where the fighter shifts his weight and leans in unusual ways to create confusion. Young Vagabond takes this to its logical conclusion, borrowing from the Taoist military scholars the notion that form is vulnerable, but formlessness cannot be attacked.
January 5th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
Awesome. Thank you. Yeah, I’d not thought that drunkenness was being portrayed as purely positive, but it sure does seem to help sometimes. Also, I’d heard of actual Drunken styles, but they don’t rely on actual drunkenness, correct? Not for reals.
Also, please be advised that I would have been incapable of making the Conficianism guess before I came under your tutelage. Again, I thank you.
January 6th, 2008 at 11:22 am
Correct. From what I’ve seen of drunken steps, one needs to be very sharp to use them at all. The balance and timing look excruciatingly difficult. I’d be wary of trying them sober, let alone drunk.