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Life and career

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Lau began learning kung fu when he was nine years old, under strict tutelage from his father.[1]: 253  He recalled sitting in a horse stance for long periods of time, practicing the movements of Hung Ga repeatedly until his father approved of his form.[2]: 45 

In 1948, his family moved to Hong Kong, and Lau began working alongside his father in the local film industry,[3] with his first on-screen appearance in the 1950 film Brave Lad of Guangdong (Chinese: 关东小侠大战女镖师).[4]: 61  Lau worked as an extra and choreographer, appearing in many of the black-and-white Wong Fei-hung movies, such as the 1956 films How Wong Fei Hung Vanquished the Twelve Lions (Chinese: 黃飛鴻怒吞十二獅) and Wong Fei Hung Wins the Dragon Boat Race (Chinese: 黃飛鴻龍舟奪錦).[5][2]: 13  Lau eventually moved into martial arts choreography in 1963,[3] working with fellow choreographer Tang Chia [fr] on Hu Peng's 1963 film South Dragon, North Phoenix (Chinese: 南龍北鳳).[6][7]: 25  Lau and Tang would continue to collaborate on many other films until the mid-1970s, but the pair rose in popularity from the 1966 wuxia film The Jade Bow.[6][8] Both Lau and Tang were soon hired by Shaw Brothers Studio in 1965.[5][7]: 293  Lau's work as a martial arts choreographer extended to him setting up "Lau's Stunt Team", which provided actors with martial arts training that would be later useful in films like the Shaolin Temple-themed movies beginning in 1974.[5][9]: 10 

Themes

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Hung Gar traditions

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  • credited as "the first martial arts choreographer to become a wuxia director"[10]: 59 [9]: 23 
  • "Why did I use kung fu to make movies—to display the art and to aestheticise fist fighting [...]"[11]: 70 

Hung Gar traditions

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  • credited as "the first martial arts choreographer to become a wuxia director"[10]: 59 
  • likes stories about Hung Gar history, "particularly those concerned with the system's roots in the Shaolin Temple"[12]: 75 
  • "The Shaolin films of Zhang Che and Lau Kar-leung are more regionally specific, seeking to construct a continuity between Hong Kong and the martial arts legacy of southern China."[9]: 15 
  • "[...] he focused so single-mindedly on the lore, rituals, and disciplines of kung-fu that he seems to reverse the industry priorities: instead of using kung-fu to keep local cinema going, he used cinema to document and preserve the traditions he venerated."[13]: 251 
  • likes introducing traditions in detail, like the lion dance - "I just love shooting the customs and practices of the martial trade: how you do the lion dance, its etiquettes, how you must not blink your eyes or raise your foot, how you must not kick your opponent, or raise the lion's head above people, or smell the lion's tail... the etiquette, the morality, the movements and manners of the lion, how with just one lift you build a human tower... it's just mind-boggling."[14]: 62 
  • uses pre-credit sequences and ending freeze-frames "as marks of his authorial vision"[12]: 81 
  • common topics of emphasis:[12]: 81 
    • graphic depictions of training
    • privileging of forms and form work over actual combat
    • emphasis on women and domestic matters
    • focus on tensions between the spiritual and material world (nationalism, patriotism, revolution, religion, etc.)
    • questioning of authority of the sifu; the legitimacy of the master-pupil relationship
    • Confucian ethics in crisis
    • cinematic rendering of Hung Gar oral history
  • "The family is the nexus of all Liu's work. Martial arts is a family of styles, related like brothers or distant cousins but essentially springing from the same source, the Shaolin Monastery. [...] The cinema is also a family, from the corporate status and idenity of Shaw Brothers, through the genre of the martial arts film, to Liu's use of his brother Liu Chia-Jung and his mother's godson, Liu-Chia-Hui, in his films. [...] Underlying all of this is the concept of China as a large family and it is within this parameter that Liu can synthesize all the different elements — History, personal experience, national identity, martial arts style, legend — to form a narrative of Being."[15]: 125 
  • "[...] the Liu family, particularly Liu Jialiang, made Hung Gar a fixture at Shaw Brothers, starting in 1965, and solidified its presence within the Hong Kong film industry."[12]: 81 
  • mastering different styles of Southern kung fu[9]: 32 
  • "Lao was the first choreographer to turn director, but also the first (post-Lee) to bring recognisable fighting styles back into films [...]"[9]: 23 
  • Like Sammo Hung and Yuen Woo-ping, Lau created a unit or 'clan' to both choreograph and perform - "Lau trained established Shaw Brothers stars, but also showcased brilliant new ones - brother Lau Kar-wing/Liu Jiayung, adopted brother Lau kar-fai/Liu Jiahui/'Gordon Liu', the acrobatic Xiao Hou and the impossibly graceful Hui Ying-hung, a former dancer"[9]: 23 
  • training sequences provide the ability to produce the director, actor, and audience - "The master/director constructs the pupil/actor through the mise-en-scene of the Look, Gesture and Voice and is himself re-constructed by the shifts in the text which are improvised through contact with the subject. These training scenes become rehearsals, phantasy plays and scenarios for the actual tests, the set piece combats against 'enemies'. The latter, who are there for the purpose of engagement, become cinematic insertions of the audience; kung fu which has been learnt and rehearsed is tried out on them."[15]: 132 
  • "Although transvestitism, gender bending, and the importance of the yin and the yang of martial arts to the genre go back decades, Liu Jialiang’s foregrounding of precisely these issues through his re-imagination of Hung Gar as a system brings Shaw Brothers more in line with global trends."[12]: 106 
  • "Why did I use kung fu to make movies—to display the art and to aestheticise fist fighting. If you want to learn all those aspects of kung fu, you will have to spend a lot of time. Ever since entering the film industry to make movies and aestheticising kung fu, Lau Kar-leung has himself become the kung fu movie."[11]: 70 
  • Lau: "At that time, Chang Cheh had two fight choreographers: Tang Chia and me. Tang Chia didn't want to go to Taiwan, so Chang Cheh came to see me, asking me to give him a hand. He told me, "Without you, I won't be able to go through with it." He asked me what to do to rescue martial arts movies. I answered: fight scenes must be truer, like those in Bruce Lee movies. "But how?" he answered back. I told him that we must portray heroes who really existed and revive the kung fu the way they practiced it."[16]
  • Lau (when asked about the importance of portraying the master/disciple relationship in his films): "Yes, in China we hold on dearly to politeness, to "Lijiao" (Confucian ethics). Between the master and his disciples and between senior and junior, the distinction is very clear and sharp. As master, we must remain respectable, and as disciple we must respect the master. Chang Cheh is a non-Cantonese. That's why he was never able to show the link between master and disciples well in his kung fu movies. He could write a script, but he didn't understand kung fu very well. Besides, at the time when I departed from Chang Cheh, kung fu movies began to tire themselves out."[16]

References

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  1. ^ Rovin, Jeff; Tracy, Kathy (1997). The Essential Jackie Chan Sourcebook. New York: Pocket Books. ISBN 9780671008437.
  2. ^ a b Logan, Bey (1995). Hong Kong Action Cinema. Woodstock, New York: The Overlook Press. ISBN 978-0879516635.
  3. ^ a b Stokes, Lisa Oldham (2007). "Lau, Kar-leung". Historical Dictionary of Hong Kong Cinema. Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. pp. 231–232.
  4. ^ Hing Chao (2 May 2018). Lingnan Hung Kuen: Kung Fu in Cinema and Community. City University of HK Press. ISBN 978-962-937-352-8.
  5. ^ a b c Chu, Karen (2013-06-25). "Hong Kong Director and Martial Arts Master Lau Kar-leung Dies at 76". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2020-08-10.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  6. ^ a b "Lau Kar-leung 劉家良" (PDF). Hong Kong Film Archive. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2020-08-10. Retrieved 2020-08-10.
  7. ^ a b Morris, Meaghan; Li, Siu Leung; Chan, Stephen Ching-kiu (2005). Hong Kong connections : transnational imagination in action cinema. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press. ISBN 978-988-220-158-3. OCLC 642690004.
  8. ^ Stephen Teo (25 July 2019). Hong Kong Cinema: The Extra Dimensions. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 97–. ISBN 978-1-83871-626-4.
  9. ^ a b c d e f Hunt, Leon (2003). Kung Fu Cult Masters: From Bruce Lee to Crouching Tiger. London: Wallflower Press. ISBN 978-1903364635.
  10. ^ a b Yu, Sabrina Qiong, (2012). Jet Li : Chinese masculinity and transnational film stardom. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-0-7486-4548-0. OCLC 815281414.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  11. ^ a b The Making of Martial Arts Films—As Told by Filmmakers and Stars. Hong Kong: Provisional Urban Council. 1999. ISBN 962-8050-06-0.
  12. ^ a b c d e Marchetti, Gina (Autumn 2006). Hunt, Leon (ed.). "Martial Arts, North and South: Liu Jialiang's Vision of Hung Gar in Shaw Brothers Films". EnterText. 6 (1).
  13. ^ Bordwell, David (2000). Planet Hong Kong: Popular Cinema and the Art of Entertainment. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674002135.
  14. ^ Li, Cheuk-to (2006). A Tribute to Action Choreographers. Hong Kong: Hong Kong International Film Festival Society. ISBN 9789889796679.
  15. ^ a b Garcia, Roger (1980). "The Autarkic World of Liu Chia-liang". A Study of Hong Kong Martial Arts Film. Hong Kong: Urban Council of Hong Kong: 113–134.
  16. ^ a b Assayas, Olivier; Tesson, Charles (September 1984). "Interview with Lau Kar Leung: The Last Shaolin". Cahiers du Cinema (Interview). No. 362–363. pp. 26–30. Archived from the original on 2008-05-17. Retrieved 2020-08-11.
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Hing Chao (2 May 2018). Lingnan Hung Kuen: Kung Fu in Cinema and Community. City University of HK Press. ISBN 978-962-937-352-8.

Interview with Lau Kar Leung:The Last Shaolin by Olivier Assayas and Charles Tesson, in collaboration with Elizabeth Cazer and Tony Rayns

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