Fearless Hyena (1984)

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Review: I really enjoyed this authentic Kung Fu movie but a lot of time is wasted on silly jokes and unnecessary scenes. At the time of it's release, I was totally amazed with this unknown Kung Fu world, were a man trains to be an expert and he uses his skills to kill the baddies, so this film definitely brought back some memories. This film sees Chan play a young Shing Lung, who lives with his grandfather and makes money any which way he can. Whilst staying in his grandfather's house, he's taught different styles of Kung Fu and he uses his skills against the bullies in his remote village. His talents soon get recognised by a money making con artist, who opens Kung Fu school were Chan takes on everyone that comes to take-on there pupils. When his grandfather finds out how he's been making money, he gets very upset because he doesn't want there Kung Fu to become known to others. After a while, the schools name spreads across the village and his grandfather's enemy tracks him down kills him after a lengthy battle. Chan then seeks revenge for his grandfather but his Kung Fu isn't up to scratch to challenge him, so he learns new styles from his grandfather's friend, which lead to a showdown that is definitely worth watching. Its your usual, "You Killed My Master" type of concept which I have grown to love in this genre. The only problem is that it takes a long time to get going but it's worth the wait. The funny dubbing really made me laugh and some of the fighting scenes were a bit over the top but that was expected because of the age of the movie. Chan does give his all throughout the movie and the different costumes that he put on during his time at the school were amusing but the true action should have started a lot earlier in the movie. With that aside, I still enjoyed the film and I'm glad that I was able to get my hands on it. Enjoyable!Round-Up: This movie was directed and written by a young Jackie Chan, who done a great job at such a young age. The choreography throughout the movie was also done by Chan so he really put a lot of time and energy into his directional debut. At the time, Chan was only 25 so you have to give him recognition for his first attempt behind the camera. Anyway, if your into your Kung Fu movies then you definitely need this film in your collection.I recommend this movie to people who are into their action/martial arts/comedies starring Jackie Chan, James Tien and Dean Shek. 7/10

Jackie Chan had just established his Hong Kong popularity with Seasonal Pictures Snake in Eagles Shadow and the sublime Drunken Master. With the success of those films Lo Wei, who lent him out to Seasonal, let Jackie have complete control over his next picture. Fearless Hyena would be Jackie's directorial debut – though he would be working with a much smaller budget than his Seasonal experience. He would also stunt coordinate and write this film too. This movie would out gross the stellar receipts of Drunken Master and help earn Jackie 6000 HK dollars (his pay was 3000 per film; though he made over 50000 on Drunken Master). This measly pay helped exacerbate the rift between him and Lo Wei which led to his departure and the infamous sequel. Jackie reprises his goofy student role that he played in Drunken Master. This time he is Shing Lung, a talented but capricious student and grandson of Chen Ping Fe (the ubiquitous James Tien). Lung would rather gamble or goof off then study his forms. Little does he know that his Grandfather is marked for death by Yen Ting Hua (the underrated Yam Sai-kwoon aka Yen Shi Kwan) who is trying to destroy the Sien Yi clan founded by Hiu Fei (I just love keeping track of these names, I do not know why). Though Shing is forbidden to teach (or show) the Kung Fu his grandfather teaches him he (of course) does it anyways.Shing tries to make his grandfather proud by getting a job selling coffins. The coffin dealer played by Dean Shek is an unscrupulous merchant who even sells secondhand coffins. This cameo plays to the strengths of Dean and is quite an interesting and hilarious scene. Hapless Shing blows this opportunity by trapping Dean in one of his favorite coffins. He runs away and while walking the public he is confronted by three ruffians (Great Bear, Stony Egg and Ironhead) he beat up earlier. They want him to teach them Kung Fu.Shing meets their Master Ti Cha who is in charge of the Everything Clan who has no actual skills except for scheming. Ti offers Lung a position and lots of money to help there school learn effective fighting techniques. Ti uses him in the old ploy as a lowly laborer to fight heads of other schools (so if the lowly laborer is that good, just imagine how good Master Ti is.) This leads to several excellent fight scenes that are incredibly fun to watch. I especially like when Shing fights the Lu Ying and the Willow Sword (using the Pink Panther theme as background music) as a cross-eyed beggar. He then fights a large albeit slow man as a woman (yes, Jackie in Drag and no he is not cute).Shing then makes a huge mistake by naming the facility under the Sien Yi name. Now the rest of the film is very predictable with the ultimate showdown between Shing Lung and Yen Ting Hua. The way it is handled though is quite sagacious. The training scenes are Jackie at his masochistic best. With him pulling huge sacks, doing amazing upside-down sit-ups with his new trainer the Unicorn having a sadistic gleam in his eyes. Shing is even taught Emotional Kung Fu (which Jackie made up for this film) using Joy, Anger, Sorrow and Happiness to focus on one's enemy "emotional" weak spot.One of my favorite scenes is the Dueling Chopsticks scene in which the Unicorn prevents Shing from eating by using his chopsticks (of course.) Unfortunately it has influenced me to be quite annoying and apply this whenever applicable.I would not rate this film as highly as Drunken Master. There are problems with the plot that takes too much from Drunken Master. However, I feel that this is an unheralded martial arts piece that is funny and exciting with excellent ideas and stunt choreography by Jackie Chan. This is also a must see if you want to watch Jackie in drag.

This movie was fun. I really thought it was TOO much like Drunken Master, but not as good. I just felt that Jackie was desparate to recreate the success of that classic, so he just did pretty much the same movie over again with some changes included. But at least he picked Drunken Master to rip off, because that movie is awesome. I make it sound like this movie is bad, but that isnt the case. Its a good movie, very enjoyable, just not original.

Jackie Chan in "Hsiao chuan yi chao" is Kung Fu's answer to Charlie Chaplan. Yes I admit that some critics may accuse the film of having a flimsy plot line or cheesy dialogue, but my God, the humor and action scenes more than make up for all of the movie's shortcomings! I have two words for anyone who has seen this movie and is on the fence as to whether or not it was the best movie that they have ever seen: Tea Cha. The scamming teacher of the S.S.S. school of kung fu is all that the movie needs. Throw in Jackie Chan's acrobatics and high flying martial arts, and wow! Fans in search of a "good" movie such as Citizen Cane or Driving Miss Daisy should probably stay away, but anyone looking to laugh and be amazed must see The Fearless Hyena starring Jackie Chan.