Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is Marvel's first film built around an Asian hero, and the first whose fights openly borrow from Hong Kong kung fu cinema. Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, it opened in the US on 3 September 2021 and grossed more than $432 million worldwide.

The Jackie Chan school

The action was led by supervising stunt coordinator Brad Allan, a member of the Jackie Chan Stunt Team, with Andy Cheng as fight coordinator. Allan died in August 2021 and the film is dedicated to him. Their signature is all over the bus fight: a brawl in a tight space where every rail, seat and passenger becomes a prop or a weapon, in the spirit of Chan's 1980s films. The sequence took over a year to plan and went through about 20 versions. Interiors were shot in Sydney on two buses mounted on gimbals, exteriors in San Francisco.

What practitioners will spot

The film sets two fighting philosophies against each other. Wenwu hits hard and straight. Ying Li, guardian of the village of Ta Lo, fights in circles, absorbing and redirecting force, with choreography drawn from tai chi and wuxia-style wushu. Their first duel plays like a dance and recalls Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which Cretton cites as a model alongside the Ip Man series. Simu Liu came in with taekwondo, gymnastics and Wing Chun, then trained in tai chi, wushu, Muay Thai, silat, Krav Maga, jiu-jitsu and boxing, and did many of his own stunts.

A Hong Kong cast

Tony Leung Chiu-wai, star of Wong Kar-wai's films and The Grandmaster, makes his Hollywood debut here and had two weeks to prepare his fights. Michelle Yeoh plays a weapons master again, twenty years after Crouching Tiger. Critics praised the action and Leung's performance; the effects-heavy finale is less satisfying for fans of real fighting. The film earned an Oscar nomination for Best Visual Effects.