This fight film adapts the proverbial rise-and-fall gangster formula to the mean streets of 1930s Shanghai. Chen Guantai is a poor peasant whose fearsome boxing ability allows him to muscle his way to the top of the Shanghai underworld. The film’s iconic match between Chen, a Russian wrestler, and ruthless hatchet-wielding thugs was recently revived as the “axe gang” in Stephen Chow’s comic tribute to the martial arts cinema, Kung Fu Hustle. 1972, Hong Kong, color, 35mm, in Mandarin with English subtitles, 126 minutes.
The Boxer from Shangtung (Ma Yongzhen) (newly restored print)
