Kung Fu Kids VI: Enter the Young Dragon (1989)

Kung Fu Kids VI: Enter the Young Dragon (1989)
Chinese Title: 好小子6－小龍過江 
Translation: Good Boys 6: Little Dragons Crossing the River

 

Starring: Chen Chung-Jung, Yan Tseng-Kuo, Tso Hsiao-Hu, Chang Yi-Teng, Fu Sing-Tak
Director: Lam Man-Cheung
Action Director: Lam Man-Cheung, Chang Yi-Teng, Lau Hon-Hing

Story: I’m assuming this is a sequel to the first two Kung Fu Kids in terms of continuity. A group of killers working for a Caucasian criminal named Scorpion (George Nicholas, of Ninja in the USA and Ninja Condors) try to steal a gold necklace from a woman (Fu Sing-Tak). The necklace contains a map to a famed Golden Buddha, hidden somewhere in Taiwan. The necklace falls into the hands of the Fatty, Ah Kuo and Tiger. The bad guys kidnap their uncle and take him to Thailand. The Kung Fu Kids team up with the woman and her brother, Blackie (Chang Yi-Teng), to rescue their uncle and find the treasure.

Fight Scene Breakdown:

Fight #1 – Fu Sing-Tak vs. killers – Fu, who looks like a Taiwanese Sibelle Hu (but with better fighting skills), fights a muscular Chinese guy (Charles Hsu, of Island of Fire and Little Shaolin Monk) in her apartment. He spends the fight throwing her through tables and cabinets in the most painful way possible. She escapes and fights several more bad guys waiting for her on the street. She fights on and around a motorcycle, before a motorcycle/car chase reminiscent of Operation Condor commences. Vehicular stunts were orchestrated by Chen Chun-Kun, who also worked on Silver Hawk and Island of Greed.

Fight #2 – The Snake Competition – This is a sport competition similar in spirit to the games we saw in Dragon Lord. The objective of the game to grab a live cobra and run with it over some obstacles, climb up a platform, and tie the snake to the flag. Of course, the opposing teams can beat each other up in order to wrest the cobra away from whomever has it. The three Kung Fu Kids participate in this competition, against a 3-man team from Hong Kong and a 3-man team from Thailand. Lots of brutal falls, flips, kicks, throws, and take downs. The kids, especially Yan and Tso, take more than their fair share of lumps in this sequence.

Fight #3 – KFK and Fu Sing-Tak vs. killers – The bad guys show up at a celebratory dinner to steal the necklace from Fatty, but a huge fight breaks out. Fu Sing-Tak beats up some low-level henchmen armed with short swords, but gets kicked around by Choi Chung-Chau (Sun Dragon and Kung Fu Executioner). Tso and Yan step in and join the fracas. Yan acrobatically beats up the henchmen, all of whom to HK spins onto tables and chairs, while Tso goes one on one with Choi. Nice 80s kickboxing choreography here.

Fight #4 – Tso Hsiao-Hu vs. Lau Hon-Hing – Lau Hon-Hing, one of the film’s fight choreographers, challenges Tso to a duel, each of them wielding a sort of tonfa/gauntlet and a metal bar. Very good escrima-like choreography, occasionally broken up by a spin kick or butterfly spin. There is some Donnie Yen style undercranking here, but the choreography is killer.

Fight #5 – Yan Tseng-Kuo vs. Thai fighters – Yan takes on a pair of Krabi-krabong fighters in two consecutive sword fights. Some good swordplay here and in a funny “twist,” Yan gets taken out by the second fighter, a woman.

Fight #6 – Warehouse Fight – Our heroes take on the bad guys while rescuing their uncle. Tso and Yan are armed with tennis rackets, which they use to fend of the bad guys’ watermelon knives. Lots of fighting on top of bags of rice (or something), with lots of painful falls, as you might expect. The boys to some good jumping kicks. Fu Sing-Tak does some acrobatics and nice axe kicks against her opponents.

Fight #7 – Fight on street – Fight #6 is immediately followed by a tuk-tuk chase, which then leads to this fight. Yan and Tso trade blows with the low-level henchmen and Choi Chung-Chau as all the good guys make their way to the docks. There is some nice stunt-oriented chase action from Tso Hsiao-Hu, and this fight gives way to an extended boat chase.

Fight #8 – Jungle Combat – At the halfway mark, our heroes take to the Thai wilderness in search of the treasure. There’s an extended jeep chase through a village, with the bad guys firing M-16s and M60 machine guns at our protagonists. Hollywood is generally loath to put young people in danger like that, especially in a kids film, but Chinese filmmakers do not care. Eventually, our heroes split up and take out the bad guys one by one. There are short bursts of choreography, plus Tso Hsiao-Hu using a mini-crossbow and painful stunts involving people getting knocked backward into trees.

Fight #9 – Climax – The finale is a big Sammo Hung-style free-for-all, with our five protagonists taking on Scorpion, his right-hand men, and a bunch of sword-wielding henchmen at the ruins of a Thai temple. Lots of Sammo-esque choreography against the lackeys, which is welcome. Chang Yi-Teng, who’s been more of a comic foil until now, shows off some nice kicks against the bad guys, and then duels with the main bad guy’s right hand man, an unnamed Caucasian with a perm and a goatee wearing white-on-white clothing. This guy does some kung fu, but does so comically. Tso Hsiao-Hu gets his butt handed to him by the one-two combo of Charles Hsu and Choi Chung-Chau, until Fu Sing-Tak helps him. Tso defeats Choi with a whip and a flying leg scissor, while Charles Hsu completely manhandles Fu (she has to get help from the boys later on). Yan takes on Yam Pak-Wang (choreographer of The Death Games and Black City) with a pair of small metal clubs, which he uses like escrima sticks. Chang Yi-Teng finally takes on George Nicolas, which has some good choreography, although Nicolas is more brawn than technique. He’s finally captured by a tribe of cannibalistic natives, which is a little disappointing, but given the quantity of fighting up until then, I can live with that.

Kung Fu Kids VI is a literal fight fest and a great example of why the 80s were such a Golden Era for action films, but in Hong Kong and abroad. The choreography reaches the heights of the best Sammo Hung movies, and the stuntwork is as painful as anything Jackie has done, even if done on a smaller scale. People break their falls with whatever furniture is on hand, get thrown into posts, jump through real glass windows, participate in all sorts of vehicular mayhem, and just put themselves through the ringer. This is easily the best film of the Kung Fu Kids series and the best example of young people doing martial arts on film.

The film isn’t perfect. While there’s an action sequence about once every five minutes during the first half, the movie loses some steam during the second half when they go looking for the treasure, especially during the cannibal tribe sequence and shortly thereafter. There’s some subplot about an orphanage that doesn’t really amount to anything, either. But like I said, the quality and quantity of action more than makes up for it.