Once Upon a Time in China Part 2 (1993)

Jet Li versus Donnie Yen ! An Easy Sell !

The first couple of times I watched this movie, I did not know who Donnie Yen was. After watching Iron Monkey, Killzone, and Seven Swords, I wanted to see more of his movies. Looking on amazon, I could not believe he was in "Once Upon a Time in China II." How did I miss him ? I already loved this movie, and now knowing Donnie Yen is in it, makes it even better!
The story for II, is Wong Fei-Hung(Jet Li), Aunt 13(Rosamund Kwan), and Foon go to Canton for a medical conference so Wong can display his acupuncture skills. While there, Wong runs up against the White Lotus Society, who hate all foreignors! As Wong battles against the White Lotus, he also eventually meets the local General(Donnie Yen). Their first martial arts scene with stick-fighting is awesome! As you can probably guess, Jet and Donnie are two of my favorite martial artists! Wong eventually saves some schoolchildren, and they all arrive at the English Embassy, where the White Lotus society wages war. After fighting off the Society, he goes to their shrine to battle the Immortal,Invincible Kung! Another great battle ensues, with Wong triumphant. As Wong and Foon attempt to meet with the "rebellion" at the docks, General Len comes to stop them. The final battle between Jet and Donnie is fantastic!!! I can't believe I did not know who he was the first time!
I liked the further subplot of the interaction between Wong, Foon, and Aunt 13. Wong is always yelling at Foon, especially when Wong seems to catch him touching or holding Aunt 13. Foon is in love with Aunt 13, while she obviously is infatuated with Wong.
The DVD picture is very good. And the sound is also very good.
The Extra's on the DVD are a bit thin.
* There is the original theatrical movie, and then an English Dubbed Version.
* There are 4 trailers
* There are filmographies of director Tsui Hark, Jet Li, Donnie Yen, and Rosamond Kwan.

Even though I believe both Once Upon movies are great, I thought this was the better one plot-wise, and with better martial arts scenes! August 6, 2007

Even Better Than The Original

Jet Li once again reprises his role as Master Wong. OUaTIC2 takes the first film and makes it even better. I like the continuation of the characters this movie has. Things have changed since the first film and change even more during it. This introduces the White Lotus society as a mystical force that is demanding that the Westerners leave China, by any means. The action sequences of this film out do and are better than what we see in the original film. This movie also leaves behind the realism and goes more towards a fictional story, it even says that a lot of the film is fictional at the beginning. Overall, really great and if you like the first film, you will LOVE this. It is even better! June 18, 2006

Simple but stylish

I loved the openning scene. It's quite stylish. The story is simple but effective.

I saw a few compliant in here but as a Chinese I thought I'd give my 2 cents here. I feel that the movie evokes a deep emotion for me as how a classic hero would do in the most difficult times. When their country is surrounded by multiple external invasion forces and oppressed by it's own corrupted govenment, your fellow countrymen mostly cared for themselves and some are even preying on their own for profits, few are still willing to fight for a better future. The hero in this story is not just Wong but those two men who are willing to give up their lives to fight for their countrymen. Wong, again, caught up in the middle of uprising and must utilize his kung fu skill to battle for his beliefs and his love.

I think this is the best of the entire series. If you are only to get one of the series, please get this one.

rent it if you must but don't believe everything you read... this included of course. June 18, 2006

2 stars for the story a 4.5 for the action, 5 stars for the stick fight and for jet li going off on EVERYBODY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This movie is really freaking weird. I am always surprised to see that this is most peoples favorite entry into the series, and while i would put it at # 3, it still rocks. The story yiou can really tell is just there so they could call it a movie. But watching jet li go off on like 30 people is really really cool. It is weird that they have clubfoot doing all the flip doubles for jet just like in the first movie, so when they fight eachother towards the end, you can see clubfoot doing the flips for himself and jet!!!!! It is really cool if you notice it.

And that brings me to a point I wanted to bring up. I have a huge problem with tsui hark, and even though OUATIC part 1 is one of the top 10 movie I have ever seen of any genre, he really limits some of his actors capabilities, at least when it comes to their martial arts abilities. Yuen biuo I think did one flip and had like 10 or 11 seconds to exchange blows with people. Xio Xio Xhiong???-very unsure of this spelling so i will just call him clubfoot. I have about 5 movies with him in it, and he is one of the best screen fighters I have ever seen. Why tsui hark decides to not show off all of his stuff really pisses me off. I mean jet looks good like he always does, better in fact, but why can't he make clubfoot look badass, I mean this guy is like the freaking horse of the first 2 rpojects, if they didn't have him the movie would have taken a hell of a lot longer and we may not have even had that spectacular ladder fight. So tsui hark finally gave him his chance in part 3 and he showed that he was the bleepin man, but we also found out that he has SUPERB acting skills. It is just too bad that part 3 really sucked, but if you take jat and clubfoot out of the mix, you would have had like a rosumand kwan lion dance or something, it would have been really weird, I don't know if it could have been worse, but it might have been more interesting. Go ahead and watch the whoel series and you will see that Hark is just a really hit and miss type director, I mean my god, look at jet li's the master, he's like , so i figured out in born to defence that I can't direct and now I figured out I can't produce either. And black mask 2, man tsui hark, i would be here all day if i named all of your bad stuff, but i would be here equally long if i was forced to name all of your good ones.



Also amazon lists this as 113 minutes and that is the full version. But I would suggest that you get the trilogy set, I got it used for 7.99, and would have piad like 30 bucks for the first 2, but the 3rd one is really only good for like backround music, YOU GOTTA LOVE THIS MUSIC, IT IS SERIOUSLY MY FAVORITE SONG OF ALL TIME. IT IS SUCH A NICE CHANGE FROM HEARIGN THAT SAME FREAKING STOCK MUSIC THAT WOO-PING AND JOSEOPH KUO AND EVERYBODY!!!! ELSE WOULD USE.

JUST SO YOU PEOPLE KNOW, THIS IS JAMES WONG WHO COMPOSED THIS AND UNFORTUNATELY HE PASSED ON A COUPLE YEARS AGO, BUT LEFT BEHIND A TRUE LEGACY. SO YOU GUYS AND GALS!! MAY REMEMBER HIM AS THE GOVERNER WITH LIKE 9 WIVES, NOT ONLY WAS HE A BRILLIANT ACTOR BUT A COMPOSER WHO OWNS THE TITLE OF MY FAVORITE SONG. AND IT IS PRETTY HARD TO RIVAL STUFF LIEK SABBATH AND HENDRIX AND JETHRO, SO I GOTTA GIVE IT UP TO THE LATE GREAT JAMES WONG.

ALSO LIKE I SAID EARLIER GET THE TRILOGY CAUSE IF THIS IS YOUR FAV IN THE SERIES, THEN YOU NEED THIS. PART 1 HAS DECENT SOUND AND EXCELLENT EXCELLENT EXCELLENT EXCELLENT EXCELLENT PICTURE AND AWESOME!!!!!! SUBTITLES. BUT THE SECOND DISC IN THE SET IS FAR SUPERIOR TO THE FIRST, IT HAS FREAKING BOOMING 5.1 SOUND AND STILL THE SAME GREAT PICTURE QUALITY. I GOTTA ADMIT THAT I LOVE TO HEAR DONNIES VOICE SO GET THIS IF YOU WANNA SEE THAT STICK FIGHT IN A PERFECTO WIDESREENED PRESENTATION.
April 3, 2006

Must have for Jet-Li fans

Very,very good movie, on top of that it's a great
martial arts flick. Any Jet-Li fan needs to have
this in their library.

A different reversal of roles, he plays a doctor
who looks like a monk helping people and fighting
occupation over territories in China.

His character Wei-Fong is well layed out, he has
some flaws, but he is great when the time comes.

The martial arts stunts are really top notch,
I can even list all the stunts but the fights
with the White Lotus bunch is outstanding.

Pretty good acting too all around.

August 21, 2005

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