User reviews

One of Jackie's earliest films, this already shows the remarkable talent he has for choreography and comic timing. All the more remarkable for the fact that he also wrote and directed this at the age of 25 (Spielberg was 28 when he directed his first film). All the hallmarks of a Jackie Chan are there, though understandably not quite as polished as he later managed to achieve. The humour stands up well too, for its age. I did laugh out loud in a couple of places.

First of all I want to say to the Dutch readers that the Fearless Hyena part I that you poses is Part II in the rest of the world because Prime Time made a mistake switching them around.

Although the story line was bad and some humor was absolutely terrible this movie contains some of the most hard acrobatic skills and it was one of his most energetic movies. I guess that he's been training like a mad person for this movie because it was one of the first movies in which he could do the fighting choreography completely by himself. This made the fighting scenes absolutely awesome and make me want to train myself again.

I saw a comment which says that it looked too much like Drunken Master, but it's Drunken Master that looks a lot like this one because Fearless Hyena was made a year earlier.

Some of Jackie's best fight scenes ever are in this one. Nobody mentioned the one near the end where he's attacked by 3 guys with spears / machetes (you'll see what I mean). The attacks come one at a time, and then all in sequence. The cuts show that there are very few breaks in the action, lots of continuous fighting. Amazing nobody got seriously injured or even killed during the filming.

Another scene of note that everyone talks about is the chopstick scene. But how about the fight against the guy with the two swords? Yet another death defying feat of timing, reflexes and luck.

If you don't enjoy HK humour then don't watch it. But the fight scenes are among the best ever. For those complaining about the dubbing, relax - even the Cantonese version suffers from very poor dubbing. I think it was just the studios at the time trying to save money.

Though 'The Fearless Hyena (1979)' has many similarities to 'The Drunken Master (1978)' and, indeed, many other martial arts movies from the era, the piece sets itself apart with some absolutely phenomenal choreography and a flashy focal style that really comes through in an explosive one-on-one finale. The story centres on a revenge plot that doesn't really begin until well over half way into the runtime, yet the plot never feels poorly paced because it's peppered with set-pieces and establishes that its lead character's choices have tangible consequences. It starts to lag ever-so-slightly in its mid-section but it is entertaining throughout, a funny and exciting adventure that constantly surprises with just how good its fight scenes truly are. Seriously, there are a couple in here that easily sit among the best of all time - including a sphincter-tightening, three-on-one sword fight - and they deserve to be recognised as such. It's a testament to the thing's quality that its downright awful dub (subs aren't available on Amazon Prime) doesn't really dampen its effect. The dub is certainly its worst aspect, though, with voice work that sounds like something from a Monty Python sketch and one character in particular who sounds like Richard Ayoade. Despite this, the film is really fun throughout. It's easy to recommend to any fan of martial arts cinema. 7/10

Notable for being an early kung fu movie for Jackie Chan, Fearless Hyena does little to set itself apart from the heap of martial arts movies that were being made at the time. That said, Jackie Chan is as fun as ever, and the fight scenes, while obviously dated by the standards of countless films to follow, are still entertaining.

It's a kung fu movie with a mix of comedy and drama. Themes of family and honor are present here as they were in much of the other Hong Kong films out there at the time. The story is the usual. An evil martial arts master kills a man, who is the father of a young martial artist. The son seeks revenge. Nothing new here. There's also comedy, and it's that uncomfortable, unsubtle Hong Kong humor, you know the kind. It's ok.

What is interesting is the movie's weirdness. Jackie's character, while undergoing his required character transformation, learns several different styles of martial arts, all named after something different, and all made to be utilized for a certain purpose. He has a happy style, a sad style, an angry style, etc. all of which have purposes, like one is more defensive, one is more offensive, etc.

The fights, of which there are plenty, do entertain. One sequence has Jackie fighting a different opponent at a time while at a dojo, each time in disguise. He fights one opponent while pretending to be mentally challenged, and fights another while pretending to be a girl. It's as weird as it sounds. There's also a really cool chopsticks duel, and a slick spear fight. The long final fight is fun and cool, and goes on for a stupidly long time. Jackie tries to mirror the emotions of his different styles, which means he'll start laughing or crying during the fight. It's great. Also the villain death is horribly brutal and has to be seen to be believed. Not graphic, but will make any male human flinch.

I am a serious Jackie Chan fan, like the rest of the world, and while this is not even close to being one of his best films, it's certainly fun and watchable, and it's very important to see it you're a kung fu enthusiast like me.

At one point Jackie starts crying during a fight and his opponent yells the word "baby" and it's the most unintentionally hilarious thing I've ever seen.

I first saw this in the mid 80s on a vhs. Repeated it many times in the 90s. It was known by Revenge n Fearless Hyena. Revisited it recently on a blu ray which I own. If u like Jackie Chan movies solely for the entertaining kung fu fights, then this is one movie not to miss. I consider this movie to contain some of his best fights ever. The most impressive thing for me was the brilliant brutal training scenes. This movie also happens to be Jackie Chan's directorial debut. Avoid its sequel like plague. The sequel has nothing but footages of this film.

Well what can I say about Jackie.. he is a total clown in this film. The movie that i saw was dubbed get this... by ENGLISHMEN! So everyone had a British accent and it was a scream it was like watching Monty Python. The film quality however is pretty poor, and the fight scenes even though well choreographed, don't come out spectacular. However, there is the classic humor of Jackie, which even involves himself dressing up as a woman and beating a guy up with his breasts, and an unbelievable chopstick battle for a piece of meat between Jackie and his teacher (THIS WAS AMAZING HOW THE HELL DID THEY DO THAT you'd HAVE TO SEE IT TO BE BELIEVED!!)

Martial Rating 6.5 out of 10

Overall rating 5 out of 10

I'm a huge fan of Jackie Chan, and I've seen over 25 of his movies, and The Fearless Hyena is definently one of the best. Though the humour is pretty dumb, and lots of the characters are un-necessary(Like Stoney Egg, the Great Bear, and Iron Head)the fights are staged beautifully. Especially the ending fight scene!The story isn't so bad either.Even though it's your usual: guy's family memeber gets killed, guy trains, guy gets revenge type of movie, it's still good.Please don't get Fearless Hyena 1 and 2 mixed up. I've heard Two is really bad. So, I definitely suggest that you buy The Fearless Hyena part 1!

I'm not sure if this movie will be seen kindly by anyone who is very strict when it comes to political correctness. And I'm not talking about how Jackie (or Jacky as the opening titles say) Chan is handling certain situations - almost acting like a villain and bullying people left and right - but since it is meant as comedy it is ok to do that.

You may get from that, that I do not condone the tone or rather the tone inconsistencies the movie depicts. From hardcore (blood and all that) to silly fun. Some movies are able to switch between those, I think this fails most of the times. Still as you can see by my vote, I liked this overall. And it is because of the action and the stunts. While this isn't yet the Jackie Chan we'll get to know or who he becomes later, which makes him a bona fide super star, you can see a lot of things in this one too. Using his surroundings to fight, the humor and all that.

While it's not long running time wise, there are certain sequences that could have used some trimming to say the least. So while I can see the flaws, I was also strangely excited how this reminded me of the Shaw Brothers movies I loved to watch in a way - I didn't look closely but apparently there are many continuity errors. If those bother you, you are certainly not enjoying yourself with this as much as you should - which would be a shame.

As much as I enjoy Jackie Chan's movies, acrobatics and martial arts, and despite how much people keep saying that "Fearless Hyena" is a martial arts classic and gem, then I found it rather difficult to sit through this movie and take it seriously.

First of all, the version I got was an English dubbed version, without the option to switch to the original language. And as if that wasn't bad enough, it sounded like a single, constipated guy was making all the voices for all characters in the movie. It was just awful.

But the movie was also incorporating a bit too much slapstick comedy and really bad sound effects in an attempt to emphasize on the comedy on the screen.

Despite the above-mentioned things, then there are good things to the movie as well. The main thing being the acrobatic and physical performance that Jackie Chan delivered. It was just impressive. And you also get to see Jackie Chan dressed up as a woman, which was just hilarious, and that scene alone makes it worth to sit through the entire movie.

Story-wise, then "Fearless Hyena" ("Xiao quan guai zhao") is fairly simplistic and easy to follow, even as the movie doesn't require any real brain activity from the audience.

This is not amongst the best of Jackie Chan's earlier movies in his otherwise impressive movie list. And I must admit that I thought this movie would be more than it turned out to be, as I had heard nothing but praise and great things about it.

This is one of Chan's best, because as opposed to his recent bloated-budget adventures, he isn't being written buy rich fat white guys who think, "hey let's make that Asian dude sing a funny song with (fill-in-the-blank) American sidekick!" I'm sorry, but as silly and awkward as Fearless Hyena is, it isn't tainted by the Hollywood "fish out of water" premise.

The fighting scenes, while exhausting at moments, are clever and fitting the themes of the film. This is one of Chan's more expressive styles, and his mere body language alone makes up for the horrible overdubbing and juvinile dialouge. Besides, the song at the end when the credits roll is AMAZING. I get chills when I hear it, it's so eerie and atmospheric. I always look forward to it after that final epic fight.

I've seen many of his films, and though the standard of his early works are good, this falls at the lower end.

The story is somewhat muddled, maybe thats because I watched the dubbed version. One thing is for sure, this film sure does have some of the longest fight scenes I've ever seen in any martial arts movie. Good or bad, you decide.

The finale battle wasn't very climatic, the best scenes were probably when he is training with his second master, the scene with the chopsticks and the big pots.

Overall fairly decent, but his better stuff like young master blows this away

A young man whose sickly grandfather has taught him a secret form of Kung Fu, starts to make a living off of his unique fighting style, only to attract the attention of his grandfather's enemy.

Typical Kung-fu action with the feats of acrobatic Kung-fu in display, which takes up much of the plot, and though the fighting style can be meandering and long-winded, the emotional content of Jackie Chan wanting get revenge pulls you in. The first half is full of comedy, the second half is serious. It's efficient Kung-fu actioner though I've seen better "hero seek revenge,gets trained," sagas such Eagle in the monkey's shadow, The Drunken Master and Snake in the monkey's shadow.

You will Love this one. Nice movie nice stunts Directed by JC

Not only are the martial arts techniques executed with skill. The humor is also top notch. Iron Head, The Great Bear and Stoney Egg are classic! If you like martial arts flicks at all or are a fan of the 3 Stooges. This is a must see for you. I'm already on my 3rd copy:-)

Jackie Chan and his grandfather live alone, while grandpa trains Jackie in kung fu. Eventually the big bad guy, who dresses and has hair like Lucius Malfoy comes along and kills the old man. Jackie wants to run after him and fight him, but a little man with a crutch stops him, then begins to train Jackie in more kung fu so he'll have a chance.

Chan's first movie as director (although he has Richard Lo credited as "Executive Director") is a pretty standard plot, with the young disciple who slipped, seeking vengeance against the chief baddie. It's the handling that is a bit different. The second quarter of the movie has Jackie as the head teacher of a martial arts school, and he has to fight a bunch of people. It's all circus clowning, with Chan whipping people while dressed as a feeble-minded individual, in drag, and so forth. It's positively cartoonish, and the sound choices emphasize this: there's the introduction to "The Pink Panther" and sound stings that sound like they came out of Treg Brown's library. Plus for the big finish, he invents new, ridiculous styles of fighting that are, of course, successful.

in the meantime, it's a fine movie that combines silliness and seriousness, despite a few glitches in He would get better and better, peaking in the middle of the 1990s. However, everyone has to start somewhere, and this is a very good start.

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

For his first effort as writer and director, Jackie Chan employed the successful formula of his earlier films, Snake in the Eagle's Shadow and Drunken Master, playing young martial artist Shing Lung, who is trained by a kung fu master to avenge his grandfather (James Tien), who died at the hands of old enemy, silver haired villain Yen (Shi-Kwan Yen).

A film of two halves, Fearless Hyena starts off in comedy mode, with Lung disobeying his grandpa's wishes by sneaking to earn a living as a fighter for a kung fu school, dressing up in various silly guises to take on a range of opponents. Watching Lung posing as a cross-eyed idiot, and dressing in drag to fight a sex maniac is desperately unfunny (especially with all the very silly cartoon sound effects), but there's some solid fight action to help ease the pain, highlight being the superbly choreographed weapon fight (pole vs. sword) between our hero and challenger Willow Sword (Tien-Chi Cheng).

The second half of the film is much better (especially for those, like me, who simply don't get Chinese humour), the puerile comedy replaced by hard hitting action: after grandpa is killed, Lung is befriended by Unicorn (Hui Lou Chen), who helps to train the young man so that he will stand a chance against Yen. Before he is ready, Lung attacks Yen and is almost killed, but is saved by Unicorn, who proceeds to teach him a special martial arts technique that draws upon the emotions of anger, sorrow, joy and happiness. After the obligatory training montages, which are always fun, the film gets to the really good stuff: a fight between Lung and Yen's three henchmen, and the final battle between our hero and the head villain. These scenes are classic Chan - inventive, acrobatic, and stunt filled, the star delivering breathtaking moves that are guaranteed to impress. It's just a shame that to get there, one has to endure all of that awful slapstick and face-pulling that passes for funny.

6.5/10, but not quite good enough for me to round it up to 7.