The (2004) movie Kung Fu Hustle is a
comedy set in Shanghai, China, parodying the pattern of martial arts movies made
at that point. The movie both pokes fun at martial arts movies and uses this
self-aware behavior to go for over-the-top with the action sequences and include
great comedy along with a seemingly serious plot. Despite this seemingly
flippant usage of what would be physical rules due to the movie having a
parodying quality and theatrical action choreography, the universe within Kung
Fu Hustle seems to follow certain discernible rules for its world. It
creatively breaks certain physics rules and establishes its own for the sake of
the movie. First of all, it exaggerates the reactions to the hits that fighters
perform on one another in order to establish a clear hierarchy of power for
clarity of the film and entertainment. Second, in the vein of power, the movie
takes a slightly magical turn by using improbable methods of attack. There are
several things in the movie which are weaponized or used in a manner with which
to fight, but which are not be used in the real world in the same way (…with just the human body as
a resource). For example, music and sound are used as at three types of
offensive weaponry. The movie introduces this idea and continues to expand upon
it after it is introduced. And finally, in overarching relation to all of this;
gravity is felt as a loose construct in
this movie world. It relates to characters in a way that is convenient or
inconvenient depending on whether the person has control over the situation or
not. This also has a relation to power due to how much control the person has. Overall,
this creates an interestingly consistent world for the martial artists as they
engage in fights throughout the plot while simultaneously enabling a continuously
entertaining and comedic movie.
First of all, all reactions to things of
importance tend to be exaggerated. There are many examples of this. The main
character, Sing, is shown half-awake after being comically beaten, and to indicate
his upcoming skill as a great healer and a strong fighter, is able to squeeze
out the knives in his body by simply flexing the muscles hard enough. These
knives shoot out at a great enough speed to penetrate this seemingly tin container
that he’s resting in, and one shoots out with an extremely conserved amount of
force, because it ricochets off of the ceiling before hitting a car in the
street. It is shown to have been gotten with so much force from his muscle
rejecting it, that it retains both a straight path to fly, and enough force to
penetrate the wheel of the car two stories down. This is all clearly
exaggeration, besides the unlikely paths of action, it is a high exaggeration
of power in general. Further along in the movie, as the fighters are revealed
to be more powerful, the attacks they endure are similarly shown to be greater
due to their greater recoil. After shown to be masters, the Landlady and
Landlord try to take on The Beast with normal hits, and are blown back. First,
they are stopped easily at two feet. Then, they are blown back about 10-15 feet
in their second attack. In the final scene, by contrast, when Sing finally understands
how to utilize the Palm technique, he uses it in two ways, both exaggerated and
both the most powerful ways in the movie. One, he creates a gigantic
indentation of a palm, about six times the length of a human being, after
falling from the sky like a meteor. He is then, shown, however using it with
great responsibility since he directs another attack at the Beast, but exhibits
restraint to not kill him. This lack of destruction is in contrast to the
building up of destruction, and even the visual destruction of the wall behind
the Beast, showing the greatest exaggeration of all that one can hit something
without harming what is in front of it. This is a detail for the incredible
show of power for this point in the movie. These threads of power and
exaggeration exist in other ways in the movie, such as uses of fantastic
elements utilized by the martial artists.
There are quite a few things which are
used as weapons for representations of power, but a certain element sticks out
in multiple ways. Sound, and similarly air, is used as a weapon by powerful
fighters. This is first seen by the Harpists who use sound in a way that is so
skilled to make the sound like a blade to cut through opponents. This idea is
introduced slowly by showing a shadowed decapitation, then after showing blades
being thrown out by the chords being played. The Harpists are also shown to be
able to make use of concussive force using different music, hitting the Tailor
with what seems to be six fists. The last, and seemingly, ultimate technique of
the Harpists is to use a tirade of music that summons such force it seems to utilize
an undead army of fighters. This, interestingly, is all topped out by the
Landlady’s secret that she is a greater Kung-Fu Master of the Lion’s Roar, and
handily defeats them with one move after the other three great masters have
been defeated and killed.
The introduction and progression of these
sound techniques was interestingly. The idea of sound being weaponized through
skill is shown slowly through a dangerous and difficult to handle enemy, and
then it is shown to be even further mastered in another way. This step toward
the Landlady’s mastery of Lion’s Roar is also a step towards more of a
utilization of air with sound. Her technique also partly uses sheer force for
some of her power. Continuing on that, in the final part of the movie, Sing’s
Palm technique is something that is sheer force without sound. Kung Fu Hustle
makes this progression through the use of three slightly different things that
would be difficult to use in reality as weapons; it progresses through the film
with the sound, air, and force as hand-offs of powerful technique, evolving
into the next one and then leaving behind another one. These strange elements
are taken as somewhat magical weaponry in the movie.
The final element of a property in this
world is how fluid gravity is. It does not seem to be the case that gravity is
something that has its own will to help or hinder the fighters, but the impossible
jumps of the martial artists seems to be in relation to a fighter’s own skill. It
makes it seem more that kung fu artists are in control of their own gravity.
When they fall or are unbalanced, this is due to the control shifting to a more
powerful opponent at the moment. When the Landlord is first shown fighting, he
is kicked off of his opponents, but as he flips, comes to a gliding landing
very much akin to the settle of a paper drop animation test. He regains control
of himself easily in a very light manner. Any opponent who is soundly defeated
is sent flying off very quickly and very out of control, showing the complete
surrender and loss of control. When the Landlady and Landlord fight the Beast,
after they have been shown to be great kung fu masters, they are sent flying as
mentioned above. This is their destabilized control over the situation when it
happens. Finally, in the final battle, Sing is sent very far into the
atmosphere, taking control of his situation in the air and freefalling again.
He plummets with such force that is able to help him defeat the Beast, and even
when he is about the hit the ground, instead, he pushes back with his own force
to stop and gently lands on his feet some distance away from where he would
have landed. It may be less about flying and more about control of one’s own
gravity in order to get this effect in the film. The hypothesis of control
would also work with what I have also established here.
I found the movie highly consistent with
its own rules. As a martial arts movie, its visual language is how to showcase
power visually (with the philosophy of martial arts being showed through dialogue
in comparison), and it uses all these different rules to that sort of advantage.
There’s an exaggeration of effect so that the audience can see what is
happening and easily establish a hierarchy in their mind that is used to
understand the movie. The film is well-aware of its use of the improbable
Asian-action movie genre, and by parodying this genre, creates an incredibly
entertaining movie. By not breaking its own rules in an obvious manner, it creates
a grounded movie while being completely over-the-top.
Outline
Notes:
I had found
better examples than what I had before, and switched “Exaggerated Reactions”
and “Dangerous Via Skill” in their order. I also removed the competing
hypothesis because I did not think it was strong.
