This is goin’ back a bit for Jet Li. Kids from Shaolin is his second movie and was released in 1983 – back when he was just 20! It’s a light hearted movie about two families and their rivalry.
Jet Li’s character San Lung belongs to a family of all males that practice Shaolin Kung Fu. Their father (who isn’t really their father) saved all of the boys (9 of them) from an attack on the village 10 years earlier. They live peacefully but are rivals with the family across the road who study a Wudangquan style – made up entirely of girls and one man, their father.
This family of girls and their father, Bao Feng, have been desperately trying to conceive a boy so their style of martial arts can be passed successfully form male to male, so they’re anxiously awaiting the birth of another child – which ends up being a girl.
There is a 3rd group of people however – the thugs that attacked the village 10 years earlier. They want revenge and also want to take all of Feng’s daughters for themselves, so they dream up a master plan to turn each family against each other even further – to have Feng kill San Lung’s family to make the Feng’s family more vulnerable. They send in a man to mix things up, and tensions start to build.
The Family Tensions
Things start off as both families merely despise each other, but things aren’t that serious. But once things start to get mixed up Feng starts to become increasingly against San Lung’s family, while San Lung and his brothers begin to befriend his daughters (no surprise there!).
While the kids build relationships as friends, tensions continue to rise up until Feng’s wife gives birth to another baby – or two! She gives birth to twins, one being a boy! So he begins to feel a little less insecure and starts to welcome to the boys a little more until the thug sent who is mixing things up turns him against them again, and things start to get serious.
Ultimately San Fung and his brothers want their father, who never met a woman or got married, to have the wife he never could and also to learn both styles of Kung Fu to create a stronger group of martial artists.
Of course in true Kung Fu fashion there’s a massive fight between the two families and the bandits which help solve their differences.
The Martial Arts and Action
This movie gets a few points as it is one of the first few made by Hong Kong movie legend Jet Li, but that’s probably it’s biggest draw.
The movie is primarily about the families and their relationships, and more suited to family friendly audiences – the action is held back until the end of the film, with pieces of martial arts choreography thrown in throughout the film in a light hearted manner.
Most of the children have very impressive abilities, and Jet Li’s ability is no different. You can see the beginnings of his on screen presence here as he performs some pretty cool moves in front of the camera, but it is best displayed during the final fight scene.
The final fight scene is a mess of people everywhere battling and going from one character to another. It’s fast and acrobatic and done extremely well – this is one of the reasons this movie should be seen as a classic. Each section of the fight shown seems to flow seamlessly into the one after it, without rest whilst holding a wicked pace.
The Verdict?
It’s not the most enjoyable film, but definitely a classic. It showcases a young Jet Li before he was the movie legend he would eventually become known as. I found it interesting as more of a historical movie (a look at an early Jet Li) that was mildly entertaining – until the final fight scene which had my attention and measures up to any of the best of that era.
I’m on the fence – if you’re a Jet Li fan check it out to see him in his early days, otherwise you may not like it as much.
On DVD –
Region 1 (US & Canada)
Kids From Shaolin
Region Free (Will play in any country)
Kids from Shaolin [DVD]
i love everything jet-li does he is the men in my eyes
Jet Li, one of the all time greats!