Ip Man has throat cancer, which should put an effective end to the Ip Man movies (after this edition, of course). Iron Mike Tyson couldn’t touch him, but the big C flattens pretty much everybody, huh? I’m actually surprised we needed more Ip movies. This is a biography, right? How much more do you have to say about this guy?
Turns out, quite a bit. In Ip Man 4: The Finale, Chinese kung fu legend Ip Man (Donnie Yen) rumbles primarily in my part of the world, San Francisco. And he ain’t alone … Bruce Lee (Kwok-Kwan Chan) shows up for some ass kickings, as do some of the best karate guys white supremacists have to offer. I’m getting ahead of myself.
First off, Li’l Ip Man (Jim Liu) beats up a kid at school and gets expelled. So Ip Man, after discovering he has cancer, decides to go to San Francisco to look for alternate schooling for junior. Apparently, Ip Teen has exhausted all the schools in Asia, which is a neat trick. While in San Francisco, Ip Man does not get the treat he desires. The disciple of Ip Man, Bruce Lee, has opened the Wing Chun school of kung fu so that everybody can Wing Chun tonight. The Chinese community elders are pissed off that Bruce is letting outsiders in on kung fu secrets and can’t Ip do anything about that?
Oh, and there have already been about five fights I haven’t even mentioned. Three seconds can’t go by in this film without somebody punching somebody. Plot-wise, the kid front, the cancer front, the Chinese Community front, and the Bruce front are all false…what this picture is really about is –and I’m not kidding- getting the United States Marine Corps of 1964 to accept kung fu as a reasonable form of training.
While Ip Man 4 leads the league in posturing by a wide margin, its worst advocates are white karate masters, especially Sergeant Barton Geddes (Scott Adkins). The latter and his cronies believe without hesitation, pause, science, or investigation that karate is the most superior form of martial art. Karate was certainly not introduced by Western culture, so white guys pretending it’s the shit while all other forms of martial artistry are bunk is, in a word, stupid. I mean, you might have an argument if you’re, say, a black belt in each of the twelve disciplines of ass kicking available in your neck of the woods. Unless I’m very much mistaken about local history, however, San Francisco of 1964 was not known for being the Mecca of organized beatdowns.
And how are these arguments settled? Well, you never believe this, but with a great deal of fighting, fighting, and more fighting. The only way an argument gets settled in Ip Man 4 is by beating an opponent to a bloody pulp. There is a whole lot of dick measuring in this film. And since most of the film takes place on US soil, we’re going to assume the measuring tool is a yardstick. For fighting purists, people who attend movies for specific hand-to-hand combat, Ip Man 4 will prove adequate. For me, the inability of a single character to present a decent argument without somebody needing a hospitalization proved off-putting. I wasn’t Ip to that, knowwhatI’msayin’? For now, I’ve had enough of Ip fighting, and since Ip Man ain’t gonna return anytime soon, that’s all the better.
♪I flew five thousand miles
To kick your ass tonight
You fight like you are drunk
Do you feel lucky punk?
The stance we use is strong
I’m like a punching tree
You’re gonna hit the floor
In, count it, one-two-three
Beat ‘im up
Beat down
Beat ‘im up
Beat him down to the ground
Everybody kick ass tonight
Everybody kick ass tonight
Everybody Wing Chun tonight♫
Not Rated, 105 Minutes
Director: Wilson Yip
Writer: Tai-lee Chan, Lai-Yin Leung, Edmond Wong
Genre: ♪My arts are better than your arts
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Kung fools
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Folks not terribly interested in toxic masculinity
♪ Parody Inspired by “Everybody Have Fun Tonight”
