The legend is born

Donnie Yen's Ip Man had a sequel; a prequel was inevitable, once a suitable actor appeared to play the Hong Kong kung fu hero. Dennis To Yu-hang had roles (his first) in both Ip Man movies, and the lanky martial artist was signed up by a different production company for the title role in The Legend Is Born: Ip Man. He's not a charismatic actor, so veteran director Herman Yau was hired to deliver a product that didn't need star appeal.

Sammo Hung, a Hong Kong martial arts super-star and featured actor in both Ip Man films, plays Ip's first teacher (of the Wing Chun school), and a neat casting coup presents Ip Man's real first son, Ip Chun, also an Ip Man retread, as a comically cantankerous old teacher of new methods. Yau uses him well, for pace and to enliven the screen whenever he shares it with wooden To. There are two wistful love interests to add female allure, but the only other major character is Ip's adopted brother, an undercover Japanese agent sympathetically portrayed by Fan Siu-wong. The son of a Hong Kong martial arts actor, Fan was a supporting actor award nominee for the first Ip Man movie - Hong Kong in reality is a very small movie world.

The real-life Ip (or Yip) Man, born into a wealthy Foshan family in 1893, trained in the Wing Chun school of martial arts, moved to Hong Kong at 15, studied at St Stephen's College, gained a name for an anti-colonial stance, and returned to Foshan in 1917 to become a policeman and part-time martial arts teacher. An opium addict, he started his own kung fu school to raise funds when he moved back to Hong Kong after 1949, his best-known pupil being Bruce Lee. He died of cancer in 1972; there's a commemorative museum in Foshan.

Donnie Yen has refused to make any more Ip Man sequels, it's been reported. Other people will, and they'll be lucky if they hire a director as competent as Yau. He's the cinematographer who made Scud's gay Permanent Residence look better than it deserved to, and he gave the third Ip Man saga a good professional look.