The recent release of《Ip Man 2》, sequel to 2008's very successful《Ip Man》, highlights the ongoing popularity of movies based on true-life martial arts legends, and what a rich source of material these legendary heroes have been for filmmakers. Wong Fei Hung has easily been the one portrayed most often on screen, with Fong Sai Yuk a distant second. There have been others, most recently in Jet Li's 2006《Fearless》, the story of Huo Yuanjia (1869-1910). All of these were heroes as the term is usually understood. But another who has been portrayed a few times was Ma Yongzhen, who really doesn't fit the heroic mold, as he was almost an anti-hero. Ma was a native of Shandong who rose from poor but ambitious and idealistic country boy who went to Shanghai to try his boxing skills against the best the city had to offer, but instead turned somewhat to the dark side and became one of its top gangsters. At that time (the mid-19th century), Shanghai's teahouses were the center of much of the city's illegal activity, as were speakeasies, seedy night clubs and strip joints later on in America and Europe. Unable to beat him, Ma's adversaries initially bought him off by giving him his own teahouse, from which he operated a protection racket, extorting the wealthy in the area he controlled, men usually as corrupt as himself. But he was popular among Shanghai's poor and downtrodden, a popularity which stemmed from his remembering his own humble origins and treating society's lower classes as his people, helping out when they were desperate and giving them some measure of protection from those who would abuse and exploit them; in other words, an outlaw, but more Godfather than Robin Hood.
Ma Yongzhen's story has been told twice on screen in the sound era: in 1972's 《Boxer from Shantung》[aka《Killer from Shantung》], and in 1997's《Hero》, (not to be confused with the 2002 Zhang Yimou/Jet Li movie of the same English release title). The two sound versions were transplanted in time to the wide-open, triad-dominated (and probably more interesting), "city for sale" Shanghai of the 1930s. But the real Ma Yongzhen was a 19th century person, whose last battle took place in 1879. His story in its correct historical setting has been told once, in a 1927 Mingxing silent production 《Shandong Ma Yongzhen》, starring early martial arts actor Zhang Huichong in the title role, with Zhao Jingxia as his loving sister (and eventual avenger) Ma Suzhen. While stories based on legends are always a combination of facts and folktales fleshed out with the imaginary creations of the dramatists, it is known that Ma Yongzhen's final battle was an epic one that took place in a teahouse, with Ma battling to the death against an overwhelming number of assassins. Each of the three versions concludes with that battle, and while the actual details of the fight are of course products of the directors' imaginations, the plots of all three movies stay fairly close to the known historical facts. In the original, 1927 version, Yongzhen is avenged by his sister at the end; the 1972 version also had the vengeance story, but as a sequel.
In Chinese martial arts movie history,《Shandong Ma Yongzhen》was one of the earliest hits, released before the later mania for the genre touched off by《Burning of Red Lotus Temple》a year later. Zheng Zhengqiu based his screenplay on his own stage play, and the success of the film led to a revival of the play, which had a good run on the Shanghai stage in the 1930s. It is interesting that the director was Zhang Shichuan, for while he was the top director at the Mingxing studio, and no stranger to the martial arts genre, as Zhang himself later wrote, he treated it as just another type of movie. It was not until he had read the novel on which《Burning》was based that he realized the potential of the genre and made it a focus of the studio's output, and until the mania died out (the victim of changing public taste and official censorship) it was really a franchise.
Also of interest in the casting is that of Zheng Xiaoqiu playing a negative character, a would-be sexual predator: Zheng was just 17, and making the transition from child star to adult leading man; as far as I can determine, this was his only screen appearance as a bad guy.
[Full credits and plot synopsis follow after the bump]
Shandong Ma Yongzhen (1927) 山东马永贞 (Ma Yongzhen of Shandong)
Mingxing. B&W. Silent. 9 reels. Premiered December 4, 1927 at the Palace Theater in Shanghai. Direction: Zhang Shichuan. Screenplay and program notes: Zheng Zhengqiu, adapted from his stage play “Ma Yongzhen.” Cinematography: Dong Keyi. Sets: Dong Tianya. Cast: Zhang Huichong (Ma Yongzhen), Gong Jianong (Jin Shoushan), Dong Xiangping (Ji Ganlin), Guo Yifeng (Lin Deshen), Xiao Sheng (Bi Guang), Xiao Ying (Chai Jiuyun), Wang Jiting (Bai the leper), Ye Liangde (the flag holder), Tang Jie (Sanbao), Su Zhiqing (the officer spitting blood), Kai Yueke (Huang Yaxu), Yan Zhongying (Ma Fanmou), Zhao Jingxia (Ma Suzhen), Wang Mengshi (the poor man), Wang Xieyan (his wife), Li Shifan (Bai the leper’s wife), Zheng Xiaoqiu (Cai Botang), Ma Xinrong (Hu Diaoren), Huang Junpu (Cheng Zimin), Zhu Xiuying (Chai’s wife, Madame Kong).
Ma Yongzhen was born into a martial arts family in Shandong. His parents both died when he was young, leaving him and his younger sister Suzhen to raise themselves. Ma carries on the martial tradition, so perfecting his fighting skills that by the time he is a young adult he can no longer find anyone to fight in his village or the surrounding area. When he learns that prosperous Shanghai is a magnet for skilled fighters from all over, he decides to go there and join the competition. Suzhen at first tries to dissuade her brother from going, but relents when she sees how determined he is to fight against the best. She asks only that the quick-tempered Yongzhen not act impulsively, nor use firearms, and not stay away from home too long.
After arriving in Shanghai, Yongzhen enters a boxing competition, and defeats one after another of the fighters. The last opponent he defeats is Chai Jiuyun, a protege of a leprous gangster named Bai, boss of a particular district in Shanghai. Chai is so impressed with Ma's skills that he warmly congratulates him, and the two become good friends. Bai, however, is seething that his man was defeated, but does nothing, out of fear of Ma Yongzhen. Instead, he co-opts Ma, taking the newcomer into his empire, and giving him his own small bailiwick, a teahouse as a base for criminal operations. The once-idealistic young man soon finds he has a talent for crime: from the teahouse he operates a protection racket, menacing and shaking down the corrupt businessmen in the area. While he makes money from this, he shares it with the less fortunate in the area, and protects them from harm by other, petty thugs.
[right, Ma Yongzhen flattens someone who gets out of hand at the teahouse]
His friend Chai Jiuyun is fond of visiting brothels, and insists on hosting Yongzhen for dinner there one evening. Yongzhen sees no way of refusing without insulting Chai, so he accepts. But during the evening's revelry he recalls Suzhen's parting words, and realizes how far he has departed from the idealist he once was.
As Ma Yongzhen's popularity and influence grow and spread, Bai the leper sees the young man as a threat to his own livelihood, and calls together a meeting of his chief lieutenants. They decide to have their underlings eliminate Ma, but each attempt fails, with Ma easily beating off his attackers, although Ma does not recognize these as concerted attacks on himself, thinking them just isolated acts of urban violence.
One day, Ma and Chai are on their way to a temple when they come across a young thug named Cai Botang molesting a woman. Ma, furious at this, beats up the attacker and drives him off. Cai goes to the head of an ax gang, a man named Cheng, and begs him for his own revenge. Cheng knows that Bai the leper wants Ma Yongzhen taken out, and offers to join forces with Bai in the attempt. The two know that Ma arrives at his teahouse at a certain time every day, so they have their gangs go there earlier and wait for his arrival. When Ma enters, they take him by surprise and start their attack by throwing lime into his eyes. Although blinded and in pain, then severely wounded by the ax and machete-wielding assassins, Ma Yongzhen battles against overwhelming odds until at last, mortally wounded, he falls from an upper floor and dies. The surviving thugs disappear into the city streets.
Ma Yongzhen had worried that if anything happened to him, his sister Suzhen would be targeted by his adversaries. So before he dies, he asks his friend Chai Jiuyun to keep his death secret from her, lest she get involved. But back in their home village, Suzhen has grown worried at no word from her brother, and after dreaming one night he has been killed, she decides to go to Shanghai and seek the truth. On her own in Shanghai, she suffers many setbacks and difficulties, but at last finds Chai Yunzhen. He tells her what happened, and the distraught young woman vows to avenge her brother. Feeling protective of his late friend's sister, Chai declines to help her and and urges her to go home, but through Chai's wife, Suzhen learns the location of Bai the leper and begins loitering outside his home every night. Bai now feels very secure, free of any possible threats. But at last, unable to sleep one night, Bai decides to go out for a walk. Suddenly, Suzhen appears from the shadows, approaches him pretending to be a streetwalker, and engages him in conversation. When his guard is down she draws a knife and stabs him. As he lies bleeding to death, Suzhen walks away, then stops for a moment, looks at the moon, and sheds tears for her brother.
