Stuntman

Action director Sam Lee (Stephen Tung) always prioritized making a good and memorable film over the well-being of his crew. In the 1980s, while filming a scene that required a stuntman to jump off a bridge onto a moving truck, Sam’s directing skills couldn’t save an accident from happening, and a stuntman was paralyzed.

In the modern day, Sam has turned to physical therapy and odd jobs to help out friends. He’s contacted by Cho (Yen To), a veteran director that Sam used to work with. Cho is making a film with international megastar Wai (Philip Ng), who began his career as a part of Sam’s stunt team.

For his final film, Cho is returning to his roots and wants to make an action film that is in the 1980s style. Despite Wai’s reluctance, Cho brings in Sam to be the film’s action director. Sam enlists a rookie stuntman named Lee Sai-long (Terrance Lau) to be his action coordinator. What transpires is not only a clashing of the classic and modern styles, but the difficulty of adapting to the times.

Long has been struggling to find work as a stuntman, even though it has been his dream. Long’s brother Kit (Max Cheung) wants him to stop wasting his life and start working with him in his delivery business. Sam’s daughter Cherry (Cecilia Choi) is getting married. Their relationship is strained because Sam always prioritized movies over Cherry and her mother, who ended up leaving Sam over his actions one fateful evening. Sam being included in Cherry’s wedding is a courtesy on her part, as she’s mostly waiting for him to blow it.

The opening action sequence of the film takes place in a mall and seems to be heavily inspired by Jackie Chan’s Police Story. The conversation where Cho convinces Sam to be a part of the film occurs while Sam stares at the famous bronze Bruce Lee statue in Hong Kong. Stephen Tung shared a scene with Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon, so this was the Leung Brothers (the directors), Albert and Herbert, way of honoring that.

Stuntman is interesting in the sense that so much of the film is devoted to action films and action sequences, but it’s more of a drama film overall. What The Fall Guy did to honor American stuntmen, Stuntman does for Hong Kong cinema. The film emphasizes the importance of timing in action scenes and touches on what goes into action preparation.

Hong Kong cinema is dying in the modern day, and there is less and less work for stuntmen because those types of films just aren’t being made anymore. Sam is semi-retired at the start of the film. He didn’t turn his back on the business, but he believes he’ll never be able to make another film as an action director again.

What was done in the 1980s cannot be done today. Sam finds that out the hard way when he decides to shoot a robbery sequence in broad daylight around civilians in the middle of the city without permits. The film is a clash of the young and old just as much as it is a transition from the classic to the modern. Stunt teams of today aren’t willing to put their bodies on the line for just any sequence, let alone the entire film. Meanwhile, everyone on set knows who Sam is or has worked with him in some capacity. So they don’t want to make the same mistakes.

The film is overrun with strained relationships. Sam has burned bridges with the action film community as well as his relationship with his daughter, but he’s been given these chances that he hasn’t earned. Long and his brother Kit also butt heads since Long wants to follow his dream if given the opportunity, while Kit is blinded by what’s convenient and is currently financially stable.

Sam can visualize stunts even in the most claustrophobic of places, and he has a reputation for making brilliant films. His daughter owns a pottery store, and at the encouragement of Long, Sam poorly makes a pot for her. The pot is shoddy, and he has to remake it over and over again throughout the film, but the way it keeps breaking and being put back together or remolded symbolizes his attempts to repair his relationship with Cherry.

Sam’s redemption arc isn’t earned in the film. The final sequence is memorable and a hell of a way to end the film, but Sam doesn’t learn much of anything throughout the film. He still prioritizes his career in movies over anything else, and he barely apologizes for being an asshole or any mistake he’s made to any of the people he supposedly cares about. He’s given countless opportunities and throws everyone under the bus every chance he gets, just because someone changes something for the movie he was involved with.

Stuntman is an action film that embraces the new while honoring the legends that came before it. Sam’s life is a trainwreck, and he destroys every project and every friendship that’s thrown at him, but he delivers cinematic magic every time. With exceptionally poignant performances and a traumatic snowball of a storyline that builds and builds until everything around Sam explodes, Stuntman walks hand in hand with Jackie Chan’s Ride On as emotional excellence when it comes to Hong Kong films centered around stuntmen.