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‘The Grandmaster’ to open Berlin International Film Festival; plus new posters

grandmaster poster

grandmaster poster 2

grandmaster poster 3

Berlinale press release:

The international premiere of The Grandmaster by Chinese director and president of this year’s jury, WONG Kar Wai, will open the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival.

The Grandmaster is an epic martial arts drama set against the tumultuous backdrop of 1930’s China and inspired by the life and times of the legendary IP Man (Tony LEUNG Chiu Wai), mentor to Bruce LEE. The plot encompasses themes of war, family, revenge, desire, love, and memory. The all-star cast headed by Tony LEUNG Chiu Wai (Days of Being Wild – Berlinale Forum 1991, Chungking Express, Happy Together, In The Mood for Love, 2046, all directed by WONG Kar Wai), also includes Ziyi ZHANG (Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon, D: Ang Lee), who was a guest at the 2009 Berlinale Competition with Forever Enthralled (D: CHEN Kaige), CHANG Chen (Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon; Eros, D: WONG Kar Wai), ZHAO Benshan (Happy Times, D: ZHANG Yimou), XIAO Shengyang (A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop, D: ZHANG Yimou – Berlinale Competition 2010) and SONG Hye Kyo (A Reason to Live, D: LEE Jeong-hyang), as well as hundreds of Asia’s top martial artists.

“It is a special honour for us to open the 2013 Berlinale with the presentation of the newest film by this year’s jury president, WONG Kar Wai. With The Grandmaster, Kar Wai has added a new and exciting facet to his body of works, and created an artful, visually powerful genre film,” says festival director Dieter Kosslick.

Nearly three years of film production and almost a decade of preparation went into the making of The Grandmaster for its director WONG Kar Wai, who began exploring the idea for the film in 1996.

“I am truly very honoured by Dieter and his invitation for my new film The Grandmaster to participate in the 63rd Berlinale and to open the festival. This is a dream project for me that I had been developing for many years. I am very happy to be able to present it in Berlin. I was already greatly looking forward to my returning to Berlin to serve as the President of the International Jury, so seeing The Grandmaster presented there will make it all the more special for me,” says WONG Kar Wai.

With his signature style-defining mood, atmosphere and reality, director WONG Kar Wai delves into the eternal question in martial arts of whether the victor is more than merely the “last man standing”, and brings the genre to new heights.

The Grandmaster is a Block 2 Pictures and Sil-Metropole Organisation presentation of a Jet Tone Films and Sil-Metropole Organisation production. It is written and directed by WONG Kar Wai.

The Grandmaster will be presented as the opening film in the official selection, but screening out of competition.

The world premiere of The Grandmaster will be celebrated on January 8, 2013 in China, and the film will open at cinemas in numerous countries including Germany in spring 2013. The film’s distributor in Germany will be Wild Bunch.

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Tony Leung breaks a wooden board in new ‘Grandmasters’ featurette

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtQqJVBYRCE]

Sina:

Earlier in the first part of ‘The Road To The Grandmasters’ fans saw how hard the actors trained, some online even praised Tony Leung for being willing to drop his big star persona and learn martial arts from the start despite being known primarily for his acting skills. Yesterday the second part of ‘The Road To The Grandmasters’ was released online. Viewers were able to see Tony Leung’s training with Wing Chun master Ip Man’s final disciple Mr. Leung Siu Hung. Over three years of tough training, Leung managed to gain a solid martial art structure and powerful attacks. He was able to cleanly break through a wooden board several inches thick. His improvement was shocking. Master Leung said, “(Tony) Leung Chiu-wai’s advantage is that he has no burden or bad habits from any other kung fu, gradually he is able to absorb the spirit of Wing Chun.” Director Wong Kar-wai also said, “I hope that Tony Leung’s portrayal of Mr. Ip is a mix of Ip Man and Bruce Lee. I have to break everything about him and shape a person anew.”

http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-12-06/08153804966.shtml

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‘The Grandmasters’ turns Chang Chen into a master

Sina:

The new martial arts film from Wong Kar-wai, ‘The Grandmasters’, will not open until early next year in China. Actor Chang Chen trained hard in kung fu for this film. Earlier he participated in the national Bajiquan contest in Changchun and won a top prize. He went from studying kung fu for a movie to truly winning a martial arts award.

For half a year before filming began in ‘The Grandmasters’ in 2009, Chang Chen visited Master Wang Shiquan and he was asked whether he truly wanted to study or only make kung fu poses for the movie. Chang Chen said that he truly wanted to train and began his journey of studying Bajiquan for three years. In a small Beijing forest everyday for three hours in the morning and three hours in the evening he trained in all types of weather. He had to stretch and he was in so much pain that he was in tears. Chang Chen joked that he held back in front of Tony Leung and did not show him his best. Earlier Chang Chen participated in the national Bajiquan contest in Changchun under the order his master. He wanted the experience and participated. He practiced his routine almost 10,000 times. The film’s martial arts choreographer Yuen Woo-ping not being impressed with his kung fu before, but during this shoot he would discuss and accept his opinions.

http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-12-05/17233804663.shtml

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‘The Grandmasters’ delayed until 2013; new character posters released

 

 Sina:

Directed by Wong Kar-wai, featuring an all-star ensemble of Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Zhang Ziyi, Chang Chen, Zhao Benshan, Xiao Shenyang and Song Hye-kyo, the film ‘The Grandmasters’ released four new posters today. The posters show four of the lead actors ‘smashing’ through waves. Also revealed on the posters was the new release date of the movie, which is now set for January 8, 2013.

The four new posters depict Tony Leung fighting in Wing Chun style, Zhang Ziyi fighting in baguazhang style (eight trigram palm), Chang Chen using bajiquan (eight extremities fist), and Zhao Benshan using xingyiquan (shape boxing). All four actors display their clans’ special moves as they attempt to split the waves. Water appears to splash everywhere and the chill in the air is evident. The coldness also seems to seep into their faces making them appear domineering. As compared to previous years, the lineup for this year’s lunar holiday films appear to be more competitive. Due to the fierce competition predicted at the box office, ‘The Grandmasters’ has readjusted their release date to January 8, 2013 (prior to the lunar new year).

Wong Kar Wai began filming his first movie ‘As Tears Go By’ in 1988. Next year will be his 25th year as a feature film director. ‘The Grandmasters’ will be his 10th release (excluding Eros, which was a joint project with Michelangelo Antonioni and Steven Soderbergh). However, ‘The Grandmasters’ is also the film he has spent the most time preparing for. Regarding the decision to release the movie the towards end of the (Western) New Year holiday, the spokesperson from the distribution company Sil-Metropole Organisation, says, “This movie incorporates many years of hard work from director Wong and all of his cast. From that point of view, we would like to give him more space to bring his entire vision to fruition. This is the kind of respect we’d like to give to these directors.”

 http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-11-27/08583797336.shtml

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‘The Road To The Grandmasters’ documentary and a new poster are released

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3SZUobEuao]

(click to enlarge)

 Wong Kar-wai, Bajiquan master Wang Shiquan, Frankie Chan (back),  Xingyiquan master Fu Yangquan 

Sina:

The trailer for Wong Kar-wai’s ‘The Grandmasters’ was released earlier this week. Yesterday,  a new film poster and a documentary called ‘The Road To The Grandmasters’ were also released for the audience to get an understanding of the production. In the newly released poster, lead actor Tony Leung Chiu-wai as Ip Man has his back to the camera faithfully worshipping and displaying a dutiful and traditional aura and spirit. In the documentary, Wong Kar-wai talked about how this film started for the first time, when he saw a video three days before Ip Man’s passing deeply moved him and gave him the inspiration to make the movie.

The documentary revealed that the idea of making ‘The Grandmasters’ started in 1996 when Wong Kar-wai was working on ‘Happy Together’ in Argentina. He saw a  local magazine with Bruce Lee on its cover and felt that the superstar’s influence on the world. Yet because the Bruce Lee story has already made many times, he wanted to explore Bruce Lee’s master Ip Man more and how he turned Bruce Lee into a legendary figure.

Under the introduction of Wu Bin, (China’s national wushu coach and Jet Li‘s master), over the course of three years Wong Kar-wai visited Beijing, Tianjin, Xian, Hebei, Henan, Inner Mongolia, Taiwan, Guangdong, Hong Kong and other locations and over 100 different kung fu masters of Wing Chun, Eight Diagram, Tai Chi, Xingyi, Tongbei in order to find the spirit and the philosophy behind kung fu. The video mentioned that and how some of the martial art masters have now passed away and were unable to watch ‘The Grandmasters’ in its entirety; during the process Wong Kar-wai was determined to bring back an era from one person and one street.

‘The Road To The Grandmasters’ not only showed Wong Kar-wai’s filmmaking process but also included the training of Tony Leung, Zhang Ziyi and Chang Chen.

Normally looking frail as a bookworm, Tony Leung can be seen jumping rope, practicing with wooden stacks in the video and sparring with the stunt team. Once breaking his arm during practice, Tony Leung truly gave his all in his training. He did not just rely on looks and action poses to be convincing as a kung fu master because director Wong Kar-wai asked all actors to “get inside the characters’ bones”. Aside from Tony Leung, Zhang Ziyi is shown during her practice screaming from the split that the master asked her to perform and Chang Chen screaming in pain from stretching with the master. For 3 actors, willpower was the greatest training.

Tony Leung was Wong Kar-wai’s only choice to play Ip Man. Wong Kar-wai said, “I want to remove everything that Tony Leung had and shape him anew into another person.” He invited Ip Man’s final disciple Leung Siu-hung to teach Tony Leung the ways of Wing Chun. Master Leung had high praise for Leung. “To someone who has never studied martial art, Mr. Leung has a lot of potential. When you teach him a set, he understands what follows and kills three birds with one stone. He has this kind of potential and the material to learn kung fu.”

Tony Leung’s three years of training was also unveiled for the first time in the documentary. He said, “The director and I hope through the training process to experience the personality of a true martial artist, from which to shape a master image that has both flesh and blood.” With the upcoming film release, Tony Leung said that he was not nervous. He only hoped that viewers would not watch this film with just the idea of watching an Ip Man movie, because anyone who knew Wong Kar-wai knew that he definitely had his own way to innovate and open everyone’s eyes. 

http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-11-16/09563789215.shtml

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3SZUobEuao

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New stills for ‘The Grandmasters’

A couple of new promotional stills for Wong Kar-wai‘s upcoming martial arts film The Grandmasters have been released. 

Tony Leung with slicked-back  hair and punching has an extremely cool look, the fruit of his two years of Wing Chun training  has not gone to waste. Tony Leung also thanked director Wong Kar-wai for giving him this chance to play Ip Man. Although the training and the production took a long time, he felt it was completely worth it. Tony Leung said, “To experience a martial art master’s journey of the heart, the best way was to practically train in kung fu. During the training, I was able to experience the character as well as the martial art.”

Working with Tony Leung for the second time in a Wong Kar-wai film, Zhang Ziyi in the film plays an Eight Diagram palm master. Before the shoot she needed to train hard. After working together on 2046, Tony Leung and Zhang Ziyi already have built a certain chemistry. This time their scenes together were even more flavorful. Tony Leung said that although he has only worked with Ziyi twice before (they also starred together in Hero), he felt like they have worked on six movies together! Playing Ip Man’s wife, Song Hye-Kyo‘s costume was also unveiled for the first time. She was very spell bounding with her elegant grace.

The Grandmasters will be released on 18 December in China and Hong Kong.

http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-11-06/11433780894.shtml

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New trailer for ‘The Grandmasters’

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEu7bwIh3j8]

The new trailer for ‘The Grandmasters’ has been released as well as some new stills. 

The new film from Wong Kar-wai starring  Tony Leung Chiu-wai in the title role will finally be released this Christmas.  As Ip Man, Tony Leung has numerous fight scenes, one of which he had to fight over ten people in the rain and thoroughly displayed his abilities. Tony Leung and Zhang Ziyi had a “fight into an embrace” and a staring scene.

In the trailer, Tony Leung spoke Cantonese while the other actors spoke Putonghua. Other actors like Chang Chen, Song Hye-Kyo, Zhao Benshan, Xiao Shenyang and others were introduced as well.

 

 

 

http://video.sina.com.cn/p/ent/m/c/2012-11-06/000761906039.html

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Wong Kar-wai spends his 54th birthday on “The Grandmasters” set

 

Sina:

Director Wong Kar-wai turned 54 on the 17th July. He is currently working on the December release of The Grandmasters (Yut Doi Jung Si) and had to celebrate on the set. Zhang Ziyi posted the birthday celebration photo from the set. 

The Grandmasters is a film that Wong Kar-wai has prepared 13 years for and took almost 3 years to shoot on and off. Viewers who were anxious to see Tony Leung Chiu-wai were worried that the film would never be released and joked that it was “missing for a generation”. In March the film announced its mid December release, but the film is still in “a hurry to wrap up” production.

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Leaked images of Zhang Ziyi in “The Grandmasters”

Some new images of Zhang Ziyi in “The Grandmasters” have made their way onto the Internet. The images are taken from the five minutes of footage unveiled by Wong Kar-wai at the Cannes Film Festival.

http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-05-25/07073639603.shtml

And a description of the footage shown, courtesy of AICN:

Also screened was some footage from Wong Kar Wai’s The Grandmasters that was quite beautiful. A little girl watches her father practice a deadly martial art called Bogua in a snowy courtyard. Her narration tells us that her father forbade her from watching him train, but she doesn’t and soon their positions are switched as this little girl clumsily tries to mimic her father while he catches her in the act.

At first he looks sad, then resigned, as the voice over explains that her father told her no matter what she attempted in life, she would become the best at it and then we see him training the girl.

Cut to the girl all grown up (Ziyi Zhang) training alone in the snow, much like her father and with the same semi-Force power and grace. Ice cycles quiver as she punches the air, flakes of snow slam into tree bark and the limbs of a cherry blossom shake as she gracefully moves from stance to stance.

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New short film from Wong Kar-wai to premiere at Cannes; plus new poster for ‘The Grandmasters’

Wong Kar-wai will be debuting a new short film at Cannes called ‘Dejavu‘.
Whisky company Chivas Regal commissioned a promotional film from Kar-Wai which will be unveiled Friday May 18 at the festival. Shot at Umaid Bhawan Palace, the film is titled ‘Deja Vu’ and chronicles a romance between supermodel Du Juan and Chang Chen.

http://www.allocine.fr/article/dossiers/cinema/dossier-18613287/

A new poster for ‘The Grandmasters’ was spotted at Cannes: