Available from Eureka Entertainment
Following the death of his father, a man uses his martial arts skills and a hired gang to find out the truth.
Written and directed by Wei Lo, A Man Called Tiger has some interesting elements in the story, but it is also fairly predictable in how things develop. Thankfully, there are enough scenes and sequences that are entertaining and have better development that the film remains mostly entertaining. Why mostly? Well, some of the parts are just not on point and it’s difficult to figure out if it’s a writing issue or a directing issue or something else like something is missing. This does cause some issues with the story to be honest as it has so much potential, and it feels like it misses the mark here and there and that is enough to mess things up a bit. Yes, the film does have that grand finale and some will find it great, but is this enough to call the whole film great?
The cast here works decently, but there is a mild cheesy aspect to the performances that doesn’t always work. Their performances work, but something is off, a theme here. The performances mostly work, our leading man has an easy charisma about him, and it does help a lot of scenes. The fight sequences are fun and mostly well-done, giving the film plenty of good stuff to keep the viewer involved and interested. Yet, something still feels like it’s missing.
The cinematography by Ching-Chu Chen and the editing by Peter Cheung work well together here and give the film that extra boost to make the most of the story. The work by these two make the film dynamic and help make the fight sequences even better.
A Man Called Tiger is an entertaining enough film with a few things that could have been better. It’s a favorite among some groups but won’t work for many due to some cheese here and there, and there is some unevenness throughout the story and a bit in the acting. It’s entertaining, but it feels like there was potential for more.
This new release for A Man Called Tiger is solid on the technical side of things. The new 2K restoration looks good on both version and it’s nice to see the previously rare Hong Kong theatrical release version. The audio is in mono presentation but sounds really good on both the Mandarin and the English dub (which is old school so keeps that charm/quirk). The extras are good with the commentary by Frank Djeng, a regular of these releases at this point who is an expert on East Asian film and a member of NY Asian Film festival, and Michael Worth coming up on top of the bunch. The video essay by Brandon Bentley called “Cutting Tiger, Hidden Subtitles” is interesting. Lastly, there is new art of course, an O-Card slipcase, a reversible poster with the original art for the film, a collector’s booklet, and of course, the film’s trailer.