Martial arts icon Jet Li has decided to bring a close to his illustrious 26-year martial arts career with a bang. The 43-year-old master of maneuvers will hang his belt with his latest film
Fearless, the story of Huo Yuanjia, the godfather of the martial art called wushu, which releases Friday.
One message that Li says he wants to send out to youngsters through the film is 'stop fighting'. “On the street, I see a lot of young teenagers saying, 'Hey, Jet Li. Beat up somebody! Fight! Fight!' It makes me think that they think Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan and Jet Li only know how to beat up somebody,” he says disappointedly.
Wushu actually means 'stop fighting' in Mandarin. Asked why he has decided to pull the plug on what he does best, Li says: “We made a lot of action films more focused on fighting, more focused on the physical part, but nobody talks about the 'stop'. So I found the perfect story: Huo Yuanjia, the true martial artist in the last century in China. In the 5,000 years of Chinese history, he's the number one guy. He told everybody, 'Martial arts is just like sports. It's not to kill somebody, like a weapon'. I put everything in this movie, so I have nothing to say in the future.”
Fearless, helmed by Ronny Yu, tracks the travails of Huo Yuanjia, the most famous martial arts master in 20th century China. The unbeatable fighter's pride comes before his fall, which arrives in the guise of his family's massacre. Two village women rescue Yuanjia, and his experiences with them teaches him about kindness and compassion. He realizes that martial arts should be sport, not a weapon, a belief that Yuanjia later propagates.
As for Li, he learnt the nuances of wushu when he was barely eight years old. After winning several medals in Chinese wushu championships, Li made his Hollywood debut with
Shaolin Temple in 1979. In a career spanning 26 years, he has starred in about 36 films, including
Lethal Weapon 4 in which he played a villain. “I stepped into the martial arts movie market when I was only 16. I think I have proved my ability in this field and it won't make sense for me to continue for another five or 10 years. Huo Yuanjia is a conclusion to my life as a martial arts star,” Li says. The actor, however, would continue to perform in films of other genres, two of which are Rogue and
The J&J Project.
According to Li, he made several changes in the plot of
Fearless to keep the story simple. “It's about a man's journey. I also gave a lot of room to show his beautiful movements of Chinese wushu. I told the fight choreographer, Yuen Wo Ping, 'Let's go back to the roots of old Chinese wushu with longer takes'. We don't use tricks. We don't use wires or CG effects. We don't have to hide anything because we have the best wushu expert in the movie,” he says.
One more feat Li hopes to achieve from the film is giving hope to thousands of Chinese youngsters who resort to suicide, a social malaise that is on the rise in the Communist country. “When people commit suicide, they cause 10 people to suffer. So this is causing millions and millions of people to suffer. As teenagers, (Chinese youngsters) don't know how to handle their lives. I want to tell them to be strong. Life is not easy. I wrote a special line in the film, 'I cannot choose when I am born, but with courage I go to the end',” Li says, adding that the film shows how Yuanjia overcame odds to grow as person.
The star recently shifted to his birthplace Beijing from Hong Kong with his wife Nina and their two children, Jane and Jada. He has two other children from a previous marriage.
