From: twcaps@tennyson.lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
Newsgroups: rec.martial-arts
Subject: Re: Wong Fei Hung  - Fact or Fiction?
Date: 15 Oct 1992 23:11:01 GMT
Organization: Department of Redundancy Department
Reply-To: TWChan@lbl.gov (Terry Chan)
NNTP-Posting-Host: 128.3.12.117

kwp@ukc.ac.uk (K.W.Pang) writes:
  +
  +>Does anyone out there actually know the truth of WFH. Where did he come from
  +>(Fatsun...?), who was he, what MA did he practised (Hung Gar...?), and are 
  +>there still living students of WFH?

doug@eng.umd.edu (Douglas N. Cohen) writes:

  +	not only was he a real person, but he is still alive today.  he used to
  +star in his own movies, a long time ago, and i would dearly love to get a
  +hold of these.  i actually know someone who grew up on these, in canton and
  +hong kong.
  +	he did, in fact, practice Hung Gar, and was the hero that he is
  +portrayed as, though not as flamboyant as the 'once upon a time in china'
  +made him out to be.
  +	he was a special emmisary of the transitional governments around the
  +beginning of the century, but as he traveled around, he found that he was in
  +a type of moral dilema, and in a position to really help the common people.
  +true to his martial arts training, he did try to help as many as he could,
  +but was constantly running afoul of the current political position, and was
  +constantly under attack, physically and politically by the government, who,
  +after putting him there, couldn't do much about him.....

Doug, 

I have a bit of a hard time with this because I am fairly sure that
Wong Fei Hung is dead.  As you say he was involved with the transitional 
government at the turn of the century, let's say he was 33 in 1910.  
Lesse, it's 1992, so he's something like 115 years old today?  Now, he 
COULD be still alive, but I kinda doubt it.  Plus, he would be celebrated 
to the moon by all those Hung Gar guys don't you think?  When's the last 
time you heard anything about this guy?

  +	the young actor who portrays him in the movie seems to have
  +captured the spirit of Wah Fei Hung, and i would like to think that while the
  +portrayal is a little exagerated, it pretty much captures the true hero aspec
  +of Wah Fei Hung, and the martial arts hero.....

The original post and all refer to "Wong", though you write "Wah", I expect
you mean the same.`
  
  +	i have read many books, and the guy who has actually seen the movies
  +(with the *real* Wah Fei Hung) is one of the proprietiers(sp?) of mr. huang's
  +(a chinese and sushi resteraunt in laurel, maryland.... steve chan and dave
  +pipes, among others, know the place.....friday, as usual, guys?  at the bar!)

One of the most famous actors portraying Wong Fei Hong in Hong Kong movies
of the 1950s was Kwan Tak Hing (the guy referred to, albeit obliquely in
my sig last time).  Widely celebrated as one of the greats of many actors
to portray WFH, I gotta think that this is who your friend refers to.  If
you are referring to "Wah Fei Hung", then I don't know anything about it.

I'll see if I can dig up a reference to when WFH died (as I'm pretty sure
he's history).  To my knowledge, he never made any movies (or they would 
have been made long ago on the mainland), but, you learn something new 
everyday.

  +	his kung fu was reportedly *MUCH BETTER* than the actor's, but then...
  +the actor has made him much more famous to at least another generation, and
  +seems to not have disgraced the name or image.....

WFH was such a populist hero, that movies of his life are remade every decade 
since at least the 50s.

  +	i recommend the movies (2) very highly!  excellent.  especially in 
  +light of the discussions on the poor quality of available martial arts movies
  +these are great!  (but captioned.....)  and quite exciting, clever, and well
  +acted and choreographed, as well as based in historical fact!

I dunno, but the original movies look like pretty good evidence of 
"No-contact knockdown" to me.  As an aside, Kwan Tak Hing was not a 
Hung Gar practitioner, but a Hop Gar one.  If you really do know of 
which movies actually starred WFH, I would be very interested in 
seeing much more info.

Terry "Looking forward to more info" Chan
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