highly entertaining with great performance from lead

Rating: 7/10 (5 February 2011)

Ip Man starts off as a light, rather humorous movie about martial arts expert Mast Ip, wonderfully played by Donnie Yen with quiet grace and a twinkling eye, who spends his time wowing the town with his amazing (and beautifully choreographed) fights.
About a third of the way through there is a marked shift in tone as the Japanese invade China and subjugate everyone, with martial arts masters forced to work in factories and perform in tournaments with the Japanese in exchange for bags of rice to feed their starving children.
The darkened mood seems a little odd but works pretty well, and Ip continues to battle for good in some very cool fights. But to me there is a certain disconnect in the earnestness of the movie's hatred of the Japanese (who are portrayed pretty much the way American movies portray Nazis) versus the flashy combat.
The story itself is apparently based on a real martial arts teacher but doesn't portray anything that actually happened to him, making it the same sort of nonsensical biopic you get in the U.S. But it is a lot of fun.