I mean, come on. Is there any other way I could’ve started off Fighting February?
Drunken Master II – called The Legend of Drunken Master when it was released here in the USA – is possibly the best Jackie Chan movie of all time. He’s at his absolute peak here, both in terms of martial arts and insanely physical stuntwork.
He’s surrounded by an insanely talented team of supporting martial artists who give him legitimate rivals to overcome, and the fight choreography is not notch from start to finish.
This movie features an insane amount of fights. My two favorites are the Axe Gang battle, which sees Chan and his mentor fighting off about 50 dudes armed with axes, and the final battle sequence, which is what I’ve linked here.
There are actually two mini-fights before this which are both incredible, but this final confrontation is just a masterpiece of martial arts action. We get to see two fighters at the top of their game performing a mindblowingly awesome fight, and even after dozens of rewatches of this film, I get hype every time.
Random side note, I first found out about this movie as a kid. I bought this movie on VHS as an import with subtitles back when it was only available overseas, and it absolutely blew my mind. It was sitting in a bin at a comic convention at the Wildwood Convention Center one summer. I watched that tape so many times that I’m surprised it didn’t simply break from pure use.