“Iron Protector” is a martial arts film that shows us that Yue Song is a total package when it comes to starring, directing, producing, writing and editing his own films. Featuring exciting martial arts choreography, “Iron Protector” is a popcorn martial arts film worth watching!
TITLE: Iron Protector
FILM RELEASE: 2016
DURATION: 90 Minutes
BLU-RAY DISC INFORMATION: 1080p High Definition (2:35:1), Mandarin DTS-HD MA 5.1, Subtitles: English
COMPANY: Well Go USA Entertainment
RATED: N/A
RELEASE DATE: September 5, 2017
Written and Directed by Yue Song
Produced by Yue Song, Kong Lingcheng, Liu Chengguo, Guo TingtingÂ
Associate Producer: Liu Yanming, Yang Jun, Li Changhai, Shi Bingjie
Music: Derek Zhao
Cinematography: Jingfang Chen, Xing Gu
Starring:
Yue Song as Wu-Lin
Yu Xing (Shi Yanneng) as Jiang Li
Wai-Man Chan
Colling Chou
Li Yufei as Feifei
After the death of his clan master, Wu-Lin leaves the village for the City of Stone-cold to protect the daughter of the richest family in the city, Fei-Fei. When the city s most dangerous gang attempts to kidnap Fei-Fei, Wu-Lin is forced to fight them alone and discovers an even more sinister power is taking over the city.
In the search for a new martial arts hero, one willing to take on the risky stunts and bone-break risks, China has found a man who not only is willing to step up as a martial arts fighter and take on risky stunts but also a man who knows how to direct, write, produce and edit a film.
Yue Song has not been around all that long and the one film he was known previously for was “The King of the Streets” and now, he’s back with his second film “Iron Protector” (a.k.a. “Super Bodyguard”), which will be released in Sept. 2017 courtesy of Well Go USA Entertainment.
The film begins with Wu Lin doing splits with a child and the public watching him. The kid tries to distract Wu Lin with ice cream and even peeing on the street.
But when a group of thugs go after a man, they run into the child, causing him to cry and also upset Wu Lin (since they ran over the ice cream the boy gave to him). As Wu Lin confronts the punks of who stepped on his ice cream, they try to attack him but he easily beats them. The older man named Jia-Shan Li offers him money, but Wu Lin is not so interested.
As Wu Lin goes back to the area he was working on his splits, several cars park around him and out comes a man who confronts him. The man happens to be Jiang Li (portrayed by Xing Yu), who was a fellow apprentice with Wu Lin and both learned martial arts together.
But when Wu Lin was chosen to become the successor of the “Iron Feet”, Jiang Li who tried to steal the iron feet was cast out of the martial arts training area.
But now with the death of his master, Wu Lin decided to visit the City of Stone and visit his old friend. But when Jiang Li sees Wu Lin still wearing the iron boots, he becomes jealous.
Meanwhile, Wu Lin gets a job in the city from Jia-Shan Li, the older man he saved earlier and that is to become a bodyguard for his daughter Feifei (portrayed by Li YuFei).
Feifei is irritated that her father has sent a bodyguard that is always with her 24/7 and she does all he can to be rude and annoying to get him to leave but Wu Lin intends to stick with his job to protect her.
But one day, Feifei is kidnapped by a group of thugs but what happens when Wu Lin find out that the person responsible for the kidnapping is his friend Jiang Li.
VIDEO:
“Iron Protector” is presented in 1080p High Definition (2:35:1). A lot of shots indoors but for the most part, picture quality is good, outdoor scenes are vibrant.
AUDIO & SUBTITLES:
“Iron Protector” is presented in Mandarin 5.1 DTS-HD MA. Dialogue and music is crystal clear, as with action sequences which utilize the surround channels quite well.
Subtitles are in English.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
“Iron Protector” comes with the following short featurettes: The Chase, the Final Battle, Training, Stunts and Fighting Highlights and a trailer.
Back in the day, Jackie Chan and many other action stars and stuntmen, would partake in action sequences that were risky, dangerous and literally leave people with broken bones or concussions.
While the practice still continues, these risky stunts practiced by the main stars of a film is still commonplace in Asian cinema back then but now more stunt actors and actresses are utilized and minimizing the danger experienced by the main talent and practicing safety is becoming more common place in Asian martial arts films.
But there are people who still feel the original way of having the main talent fight, take part in their own stunts and putting themselves in harms way is still important.
While Jackie Chan still practices this to a lesser degree today, he still does a lot of his stunts. But in terms of hardcore action and willing to go through many risks, Yue Song has emerged as an action star willing to carry out the practices of martial arts films of yesteryear, and literally putting himself in harms way.
And this is a true Yue Song film which he directs, writes, produces and edits but also stars in.
“Iron Protector” is strictly a martial arts popcorn action film. The story does have a bit of banality as two men, who grew up together as brothers and trained in martial arts but jealousy broke them apart.
Yue Song’ character of Wu Lin has practiced martial arts with excessively heavy iron boots and doesn’t intent to stop using them until his tenth year. Meanwhile, his old friend Jiang Li, who was literally kicked out of their martial arts training, ended up being a crime boss, pitting these two men against each other.
Meanwhile, Wu Lin tries to protect his client’s daughter, Feifei, a stubborn, spoiled, stuck-up and rude young woman. She does all she can to get away from Wu Lin, but he has been good at tracking her.
But when he finds out his friend Jiang Li and his gang of thugs have kidnapped FeiFei, one can expect an explosive battle between the two men.
Martial arts choreography was well-done and Yue Song has no doubt given audiences a chance to see China’s new martial arts hero in action but also from the end credits and the special features, to see how many times he put himself at risk.
As for the Blu-ray release, picture quality is good, lossless audio is much better and special features that are quite short but gives an idea of how challenging it was to shoot these stunt scenes and how badly Yue Song was hurt
Overall, “Iron Protector” is a martial arts film that shows us that Yue Song is a total package when it comes to starring, directing, producing, writing and editing his own films. Featuring exciting martial arts choreography, “Iron Protector” is a popcorn martial arts film worth watching!
