Tagline: "Fate made him a warrior, courage made him a hero"
Plot
Jet Li portrays the life of martial art master Huo Yuanjia. The plot differs greatly from the actual life of Huo Yuanjia.
The story flashes back to when Huo Yuanjia was a small boy. His father, Huo Endi, was a great fighter but did not want his son to follow in his footsteps and hence, refused to teach Yuanjia martial arts. However, with the help of his friend, Nong Jinsun, Yuanjia stole his father's wushu manual and taught himself how to fight.
The young Yuanjia then witnesses his father losing a Leitai match; his father could have won but was unwilling to deliver the finishing blow because it would have been a fatal one. Yuanjia is taunted by the son of the man who defeated his father and he steps up to defend the Huo family name. Yuanjia is defeated and he swears never to lose again.
As the years pass, Yuanjia grows into a powerful fighter, winning fight after fight on the Leitai until he becomes known as one of the greatest fighters in Tianjin, China. However, as his success grows, he becomes arrogant and increasingly ruthless, unlike his late father. When a rival martial arts master named Qin Lei (Master Chin in the US version) apparently injures one of Huo's followers, Huo forces Qin to fight him to the death during Qin's birthday celebration. After much effort, during which both fighters demolish a restaurant, Huo kills Qin. However, when he returns home, he realizes that both his mother and daughter (Jade in the US version) have been killed in revenge by Qin's apprentices. Guided by fury, he comes to Qin's home to slay the one who perpetrated the murder of his relatives but misses his chance when the man slits his own throat. He spares the lives of Qin's wife and daughter who were cowering in the corner. In addition, on his way home he finds out that Master Qin 'teached' his pupil a lesson because the pupil had slept with Qin's concubine. Crazed with grief and shame, Huo flees Tianjin and wanders aimlessly for many miles, no longer caring about himself. After he nearly drowns in a river, he is saved by Granny Sun (Grandma in the US version) and her visually impaired grand-daughter, Yueci (Moon in the US version). They bring him back to their village and guided by their simple acts of kindness, Huo begins to learn the meaning of kindness and mercy.
In 1907, Huo Yuanjia returns to a very different Tianjin than the one he had left. No longer a comfortable rural village, it is now a bustling city, crowded with foreign troops and merchants. There, he makes peace with his past -- visiting the graves of his family and apologizing for his faults, and paying his respects to the family of Master Qin.
He then reconciles with his old friend, Nong Jinsun, and challenges American wrestler, Hercules O'Brien, who was making headlines defeating Chinese fighters and dismissing them as the Weak man of the East. To the astonishment of the foreigners, Huo not only wins the fight, but the admiration of O'Brien in the process. Huo Yuanjia's fame begins to spread with successive challenge matches with other foreign fighters, and with funding from his businessman friend, Nong Jinsun, he sets up Jing Wu Men, a martial arts school in Shanghai.
The members of the Foreign Chambers of Commerce fear that Huo Yuanjia's victory will fan anti-western sentiments in the Chinese people and lead to revolts, so they seek to humiliate him. They challenge him to a match in which he will take on four foreign champions in a single evening: a British boxer, a German lancer, a Spanish fencer, and a Japanese martial artist. Though Jinsun urges Huo to refuse such an unfair challenge, Huo decides to accept, adding that afterwards, he intends to take a break and visit Granny and Yueci (Grandma and Moon in the US version). He also accepts an invitation to join the Japanese challenger, Anno Tanaka, for tea. While there, they have an important debate about the value of the martial arts. Tanaka believes the goal of a martial artist is to defeat his opponent, but Huo impresses Tanaka by successfully arguing that the goal of studying martial arts is self-improvement, and that challenge matches are important not because of who wins or loses but because they provide a way for a practitioner to gauge his progress and can act as a focal point in his training. The two fighters leave with a friendly respect for each other. Looking almost if the two were actually friends.
The match takes place on 14 September, 1910. Huo Yuanjia soundly beats the first three fighters before facing Tanaka in a titanic battle. In the first round, they fight with weapons, and, while the fight is extraordinarily close, Huo clearly demonstrates superior skill, showing that he could have severely injured or killed Tanaka on several occasions.
Worried that Huo will emerge victorious, the Japanese diplomat delegate has Huo's teacup switched with a poisoned cup from which Huo drinks. In the second round, to be fought without weapons, Huo has difficulty breathing, loses his strength, and starts vomiting blood. Tanaka and Huo's students immediately demand that the fight be stopped, but Huo replies that they might as well finish it since he will die regardless.
In his weakened state, Huo is no match for Tanaka but sees an opening to seize victory by delivering the same fatal technique that he had used to defeat and kill Master Qin. But, at the last second, he pulls the strike, letting it land without any power behind it. As he collapses, Tanaka realizes both Huo's mastery and his mercy and raises Huo's arm, declaring him the victor.
When the furious Japanese diplomat confronts Tanaka and accuses him of throwing certain victory away, Tanaka, knowing him as the one who was behind the poison over his now dying friend, angrily slams him against a pillar slightly injuring him and tells him that it is the diplomat who is a disgrace to the Japanese people.
The movie ends with Yueci seeing a flashback vision of Huo in her mind's eye and realizing that he has redeemed himself.
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