Dragon Fist (龍拳) is a 1979 live-action theatrical Hong Kong film directed by Lo Wei, and produced by Hsu Li-Hwa, with distribution by Lo Wei Motion Picture Company Ltd. The film starred Jackie Chan, Nora Miao, James Tien Chun, Im Eun-Joo, Yen Shi-Kwan, Mu Szu-Cheng and Hsu Hsia, with screenplay writer Wang Chung-Pin and music composed by Frankie Chan. The film was theatrically released in April 1979 for Hong Kong.
Note: As I’ve purchased the film a while back, this is more akin to a ‘delayed unboxing’ post but the photos were sorted at the time of its arrival.
Background:
“Director Wei Lo and martial arts legend Jackie Chan are back together in a kung-fu saturated story of revenge and justice. Tong Huo-wan (Chan) is on the hunt for retribution for the death of his mentor whilst also balancing out the power between locals and violent gangsters as well as dealing with the devastating news that his master’s family are joining a rival school! Chan is on red-hot form here, as a seemingly indestructible man determined to right all wrongs, even if that means going against his teachings.”
Plot Synopsis via 88 Films, February 2025.
Lo Wei was one of the biggest directors known in Hong Kong for introducing many people to not just martial art films but also Asian Cinema in general, having worked with famous actors including Bruce Lee, Jimmy Wang Yu, James Tien Chun and more, but is also famous for his collaboration with Jackie Chan for a number of film projects including Magnificent Bodyguards, New Fist of Fury and Spiritual Kung Fu. Dragon Fist was one of the last films Lo Wei had directed and was also the last major collaboration with Jackie Chan as the star, as their next project Fearless Hyena Part II (which Lo Wei didn’t direct but produced and wrote the script) had Jackie leave production to join Golden Harvest.
While Jackie Chan was known for his comedic acts, Dragon Fist went with a more serious revenge themed story with Jackie’s character dealing some pretty rustic moves against his opponents, some of which were pretty brutal. The story was pretty engaging, though the timeline is pretty hectic as you wouldn’t really notice that x amount of days or years had passed between scenes.
There’s a lot going on, with a subplot involving a clan trying to stop a rival school from doing some evil deeds, whilst you also have Chan’s character trying to protect his master’s family which forces him to do some anti-hero motives though he does this because of his emotions after going through a shock moment that he spent the past few years planning to do. I saw a comment that someone made that compared Jackie’s actions to that of Darth Vader in Star Wars and weirdly it makes complete sense.
Dragon Fist is surprisingly not as well-liked as the other films in Jackie Chan’s filmography and supposedly its due to Lo Wei reusing a lot of popular tropes and story beats, but as someone who hasn’t delved too much into Lo Wei’s filmography and this being the first time I’ve seen Jackie Chan take a revenge approach in a historical themed setting, I personally really enjoyed the film as a whole. I suppose it depends on how much you have consumed of Hong Kong cinema before you start to notice these key details.
UK distributor 88 Films released Dragon Fist on Blu-ray from a 2K restoration in December 2018, however back then their authoring work was considered pretty hit or miss, and for many fans it was when they released Crime Story onwards where the detail and quality control improved drastically. Since then, many had wondered if they would go back to Dragon Fist as well as three other films Battle Creek Brawl, Snake and Crane Arts of Shaolin and To Kill with Intrigue. It took 7 years but 88 Films did return with a new 4K restoration and on the 4K Ultra HD format.
Deluxe Limited Edition Contents:
88 Films released Dragon Fist before in a first-print edition packaging years back, but with the 4K Ultra HD release they went with the deluxe limited edition packaging that offered more for the fans of the film. The distributor released two variations for this edition; the regular variant features KUNG FU BOB’s newly illustrated artwork, and exclusive to the 88 Films online store was a variant that features the original theatrical poster artwork on the rigid box cover and the Amaray case cover. I decided to go for the latter as the new artwork will still be included on various parts of the release.
This deluxe limited edition release is presented with a rigid box (and depending on which variation you went with on the artwork as mentioned above), a 4K Ultra HD Amaray case housing the discs, 6 lobby card reproductions, a double-sided poster featuring newly illustrated artwork and the original Hong Kong poster artwork, and an 80-page perfect-bound book featuring four write-ups. The articles covered are ‘Rumble in Korea: A Look Back on the Hong Kong Kung-Fu Genre Filming in Korea’ by Paul Bramhall, ‘Exit the Dragon’ by Andy Heskins, and ‘Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man: Jackie Chan, Dragon Fist and a (partial) defence of Lo Wei’ by James Oliver.
The box art is clean with no ratings/information on the front and spine, whilst the back cover features the information, synopsis, ratings and specs. The artwork on the Amaray cases (both covers) do include information and specs on the back. The deluxe limited edition 4K Ultra HD release retailed for £34.99 SRP, and the previously released Blu-ray from years ago is still available (but is based on the 2K restoration). A standard edition 4K Ultra HD release and a Blu-ray re-release using the 4K restoration are also available.
I pre-ordered the film on its own from the 88 Films store.
Physical Contents:
- Rigid Slipcase featuring the original theatrical artwork (88 Films Store Exclusive Variant)
- 4K Amaray case packaging featuring illustrated artwork by KUNG FU BOB
- Info sheet for specification details
- 6 Lobby Card Reproductions
- Double-sided foldout poster
- 80-page illustrated book featuring new and archive articles by Paul Bramhall, Andy Heskins & James Oliver.
On-Disc Contents:
Distributor: 88 Films
Released: 24th February 2025
The deluxe limited edition release for Dragon Fist contains the film on a single 4K Ultra HD disc and single Blu-ray disc. All the discs were encoded and authored by MJM Multimedia on behalf of 88 Films.
The previous 88 Films Blu-ray release was based on a 2K restoration, but here we have a brand new 4K restoration from the original camera negatives. There’s only one version released for the film which is the Hong Kong theatrical cut.
On both 4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray discs are the film presented in Mandarin audio with English subtitles, Cantonese audio with English subtitles, an Alternative Cantonese audio track with English subtitles, as well as the classic English audio track.
The 4K Ultra HD discs feature Dolby Vision High Dynamic Range. The white subtitles are unlockable during playback and the 4K Ultra HD disc is playable to 4K players of any region. The regions for the Blu-ray disc however are locked to players set to B.
4K Ultra HD Specs:
| Languages | Mandarin, Cantonese, English |
| Audio | Mandarin ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 Cantonese ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 Cantonese ‘Alternative Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 English ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 |
| Video | 2160p Ultra High Definition format 2.35:1 aspect ratio Dolby Vision HDR |
| Region | All Region |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | No |
| Discs | 1 BD-100 |
Blu-ray Specs:
| Languages | Mandarin, Cantonese, English |
| Audio | Mandarin ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 Cantonese ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 Cantonese ‘Alternative Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 English ‘Dual Mono’ Linear PCM 2.0 |
| Video | 1080p High Definition format 2.35:1 aspect ratio |
| Region | B |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | No |
| Discs | 1 BD-50 |
4K Ultra HD On-Disc Extra Features:
- Audio Commentary by Frank Djeng & F.J. Desanto
- Interview with David West (21:52 runtime)
- Japanese Opening Credits (02:30 runtime)
- Japanese TV Spot (00:14 runtime)
- Japanese Trailer (01:52 runtime)
- Hong Kong Trailer (03:58 runtime)
- Lobby Card Gallery (01:04 runtime)
- Then & Now Gallery (04:07 runtime)
Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:
- Audio Commentary by Frank Djeng & F.J. Desanto
- Interview with David West (21:52 runtime)
- Japanese Opening Credits (02:30 runtime)
- Japanese TV Spot (00:14 runtime)
- Japanese Trailer (01:52 runtime)
- Hong Kong Trailer (03:58 runtime)
- Lobby Card Gallery (01:04 runtime)
- Then & Now Gallery (04:07 runtime)
Unboxing Photos:
Final Notes:
Dragon Fist is available to purchase on 4K Ultra HD and Blu-ray by 88 Films in the United Kingdom.
The deluxe limited edition 4K Ultra HD release can be purchased across different retailers including 88 Films, Amazon UK, HMV, Terracotta Distribution and Zavvi. The 88 Films store exclusive variant is no longer available for purchase, though Terracotta Distribution did manage to locate a copy.
A standard edition 4K Ultra HD release is also available to purchase across different retailers including 88 Films, Amazon UK, HMV, Terracotta Distribution and Zavvi.
(Disclaimer: Amazon links are also included when available. They are affiliated so if you decide to order them, I’ll earn a small percentage if they ship which will help me with any hauls or small bills.)
The Normanic Vault 
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