Why is Chow Yun Fat considered the greatest action hero in cinema?

And if Woo helped lay the foundations of modern action cinema, Chow was right alongside him, showing what the ideal action hero looked like in these times, both in Woo’s own works and in other action classics like Ringo Lam’s City on Fire (1987). “It grounds the imaginative work of John Woo and Lam’s masterpieces in everyday reality,” says Gilman. “[He’s typically a] “Hong Kong’s working class is trying to follow the rules and do the right thing in a world of violence and chaos.”

His most influential role

The actor’s supporting role in A Better Tomorrow was a huge success for him and demonstrated his famous poise and screen presence – just look at him playing Mark, the trusting best friend and triad brother of Ti Lung’s protagonist Soong Zi Ho., Lighting a cigarette on a burning banknote. But it was The Killer (1989) that really proved what he was made of. The film follows Ah Jung, a hitman in the Triads, as he becomes disillusioned with his work. His slow quest to repent begins after he blinds a singer named Jenny during a gunfight. Shortly after this incident, we see Ah Jung in pain after a bullet is removed from his back. Portraying him as clearly emotionally and physically wounded early on makes the character’s trajectory immediately clear: he’s too open-hearted for a job where weakness is punished, and thus doomed to failure.

You can see traces of Chow’s work in The Killer in many of the films that followed, particularly those involving seemingly cold-blooded contract killers finding their souls: You could make an argument for Keanu Reeves’s John Wick franchise, which is influential in its own right, like blending Woo’s brand of gunplay with Chow’s brand of action hero cool.

“He’s the emotional center of these movies, exhausted and angry and damaged but at the same time romantically yearning…but with an endless supply of bullets,” says Gelman. At one point, Ah Jung’s friend, policeman Li Ying (Danny Lee), notices this longing within him, noting that his “eyes are so alert…full of compassion, full of emotion.” Throughout the film, the audience sees the battle between the character’s composure and that compassion, forcing him to reckon with the collateral damage of his action. When Ah Jung sees his therapist betraying him, he boils with tears in his eyes. Chow makes this moment seem more painful for Ah Jung than a bullet being taken out of his back.

Scientific

But despite this emotional pain, amid the storm of bullets in the action scenes, Ah Jung’s physical command is impeccable. Chow moves decisively and agilely—like when he jumps on top of a motorcycle, then fires a bullet to destroy it last Motorbike while still in the air.

While imbuing his strong characters with tenderness, Chow also maintains a twinkle in his eye: his playfulness is palpable even in a film as dramatic and tragic as The Killer, especially in the scenes where he jokes with Li Ying. In his 80s and 90s, the actor was “more sociable and cynical” than his Hollywood peers, even Jean-Claude Van Damme, says Elena Lazic, critic and founder of the online film magazine Animus.[whose persona wasn’t] “Quite one of steely seriousness, too.” She adds: “I really enjoy watching Sylvester Stallone in his classic films, for example the other action star, but it’s not always obvious that he’s actually enjoying himself, the way Chow Yun Fat really is.”