The Legend (1993 film)

The Legend, released in Hong Kong as Fong Sai-Yuk (方世玉), is a 1993 Hong Kong martial arts action-comedy directed by Corey Yuen and starring Jet Li as the folk-hero fighter Fong Sai Yuk, a young kung fu practitioner in Qing-dynasty Canton who enters a marriage contest and then must protect his father, a member of a secret anti-Qing society, from a ruthless imperial governor.^{1 • 2} The film was Jet Li's first production for his own company, Eastern Production, and it became one of the biggest Hong Kong hits of 1993 while winning awards for its action choreography.^{3 • 4}

Production and background

The film marked a turning point in Jet Li's career. After three Once Upon a Time in China films for Golden Harvest, his contract had expired amid a pay dispute, and in 1992 his manager was killed, a shock that pushed him toward new business arrangements. He founded Eastern Production, named partly after his own given name, and made Fong Sai Yuk as the company's first film, producing it under the pseudonym Li Yang-chung, a name the writer Jin Yong had suggested for him.³

Corey Yuen, a member of the Peking Opera school troupe the Seven Little Fortunes alongside Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung, directed and co-choreographed the action with Yuen Tak. The screenplay is credited to Jeff Lau, Chan Kin-chung, and Kevin Tsai; according to a later retrospective, Jeff Lau wrote the initial framework in about five days while juggling other productions.^{7 • 3} The film was shot as a co-production involving Beijing Film Studio, part of the wave of Hong Kong-mainland co-productions of the early 1990s.^{4 • 14}

The character Fong Sai Yuk comes from Southern Shaolin legend, a Cantonese folk hero with a screen history reaching back to 1930s and 1940s Hong Kong cinema; the Hong Kong Film Archive notes that the Fong Sai-yuk and Wong Fei-hung series built the foundation of Southern Shaolin legend films from the late 1940s onward.¹⁵ The 1993 film spins the folk legend into what the Archive calls "a wickedly playful coming-of-age tale of romance, friendship, loyalty, family and comical misunderstandings." ¹⁶

Action choreography and reception

The film's reputation rests chiefly on its choreography. Reviewers single out the tournament fight staged on the heads and shoulders of the crowd, a sequence the Apple TV synopsis describes as "fought entirely atop the heads of stunned onlookers," and a bamboo-staff duel between Jet Li's Fong and Vincent Zhao's governor.^{2 • 17} The Austin Chronicle's review praised "some of the most breathtakingly choreographed fight scenes witnessed in years." ⁹

Josephine Siao's performance drew particular attention. Time Out called her work "a show-stopping culmination of three decades of fine work in the Hong Kong cinema," and her cross-dressed fighter earned a Best Actress nomination at the Hong Kong Film Awards.^{9 • 6} The film also introduced Vincent Zhao, a Beijing sport university wushu student whom Corey Yuen cast as the villain; it was his first film, and it launched a career that later included taking over the Wong Fei-hung role in the Once Upon a Time in China series.³

At the Hong Kong box office the film earned HK$30,666,842, placing fifth for 1993, ahead of Once Upon a Time in China III in seventh place.^{4 • 5} On Rotten Tomatoes it holds 89% from nine critics, with an 84% audience score.⁹

Versions and legacy

The film exists in cuts of different lengths: festival and archive listings give 106 minutes for the Hong Kong version, while the US release runs shorter.^{8 • 9} The American rights were acquired by Miramax/Dimension, which retitled the film simply The Legend and, according to the review site LoveHKFilm, rescored and dubbed it.¹⁸ A sequel, Fong Sai Yuk II, followed the same year with the same leads, continuing the story after Fong joins the secret society.¹⁶

The Hong Kong Film Archive included Fong Sai Yuk in its "100 Must-See Hong Kong Movies" series, screening it alongside its sequel in 2014.¹⁶ Later restorations have kept it in circulation: 88 Films released a 4K restoration of both films in 2024, and Shout! Studios issued a US 4K UHD set in 2025.⁴

References

1. The Legend (1993) – Release info, IMDb
2. The Legend – Apple TV
3. 想当年｜《方世玉》：功夫皇帝的正名, The Paper
4. HKFACT – 电影 – 方世玉
5. 香港电影票房榜 1993年, Douban
6. The Legend – TV Guide
7. 功夫皇帝方世玉, Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival archive
8. Fong Sai-yuk, Festival des 3 Continents
9. Fong Sai-Yuk, Rotten Tomatoes
10. Fong Sai Yuk = The Legend, ACMI collection
11. Fong Sai Yuk, Melbourne International Film Festival archive
12. The Legend, Netflix
13. 鄭少秋電影 – 方世玉 Fong Sai Yuk part 1, AdamCheng.HK
14. 《当代电影》: 从华语圈到全球化, Sohu
15. ProFolio 101, Hong Kong Film Archive
16. HK Film Archive's "100 Must-See Hong Kong Movies", Hong Kong Government Information Services
17. Remembering Corey Yuen #6 – Fong Sai Yuk (1993) Review, Casey's Movie Mania
18. Fong Sai-Yuk (1993), LoveHKFilm

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026

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