Yip Man's Grave, Fanling

Continuing the process of resurrecting my film- and Bruce Lee-related posts from my old, deleted history blog, here is a post I originally made back in 2011 about how to visit Yip Man's grave in Fanling. It's been a while since I made the effort to go (I think my last trip was around 2014?) but I don't believe very much has changed since then.

Yip Man has been very much in the public eye over the past decade or so thanks to the rather large number (relatively speaking) of films that have been made about him, including four with Donnie Yen, two with Dennis To, an effort from Wong Kar Wai starring Tony Leung, a mainland Chinese TV series, another film with Anthony Wong, and a plethora of cheap and quick cynical cash-ins from mainland China. First we had Brucesploitation and now we have Yip Mansploitation. If you're curious about whether the old master is spinning in his grave about all this, you can now go and check.

This photo is on Yip’s grave stone

Killer Angels - Moon Lee (1989) - Lai Yue Hing Tong, Fanling

People may know this place by another name, the "Fanling Babies Home", and it was a regularly featured property in many movies following the exit of the orphange in the mid-60s. Andi has the best break down of many locations over on his blog. In this movie it is the location where the gang have all their kidnapped women holed up in preparation for shipping them to the Middle East. The real name of the house was Lai Yue Hing Tong (賴餘馨堂) - the babies home was only located here between 1940 to 1966.

Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog! - Sammo Hung (1978) - Chong Ha Ching Sze, Fanling

Here's another location that I spent a significant amount of time tracking down for my Snake in the Eagle's Shadow posts. Since then it has popped up a couple of times (quite recently with this Dragon's Claws post). Once found these places are fairly easy to subsequently recognise. In this film, this old building is the brothel where Frog and Tiger go to lure the Coffin King's henchman into a trap.

Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog! - Sammo Hung (1978) - Fanling Babies Home, Fanling

Next up is Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog!, one of those late 70s kung fu films that would feel a bit generic if it wasn't for the presence of Sammo in the role of Frog, a gold digging opportunist who married a wealthy old woman in order to get access to her family heirloom - a knitted metal pullover that makes its wearer impervious to blades.

He runs off with it but loses it to some con artists and teams up with the bounty hunter, Tiger (Lau Kar-wing), to get it back. It's directed by Karl Maka (who makes a brief appearance, with hair, as a local policeman) so expect that level of humour. One of the funniest bits for me is when Frog's old wife turns to weep at a portrait of her father and it's quite obviously a drawing of a snarling Richard Ng.

Anyway, the film kicks off with some local thugs attempting to best Tiger by sneaking up on him. This whole sequence was filmed at Lai Yue Hing Tong (賴餘馨堂) aka the Fanling Babies Home. This old mansion was a popular filming location until its demolition in the early 1990s. I think the most recent production to film there featured on the blog is probably Shadow of China (1989).

Dragon's Claws - Lau Kar-yung (1979) - Chong Ha Ching Sze, Fanling

The "back of the school" scenes where we see the living quarters of the family were filmed at another location I identified a few years ago for Snake in the Eagle's Shadow. It's called Chong Ha Ching Sze and is a Taoist retreat/temple so I am not sure of how easy it is to enter. The exterior garden at least seems to be accessible to the general public. I have yet to go there despite identifying it several years ago.

In this night time scene it was the moon gate and adjacent windows that gave away the location. You can compare it to the screen cap from the link above.

Dragon's Claws - Lau Kar-yung (1979) - Tang Chung Ling Ancestral Hall, Lung Yeuk Tau

The headquarters of the Dragon Boxing Set (the style of kung fu practised by Lung Hsia and his family) is based at the Tang Chung Ling Ancestral Hall in Lung Yeuk Tau. This is where Ling Ko-fung (Wang Jang Lee) goes to claim leadership of the sect by defeating Lung's father, the current master.

We've seen it so many times on this blog in local movies and the great thing is fans like us can still go and visit because it forms part of the Lung Yeuk Tau Heritage Trail in Fanling.

Rich and Famous - Chow Yun Fat (1987) - Fanling Highway, Kwu Tung

The rather violent denouement to the film takes place on the side of a road embankment somewhere in the New Territories as Yung tries to finish off the newly married couple. This was filmed on a stretch of the New Territories Circular Road (Fanling Highway section) just outside of Fanling. In the film the embankment (thisis the one on the north side of the road) is just a grassy slope in the film, but these days it is covered with mature tree growth. The section we are on is right where the highway goes over the old Castle Peak Road at Kwu Tung. The view inthe background of the top images is looking east back towards Choi Po Court. The last image is looking west towards Ki Lun Shan.

Choi Po Court in Fanling can be seen in the background of the above images

Yung's car crashes under the flyover. Castle Peak Road at the lower level.

View looking west towards Ki Lun Shan in the distance

We're Going to Eat You - Norman Chui (1980) - Tang Chung Ling Ancestral Hall, Lung Yeuk Tau

We saw it just a few posts ago as the location where Wang Jang Lee picks up his kill contracts in another of Seasonal's films, Drunken Master. In We're Going to Eat you the place plays a rather more significant role as the location of, not only, the village meetings (where the food is divided up between the ever-hungry inhabitants), but also the location for the slaughterhouse scenes and the alleyway connecting the front gate entrance (Lo Wai) to the slaughterhouse area.

The area used for the slaughterhouse is actually a walled courtyard on the east side of the hall. You can see the outside of it on GoogleEarth here. Being a Tsui Hark film, we get a plethora of weird angles from low to high, so I've just included the more conventional views in the screen caps below.

The alleyway connecting the entrance to the courtyard is indeed an alleyway connecting this courtyard to the front of the hall. It's formed by the main hall structure and a couple of lower side blocks (one of which can be see in the courtyard grabs above). Remember, in the film the front entrance was actually shot over at Lo Wai (literally a minute's walk away).

And lastly we can see the main courtyard inside the hall where all the meetings take a place and is also the same location where the finale was shot as the remaining survivors set off fireworks as they rollerskate around avoiding the horde. This area is the one that is usually open to visit as part of the heritage trail.