After watching this film, audiences in the 1970's cannot have been in any doubt that Fu Sheng was a star. 'New Shaolin Boxers' was his first opportunity to carry a film on his own and he does it brilliantly. Here he delivers everything you would want from the leading man in a kung fu film - he's handsome, charismatic, endearingly naive and carries himself with enough cocky swagger to give him an 'edge'. He excels in the films many action sequences too, Fu really attacks the fights with conviction and energy. Choi Li Fut is the style of choice in the film, which Fu ably shows at the beginning with a demonstration of some of the forms along with a short history on the style. The Choi Li Fut is only really used at the end of the film after the obligatory training sequences. Chang Cheh adds something a little different to the final bout by intercutting the training scenes with the fight to show how the style is taken from practice to proper use. This technique works really well and manages to stay the cool side of gimmicky.

The story feels fairly slight and it's a touch episodic but the way the townspeople react to Jian's 'heroics' gives the film a nice twist. They don't see him as the hero but rather as a nuisance. This makes the audience even more keen to root for him and leads to an interesting Buddhist message at the end.

As mentioned before, Fu Sheng gives an excellent performance and is ably supported by the rest of the cast, most notably by Leung Kar Yan (or maybe it was notable because Leung is one of this reviewer's favourite actors). He shows more of his range as the snivelling little henchman for Wang Lung Wei who is in fact one of the weaker elements of the film. Wang is terrific in the fight scenes, of course, but lacks any depth to his character and comes off looking quite lightweight when compared to Fu Sheng's character.

This is a very slight criticism in a splendid, fight packed romp that is a must for any fan of Fu Sheng. In fact it's probably a must for any fan of kung fu films.

Jian lives with his uncle in a small tenement building, although the neighbors aren't keen on his wild cocky ways. Even his Kung Fu teacher refuses to teach him for messing around with street gangs.

For the next couple of days the street gang, lead by Feng Tian-Shan (Wang Lung-Wei) go to regain face by destroying all the street carriages looking for Jian. Eventually they find him and manages to put up a decent fight against most of the gang. When Jian is confronted by Feng, he does attempt fight Feng, but it suddenly shows that he's no match for this Gang leader, he's only just saved from his Kung Fu teacher.

The teacher admits he can't beat Feng, but he thinks there is hope Jian. He leads Jian up to a small remote area in the mountains where a Shaolin Monk lives. The monk agrees to teach Jian the style of 'Choy Li Fut'.

At first Jian is only being taught how to carry two buckets of water for ten miles to be only told to do it again. As you can expect Jian doesn't stay long and return back to his home town. But he only returns to find out that his teacher has been brutally murdered by Feng. Jian looses his temper and returns to the mountains to complete his training and seek revenge against Feng Tian-Shan!

Review: Isn't this movie just the stereotype Kung Fu Revenge Flick! Guy fights gang, gang wins, guy learns kung fu and guy kicks Gangs Ass. But I must say I did really enjoy it, but there is one thing that really ruined the movie. The Music, the music in the movie is just stupid, really annoying and out of place.

The actress playing the leading lady in the movie is a right cow too! Sure the gang raped her, but your just plain annoying!

The action is great, Fu Sheng can still bust-a-move, as well as Leung Kar-Yan and the deadly moustache wearing Wang Lung-Wei, looking identical to his character in Fast Fingers.

Final Thoughts good film, great action, good action, crap music!

Rating: 6.6 out of 10.0