Stephen Chow's 2004 wuxia gangster comedy film Kung Fu Hustle 功夫 was on TV yesterday. The cartoonish film was an all-time tenth-highest-grossing foreign language film in the United States and why not; it's a ridiculously funny movie with great stunts. Stephen Chow, the movie's director also plays the lead role, Sing who aspires to join the Axe Gang. When a boy, Sing practised the legendary Buddhist Palm with the help of a manual which he bought from a beggar but it didn't work. When he tried to protect a mute girl from bullies, he got beaten and was pissed on literally. When I first watched the movie when it was released in the theater, I didn't notice the manual which falls down with him in this scene. The cover of the manual has the image of Buddha. Some other kung fu movies which I've seen, I remember, have fighting scenes in temples and the actors would be jumping up and down and all over a Buddha statue sometimes. Buddhists don't get all worked up over such scenes, do they?
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