MovieChat Forums > Jui kuen (1978) Discussion > Who invented "drunken boxing"?

Who invented "drunken boxing"?


Is it an existing, "real" fighting style, or is it made up just for this film (and its sequels)?
If so, is it Jackie Chan who came up with the concept of it all, the moves, stances, the nine drunken gods and all?
There are characters in fighting games (Tekken 3 and DOA, maybe more?) that use "drunken style", which might be a proof of it being an actual "real" fighting style, but on the other hand it may as well be taken as a proof of Drunken Master's (the movie's) cult status.
I mean, they do take a lot of liberties when making Kung Fu movies, pulling stunts and stuff that would never be humanly possible (or effective in combat) when attempted real life - so it's not impossible entire "styles", like drunken style, is made up... but does anyone know for sure?

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Wu shu is a weak Style.
Hung Gar is more bettter.
I beat the Best Wu Shu Student is Victoria by using Hung Gar

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You're shaming both yourself and fellow practicioners of Hung Gar by talking trash about other styles. If you cannot practice the principles of tolerance and respect, you have no business learning kung fu IMO.

In any case, drunken boxing IS a real style and there are plenty of good sources of information available using google.

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How do you know which ones are the good sources on Google? Seems to me to be a lot of crap on the net.

Anyway, in my opinion, drunken boxing is a real style originating from wudang. Or rather the eight drunken gods did. When I went there, I learnt a little °ËÏɹ÷, eight immortal staff and which contained a small drunken sample, with a staff! From what I saw though, Chinese people were very good at impersonating drunken people, I guess it comes from a lack of experince.

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Exaxtly.

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It comes from a bottle just drink. I saw a anime called Naruto and in that anime there is a caracter called Rock Lee he is a good fighter and he is also called the natural drunken master he did have to learn the 8 dronken gods. He just had to drink from a bottle. But about the real thing i saw a intervieuw on TV and Jackie said that he just made up all the moves for the 8 drunken gods.

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Yes, Zuijiuquan (Lit. Drunk[en] Fist) is a real style, and a very old one at that. There is a ton of information about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunken_Fist . It is translated into Japanese as Suiken (Sui meaning drunk, ken meaningfist. Jiu is added in the Chinese word to be more specific. You can begin to see how Chinese translates to Japanese), though I'm not sure if any other changes were made. A few theories about the origins are in the wikipedia article, but I'll post it here anyway:
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// Origins

The style is ancient, so much so that its conception is shrouded in myth. According to legend, it originated with the poet Li Po in the Tang Dynasty, but there are two other stories of its beginnings.

The first is that Shaolin monasteries had tournaments between each other; one year, a master spoke to his pupils. He said that should they win that year, they would celebrate for six months. When the competition came, they won, and, true to his word, the master began the celebrations. However, the other monasteries sought revenge, and when they came to the monastery of the celebrating monks, the monks were so drunk that it seemed that they would be unable to defend their home. The master still managed to defeat the vengeful monks, and thus was created 'The Drunkard's Fist'.

The other story is that an unnamed hermit (his drinking habits are unmentioned) lived alone in a cave in the Wudang Mountains, well placed to learn styles from which to create his own. When he became old, he soon felt that he needed to transmit his art so that it may continue. He began teaching a child, his only disciple. However, realising that he would not be able to teach the whole style to the student before his own death, he taught him a poem in which the precepts of his style were contained. He then told the student to study the paintings upon the cave walls, so that he may know the style. After the master's death, when the student attempted to read the paintings, he found that he couldn't understand the paintings and, disheartened, he decided to leave. Before he did so, he got drunk and returned to the cave. When he gazed at the paintings, he found that they began to move, and he discovered the workings of the style. //
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I suggest actually visiting the article though, because if you don't know who/ what/where some of these things are/is you can click on them and go to their own article.

Although Zuijiuquan is considered one of the most difficult of the wushu, I'm sure you could find a school solely dedicated to that style. Especially if you just want to learn that and don't want to go through other styles.

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//Wu shu is a weak Style. //
-lam0002
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"Wushu" is simply the Chinese word for "Martial Art". In any case, it's likely your opponent was weak, not their style.

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As far as I've heard the "drunken"-styles were invented by various martial artists who observed drunkards fight in bars and similar. They found that a drunk is practically impossible to read and tried to implement that into their own fighting. As usual the style didn't just appear but took a long time to develop and there is probably no official drunken boxing-style. It's practically Chinese boxing/Gung fu while moving like a drunkard or actually being drunk. I'm sure there are schools that teach Drunken boxing but I think the main idea is just to use as unpredictable movements as possible. Confusing the opponent is the goal as far as I've understood.

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drunken isn't really a style as it is a variation. drunken mnkey was a very common style. and obviously drunken "boxing"

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[deleted]

This is a suprising difficult question. My Bushidokan instructor swears that Chan invented the style for his film, but I've seen it listed as traditional WuShu/KungFu on various sites, including wiki as mentioned. The problem being, none of the sites I've seen it on are "professional," so I tend to be hesitant about assuming them as truthful. Indeed, as the films discuss much of the alleged history of DrunkenBoxing, the sites could simply be quoting from film.

On another note, I did see DrunkenBoxing presented in a Kung Fu demo film that also featured a very young Jet Li. Given that Li won competions as early as 1974 it could be assumed that the form preceded the movies. However, as the film was a collection from various competitions and live demos, I cannot logically assume that they were all from the same time period, so, as you can see, this is a very vexing problem.

Anyone want to comment.

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Jackie Chan might have invented that particular style but he definetly did not invent drunken boxing. Jacki chan is flexible as hell and creates lots of new moves and styles in order to make it look good on the screen. He did create that choreography but he did definetly not create drunken boxing.

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[deleted]

Here is a funny drunken boxing web site.

http://www.geocities.com/pete_stubbs/boxing/boxing.html

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I dont have the exact link to this movie but if u go to kontraband.com
search thru the movies (not home videos) section until u can hover the mouse over one that says somethign about drunken boxing.
Very cool to watch this young student pull off his drunkenness


"You're a smeeeeee-hhheeeee!" - Kryten (Red Dwarf)

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"Wushu is a weak Style.
Hung Gar is more bettter.
I beat the Best Wu Shu Student is Victoria by using Hung Gar"

Don't be stupid. It all depends on who the practitioner is, not on the style.

And from what I've read on drunken boxing, they have traditional and modern. Modern is more acrobatic and flashy, and traditional is more combat-involved. I don't know many (if any) Drunken Boxing fighters, so I assume that it's rare for a person to know some, or have mastered it!
If someone knows a website which teaches a few moves in drunken boxing, it would be nice if they showed it here. I'd never find any form of Drunken Boxing where I live!

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And from what I've read on drunken boxing, they have traditional and modern. Modern is more acrobatic and flashy, and traditional is more combat-involved.


The reality is that it's more of a training form, than an actual fighting form, but that's not to say that it isn't used as one. It teaches the fighter how to move with unpredictability, how to react to it, and how to blend it with the other forms.

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[deleted]

There are Irish who might contradict you.

I think there is a sullen suspicion that drunks get away with being injured in, say, motor accidents because they are 'loosey-goosey' & their bodies survive getting knocked around (how many reports have there been of THE DRUNK surviving a head-on!).

Recently I have seen on the internet some amazing Russian carcam videos of pedestrians bouncing off vehicles as if they were made of India rubber and surviving - the result no doubt of the subtle fortification from vodka.

So, the Russians might also contradict you.




You know, you're almost likeable in a shabby sort of way.



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