Little Tiger of Canton

Cub Tiger From Kwang Tung
UK DVD Artwork
Directed by	Chu Mu
Produced by	Lee Long Koon
Written by	Lau Suen
Starring	Jackie Chan Chan Hung Lit Tien Feng
Music by	Frankie Chan
Cinematography	Ng Fat Sam Wong Kwok Nam Cheung Chi Keung
Editing by	Hamilton Yu
Studio	Soon Lee Films Co.
Distributed by	Showbox Home Entertainment (UK)
Release date(s)	1973 (Hong Kong) 2007 (DVD)
Running time	95 minutes
Country	Hong Kong
Language	Mandarin

Cub Tiger From Kwang Tung (simplified Chinese: 广东小老虎; traditional Chinese: 廣東小老虎; pinyin: Guǎngdōng xiǎo lǎohǔ) is a 1973 Hong Kong martial arts action film directed by Chu Mu and starring Jackie Chan. Chan was 17 when the film was made in 1971, and it is considered to be his first starring role.

Background

Cub Tiger From Kwang Tung was filmed in Hong Kong in 1971, but only saw a limited cinema release two years later. The small independent release was shelved after its brief run and never received an international release. In the late 1979, in the wake of Chan's success in Snake in the Eagle's Shadow and Drunken Master (both 1978), the film re-emerged at Hong Kong cinemas, in a poorly re-edited version with some newer footage of Dean Shek and Yuen Siu Tien spliced in, along with a rather obvious Jackie Chan double.^[1]

The amalgamated footage was sold to US film producer Dick Randall, who dubbed and repackaged it, and gave it an alternative title, Master with Cracked Fingers. The rights were subsequently sold to 21st Century Distribution who gave this version of the film a brief run in US cinemas in 1981, under the title Snake Fist Fighter.^[2]

Since Chan became more popular in the West, particularly after the US release of Rumble in the Bronx (1996), the concoted film has seen large number of VHS and DVD releases from a wide variety of film distributors in the US and UK.

The original film, Cub Tiger From Kwang Tung was finally given an international DVD release for the first time in 2007. It was released in the UK (region 2) on Showbox Home Entertainment's Rarescope label. This is the complete original 95 minute film, as it was released in Hong Kong in 1973, without edits and additions. It contains the original Mandarin soundtrack and imbedded English/Chinese subtitles. Due to the poor quality of the print, some of the subtitles are chopped from the foot of the screen, so the dvd contains an additional set of subtitles which appear whenever the originals are cropped or missing.

Plot

Ah Lung (Jackie Chan) has been secretly training in martial arts, as his father (Tien Feng) has forbidden him. Later, some local store owners ask Ah to help protect them from a greedy Chinese extortion ring. Ah discovers that the crime lord behind the extortion had killed his father years before and is determined for revenge.

Cast

Cast	Role
Jackie Chan	Ah Lung / Jackie (as Chan Yuan Lung)
Chan Hung Lit	Chow Bin
Tien Feng	Lung's Foster Father
Yuen Biao	Pickpocket (as Bill Yuen)
Chun Chin	Uncle Xia
Chi Ming Wong	cameo
Mars	(as Fo Sing)

See also

• Master with Cracked Fingers
• Jackie Chan filmography

References

1. ^ "HKMDB listing". The Cub Tiger from Kwangtung (1973). http://hkmdb.com/db/movies/view.mhtml?id=9246&display_set=eng. Retrieved 2009-01-26. 
2. ^ "Hong Kong Digital". Master with Cracked Fingers. http://www.dighkmovies.com/v1/15/15.html. Retrieved 2009-02-05. 

External links

• Little Tiger of Canton at the Internet Movie Database
• Little Tiger of Canton at AllRovi