Production
Prior to Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, Chan had worked for director Lo Wei who wanted to make him into the new "Bruce Lee" in films like New Fist of Fury. However, those films yielded relatively poor box office returns. When producer Ng See-yuen decided to make a comedy with Chan as the star, the concept did not initially meet with approval from the film distributors. However, Ng and Chan persevered and together with Drunken Master, this film launched Jackie Chan into national stardom.
The combination of comedy, martial arts, stunts and acrobatics had been done before, in Lau Kar-leung's 1975 film, Spiritual Boxer. However, the release of Snake in the Eagle's Shadow heralded a new direction for Hong Kong action movies.
Ng See-Yuen and Yuen Woo-ping checked over many actors for the part of the old, eccentric, wandering Kung Fu master, before Ng suggested casting Yuen's own father, Yuen Siu Tien. Yuen would continue to reprise the role of Beggar So several more times before his death in 1979.
Read more about this topic: Snake In The Eagle's Shadow
Famous quotes containing the word production:
“... if the production of any commodity necessitates the sacrifice of human life, society should do without that commodity, but it can not do without that life.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“Just as modern mass production requires the standardization of commodities, so the social process requires standardization of man, and this standardization is called equality.”
—Erich Fromm (1900–1980)
“... this dream that men shall cease to waste strength in competition and shall come to pool their powers of production is coming to pass all over the earth.”
—Jane Addams (1860–1935)