Ip Man 4: The Finale

“

Strangers in a strange land.

”

Ip Man 4: The Finale

Synopsis

Ip Man encounters racial discrimination after traveling to the United States to seek a better life.

General Information

Directed By

Wilson Yip

Produced By

Raymond WongWilson YipDonnie Yen

Written By

Edmond WongChan Tai-leeJil Leung

Starring

Donnie YenWu YueVanness WuScott AdkinsKent ChengDanny ChanNgo Ka-nin

Music By

Kenji Kawai

Cinematography

Cheng Siu-Keung

Distributed By

Well Go USA

Release Information

Release Date

December 20, 2019

Running Time

105 minutes

Country

Hong KongChina

Budget

US $52 million

Language

CantoneseMandarinEnglish Film Chronology

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Ip Man 3 Master Z: Ip Man Legacy	Ip Man 5

Ip Man 4: The Finale(Simplified Chinese: 叶问4: 完结篇, Traditional Chinese: 葉問4: 完結篇) is a 2019 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film and is the fourth and final film installment of the Ip Man series.

Contents

• 1 Summary
• 2 Extended Plot
• 3 Credits
• 4 Trivia
• 5 Featured Music
• 6 = Promotional Photos
  • 6.1 Videos
  • 6.2 References

Summary[]

Ip Man travels to San Francisco to find a new school for his son, who had just gotten expelled from his school in Hong Kong. When he attempts to get a recommendation letter from the Chinese Benevolent Association (required for Chinese immigrants to attend American schools), he finds that the martial arts masters on its board are furious with one of Ip Man's former students who teaches Kung Fu to Americans. Meanwhile, discrimination against Chinese heightens tensions as Ip Man must also stand up for his fellow countrymen.

Extended Plot[]

In 1964, following the death of his wife, Ip Man discovers he has throat cancer due to chronic smoking. After his rebellious son Ip Ching is expelled for fighting a school bully, Ip Man decides to travel to San Francisco to seek other scholastic opportunities for his son. He entrusts Ching to his friend, Fat Bo, and promises to call Ching every night.

Ip's former student, Bruce Lee, has upset the local martial arts community in San Francisco by opening a Wing Chun school and teaching non-Chinese people martial arts, and writing an English-language book on martial arts. He discovers from his friend Liang Gen that because Ip is a foreigner, a referral letter from the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association promising to guarantee the tuition is needed to enroll Ching into an American school. Grandmaster Wan Zhong-hua, the Association's president, refuses to write the letter, as Ip is unbothered by Lee's actions, whereas the other grandmasters display open contempt. After a brief confrontation with Wan, resulting in a broken tabletop, Ip leaves.

While leaving the school after a meeting with the principal, Ip chances upon Wan's teenage daughter, Yonah, suffering a racially motivated attack by a rival cheerleader, Becky, and her male friends. Yonah fights back which results in Becky accidentally cutting herself with a pair of scissors. She is ultimately outnumbered, and Ip steps in to rescue her. He escorts Yonah home, where Wan accuses Ip of using his daughter to get a referral letter and challenges him to a fight for it. The duel is interrupted by an earthquake, and Wan tells Ip they will finish their fight at the upcoming Mid-Autumn Festival. Ip refuses, explaining that he merely accompanied Yonah home for her own safety, and leaves.

Becky lies to her parents, claiming that she had been attacked by Yonah. Her father, Andrew Walters, is an officer of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and is pressured by his wife into holding the Association responsible and deporting all illegal immigrants associated with them. Meanwhile, SSgt Hartman (USMC), a student of Lee's, attempts to convince GySgt Barton Geddes to incorporate Chinese martial arts into their hand-to-hand combat training. Geddes, an open racist, goads Hartman into fighting the base's Karate instructor, Colin Frater, in a public bout, to humiliate Hartman and prove the Marine's current program superior; Frater easily defeats him. However, Hartman later manages to convince the base's commanding general of kung fu's potential and is instructed to film the Mid-Autumn Festival in Chinatown for research purposes, infuriating Geddes.

Geddes instructs Frater to challenge the grandmasters at the Festival, in order to publicly disgrace kung fu. Frater proves his strength by defeating and badly battering three grandmasters, until Ip intervenes and hospitalizes him. Meanwhile, Wan, who was supposed to be at the festival, is arrested by the INS. Upon seeing Frater in the hospital, Geddes barges into the Association headquarters to find and challenge Wan. Revealing his own martial arts prowess, he brutally defeats all the remaining grandmasters. He then threatens Walters to release Wan into the Marines' custody before bringing him onto the base for a fight. Due to a tip-off by Billy, a subordinate of Walters' and a student of Lee's, Ip and Liang Gen help members of the Association evade the INS raid. Lee provides refuge for the Association, earning their respect.

Wan and Geddes fight at the Marines' camp. At first, Wan holds his own, but is eventually overwhelmed and seriously injured. An emotional Ip reveals to Bo that he has cancer, which finally compels Ching to talk to his father over the phone, after repeatedly refusing to take his daily calls. Ip is brought into the Marines' camp by Hartman, and ultimately defeats Geddes after a long and savage battle.

Wan prepares the referral letter for Ip, who no longer needs it; he does not intend to move to San Francisco, due to the flagrant racism and social ostracism that makes life so difficult for Chinese Americans. Ip returns to Hong Kong and reconciles with his son. A weary but determined Ip instructs his son to film him as he demonstrates Wing Chun on a wooden dummy.

An epilogue shows Lee paying respect to Ip at his funeral. Onscreen text states that Ip succumbed to his cancer in 1972 at the age of 79, and that the Marines officially incorporated Chinese kung fu into their training by inviting Chinese martial artists to train them in 2001.

Credits[]

• Donnie Yen as Ip Man
• Scott Adkins as Barton Geddes
• Wu Yue as Wan Zonghua
• Vanness Wu as Hartman Wu
• Kent Cheng as Fat Bo
• Danny Chan as Bruce Lee
• Simon Shiyamba as Billy
• Ngo Ka-nin as Liang Gen
• Chris Collins as Colin Frater
• Vanda Margraf as Yonah Wan
• Jim Liu as Ip Ching
• Louis Ting as Lao Ting
• Lo Mang as Law Chun-ting
• Grace Englert as Becky Walters
• Andrew Lane as Andrew Walters
• Nicola Stuard Hill as Gabrielle Walters
• Linda Jean Barry as School Principal
• Mark Strange as Karate Champion
• Dbo Funds as Rapper

Trivia[]

Featured Music[]

= Promotional Photos[]

Videos[]

References[]

Ip Man films
Canon	Ip Man · Ip Man 2 · Ip Man 3 · Ip Man 4: The Finale · Ip Man 5
Spin-off	Master Z: Ip Man Legacy · Master Z Part 2