The transcript below is from the video “Martial Artist Scott Adkins Breaks Down Fight Scenes from Movies | GQ Sports“ by GQ Sports.
Scott Adkins:
I was fighting Matt Damon, he kicked me low. He kicked me in the in the balls and I thought he was about to say I’m sorry may have kicked you in the balls I saw of both eyes to say it’s okay. And all I saw was the face of Jason Bourne peering down to me and he was frisking me. When I saw that I was like,”oh”. And I felt stupid like I was messing the film. Hey, GQ, this is Scott Adkins actor and martial artist and this is “The Breakdown”.
Scott Adkins:
First up, “Ip Man”. What are your thoughts on golf? .See he’s well up for it isn’t he? He wants to fight 10 people. Not one, not two, not three, but 10 people and you know he will and he’ll kick the [beep]out of all of them. I mean look at that.The man runs in with a jumping back kick or flying kick takes him down to the floor and straight away the stamps on his head and it looks pretty real. It’s a Hong Kong movie. So probably, he actually stamps on his head. Notice as he rolls over his arm cracks and breaks. Sickening noise. Brutal, just snaps his leg back like that. He’s not messing about. See that was the kick right there. Quick hook kick. I mean, Ip man’s not gonna be doing that, he is a wing chun guy but I just you know, it’s Donnie Yen so you gotta get a few in. Not that I snapped anyone’s leg recently but I don’t believe that it would work that way especially not at the hip. Maybe if it snaps at the knee it would’ve been a bit more believable. I enjoyed it more because it was a fake leg and it looks a little bit fake. “Ip man” is mostly about straight strikes,the wing chun it’s based on the guy that taught Bruce Lee Wing Chun. It’s considered to be a softer style and it’s very simplistic in its in its attack. Yeah, they don’t do acycle of punches. It’s all straight down the line like this. So it’s like the intercepting first blocking and hitting at the same time. Just smashes him into the ground. How brilliant is that? I tell you what,I love it when they actually get hit hard. Now it’s tough being a stunt guy, especially in Hong Kong, because you are expected just to get [tap] slammed. But he looks so damn good. It really does look great.
Scott Adkins:
Is punching him in the face for real, right? He’s just smashing him in the face. Now I don’t know about this film. But I worked with Donnie there’s a scene in another movie called “Flashpoint” where he actually punches someone in the face. That was crazy,he just punched the guy in the face and he told me that it turned out that they had a rubber fist, he will hold the rubber first it would be on a stick and they’d put the sleeve up a bit and he would just punch him with the rubber fist. So maybe they’ve done that here. I was in “Ip man 4” I played the bad guy,I have to take a few full on fists to the face for the art of filmmaking, as well. I got kicked in the face, I got punched [taps] in the face. Now there’s that line where you’re not going to go all out and try and put me in the hospital man I believe Donnie Yen wanted me to be in “Ip Man” because he knew that I was going to help him. Do what we needed to do less painfully and quicker. Because if you have to do 10,20 takes because the other guy you’re doing it with can’t get it right, that’s miserable. It’s not easy. Seemed like a good idea. When I was 12. Turns out it’s difficult.
Scott Adkins:
And also look how hard he elbows this guy. It’s one of those things in martial arts movies, especially when you’re going to fight 10 people that as a stunt performer, you’ve got to be one of those guys in the background and you have to fill space and try and look busy. But obviously you’re just waiting for your time to run in and get your face punched. It’s very difficult to choreograph anything with more than one person. It’s hard enough when it’s one on one. But you know, how do you keep these people from all just storming him one Sim? In reality, that’s what’s going to happen. One martial art that I had a little bit of experience with was Krav Maga. So we would talk we would always talk about taking on multiple opponents because that was a martial art that was all about, you know realistic scenarios and how you can deal with them. If you’re dealing with a lot of opponents, why you need to try and do is get them all in front of you somehow, that’s when you’re going to be in real trouble if anyone gets behind you. You don’t want five people coming at you at once you want to get into a position where only one or maybe two can come in here once. Not three, four or five. You can’t plan what you’re going to do. I mean, that’s the thing used to get these martial arts books where you would say Oh, if somebody tries to punch you with a straight, right you need to do this and his in there and then take him down. You don’t know what’s going to happen. So you just have to have enough experience and a call enough head to be able to react.
Scott Adkins:
No, there’s no special effects or stuntmen for Donnie. Anyone that knows anything about Donnie Yen knows that he’s up there with the likes of Jet Li,Jackie Chan. I mean he is the best. He’s an incredible martial arts performer. Not only that he’s an action director and director in his own right. And I certainly learned a lot from him. Next up “The Bourne Supremacy”, you have a car out front. The keys are in my coat pocket what we should What? Go out the back of the car. Look back at the phone. How could Jason Bourne make that mistake? Bloody hell.The Bourne films are great, and I’m a huge fan of them, and a big fan of Greengrass, but I’ve always been disappointed with the fights in the Bourne franchise because they’re so chaotic. It’s very tense, watching these fights, you know, you feel the stress of it, and maybe that’s what he’s going for bio was thought of as a missed opportunity to not actually show what’s going on because you miss so much of the techniques because it’s all this shaky cam stuff. But I would say that the martial arts is it’s close quarter fighting jeet kune do, escrima, Filipino martial art, that sort of thing. By that kick there throws the kick from the one side of the camera, and then they jump the line to the other side. So now you see the kick coming from where the other guy was stood. And that’s what confuses the audience you don’t know who threw the kick, they’re both wearing black.
Scott Adkins:
I’ve got no idea what’s going on. The fights scene I did in “The Bourne Ultimatum”, Matt Damon did every single bit of it himself. He didn’t have a stunt double, and he’s really good. And he remembers the choreography perfectly. And he was a really great screen fighter. That’s where the Bourne films are great is they’ll use different elements that are around them, like the magazine and you know, he’s got this telephone wire now and he’s using it to wrap the cord around his neck and he’s using his shin bone against his throat. That’s a legit Jiu Jitsu home. Well, I’ll tell you a funny story. On the Bourne Ultimatum I was fighting Matt Damon, you kick me low, he kicked me in the in the balls, I went down. And it was okay. It didn’t hurt too much. But it definitely stung a bit. But no one said cut. And then I could feel Matt Damon touching me like this. And I thought he was about to say I’m sorry, may have kicked him in the balls. I sort of open my eyes to say it’s okay. And all I saw was the face of Jason Bourne appearing down to me. And he was frisking me when I saw that I was like, and I felt stupid. Like I was messing the film up because it was doing its Jason Bourne thing. And I was going, “Oh”, no, don’t worry about all. But yeah, Matt Damon is a great guy, one of the nicest actors I’ve worked with.
Scott Adkins:
Next up The Karate Kid. It’s a great film. It really is. I’d say it’s one of the best martial arts films ever made, honestly. And people laugh at me when I say that. It shows martial arts off and karate in such an amazing way. It shows everything that is great about martial arts, but the fights are a little bit data too. So let’s take a look. If you’re doing the whole fight from beginning to end, you can’t go full out 100% insensitive of the whole fight because number one, you’re gonna be worried that you’re gonna forget the choreography. Gonna make a mistake, you’re gonna hit the guy, he’s gonna throw a punch, you’re gonna you’re not gonna duck. But if you just choose a section of the fight, and you’ve rehearsed it, and you know what you’re going to do, then you can go full hour 100% intensity, but I can tell that that’s not the way they did it here. When that close up shot there, you can see that he’s throwing some techniques, but you can’t actually see the techniques. Yeah, it’s kind of a wasted shot. Let’s see what the choreography is. Let’s see the technique. guy did a lot of Taekwondo tournaments back in the day. And you’d be paired up with different fighters throughout the day. And if you won your fight, you’d go through to the next round and through the next round. So in the arena, there would be all these fights taking place. So by the time you get to the semi final, everyone’s watching. And then of course, the final there, everything stops. Everyone’s watching that mat, to see who’s gonna win the final of that weight category or that belt, whatever. So that is what what it’s what it was like and what it probably still is like.
Scott Adkins:
You shouldn’t be allowed to actually punch him in the face. Yeah, normally the rules are you can kick to the body, you can punch to the body, but you can’t punch to the head. Like in kyokushin karate, you spar without pads. You can kick to the head because it’s harder to land a kick on the head, but you can’t punch them. The head, because you know, people can be covered in blood, you’re not wearing any protection, just to keep it a little bit safe. Actually, the ref. Here is a guy called Pat Johnson, legendary fight coordinator type guy. He’s not allowed to do that, because he’s trying to break his knee. That’s definitely a bad move. No, I don’t think that happens. It’d be more like, fixture fix, you wouldn’t want anyone to hear that. Because that’s not the done thing in martial arts. He knows he’s in trouble. He knows he’s losing the fight. There’s a lot riding on this. He’s got a girl that he wants to keep. He’s gonna lose the fight. So what does he do? He thinks, okay, I’m going to do the crane kick. I’m gonna bring one knee up and get these arms up like that. He’s never gonna see this coming. Let’s see what happens. He didn’t see that coming. How did you not see that coming? Let’s take another look at that. It must have just been confused. Like, why is he doing? He’s standing there. He’s trying to look like some sort of stalk. What is easy a bat? Is your bird. What’s going on? He makes a move, bang. That’s just one of those techniques. I guess you just wouldn’t say come in. I mean, once you hit strikes, that pose is obvious. He’s up to something. So what I would do is I would just back off, and let him get out of his system. And then when it goes back to normal fighting, we continue 34 years of martial arts training. I’ve never come across the crane kick. In reality, I only know from the cry kit movie.
Scott Adkins:
Yeah, it’s not gonna work in real life. Back in the mid 80s. We were lapping it up. It was great. But he had a bad knee, didn’t he? So he had no choice. I’ve got to do the crane kick. Now because I’ve only got one leg that kick has been used. I mean, I remember leotta Machida doing that kick against, I think Randy cutshaw. And he knocked him out cold and he knocked his turf out. And I’ve worked with Randy, and he didn’t see it covered. But because he wasn’t in the store position, he did it from a normal fighting stance. So you bring the one nail, they think you’re going to kick with that leg, and it’s the other leg. I think a lot of the time people think they’re gonna take the front kick to the body. And they Brace for impact. And they’re not expecting to get kicked in the head back in those days in the UFC to get a front kick to the face is quite unusual. But then Anderson Silva did it, the item and she did it. And then, you know, people were on notice that they need to look out for the front kicks of the face can certainly tell that Ralph machiko didn’t know what he’s doing with martial arts, but it’s okay because his character is learning karate. And you know, he’s not meant to be an expert at this point. But the other guy, he seems to know, but he’s, I would be surprised to learn that he hadn’t done something before that movie. Obviously, they went through some training, but he he’s the better mover, the whole thing was was Danny’s fault. He stole the guy’s girl, and then beat him up for it. Not a nice guy, really that Karate Kid.
Scott Adkins:
Next up the protector. Big fan of Tony Jaa, this is a one take fight legitimate once a fight no cuts. I know I spoke to Tony about this fight. And he told me that he thinks they did it 10 times. And he believes that it was number seven that they used. So they obviously weren’t happy with the seventh take and thought they could get it better. I guess they never did get it better. So they settled for take number seven, you can just see how fit the sky is to be able to do this whole thing in one take. It’s quite incredible. I would never have been able to have done this I wouldn’t have had the fitness I don’t think. So you can see that the tape starts now. And that they’ve put a different lens on the camera. It’s got kind of a fisheye, very wide angle lens because they want to be able to not miss any of the action. And this guy out of every guy working in the martial arts film business. This is the guy that hits people hard. And because he’s doing this as a one take, you know for sure that he’s just hitting people because you don’t want to risk making a mistake and having to do the whole thing again. So if the guy’s there in front of you just just hit him and move on to the next guy. And also this shows you the importance of having a dedicated stunting you know he’s got at least 10 1520 stunt guys that are all there to support Tony he cannot be underestimated the importance of stunts.
Scott Adkins:
So that’s a lovely Arabian no handed cartwheel off the desk there. You know, he’s just so agile. So fit. He’s putting that in at the beginning of this because he knows he’s going to be shattered by the end of it. He won’t be able to do something like that. So let’s do it at the beginning. But he learned to do these moves and jump so high. Not really. During the in the Hong Kong movies, they were using wires, he thought that you should be able to jump that high. And it just shows you what’s possible. If you have no limits in your in your mind, you can accomplish amazing things like like this guy. I mean, that’s just the guy who’s padded up and he’s smashing through the banister and landing flat on the floor is probably a padded floor. The other thing that people don’t really think about with stuff like this is how fit is the camera guy, these cameras is steadycam. It weighs quite a bit and he’s got to get all the way up the stairs. And also it’s very important to have a camera guy that understands fighting as well. He needs to think like a stunt guy.
Scott Adkins:
Sort of mean he’s just lathered that guy smashed in through the door. My tie is it’s the art of eight lenses. What it is, you’re using your fists, your feet, your knees, and your elbows, a lot of it comes from knife fighting, and that translated into fighting like this, but it is a very effective form of fighting. You see it in the UFC all the time. I can break bones with their shins, they can kick through baseball bats, it’s deadly is deadly martial. There’s a lot of breakaways set design and all that is coming into play very important. I mean, I had to set that up for 10 different tags, cleaned up and set reset and everything you want the breakaways to look real and not fake, but you don’t want them to actually be so tough that they’re gonna hurt you either. Legitimate by Kido technique there. You can see starting to get tired. Now he’s losing that explosiveness. And who can blame him? So that guy that just went off the top there? They didn’t pan down? Why didn’t they pan down? Is it because we didn’t want to see him die? Or was it because they’ve put down crash mats, probably they’ve put down some crash mats, even though the one that in the beginning, they had people building these boxes while he was doing the rest of the take ready for that guy to jump into the boxes and keep him safe.
Scott Adkins:
I mean, they’re breakaways, but they can still cut you and bruise you had a plate smashed in my face in one film, and I felt like I’ve just been punched in the face almost knocked me unconscious. I think it’s because you follow through with his fist. Okay, and you can see he’s tired now. And this guy, again the knee and this smashes into the glass the good job. You’ll notice that some of the stunt guys that get hit in the head like him smashing his head back, they’ve got bandanas on probably because they’ve got some padding underneath the bandana just to keep them safe a little bit, because the guy kicks hard. You can’t blame them. Right? You can see now though, in this bit, this technique here where he goes around, and he’s gonna, I think what he wanted to do was throw the guy over his back. But I think maybe it didn’t work as well, because he’s so tired. And maybe that’s one of the reasons why they wanted to do another tank. It still works because it’s it looks like it breaks his arm anyway, this is one of the most amazing wonders I’ve ever seen. I don’t think there is a legitimate one with no hidden cuts. That equals this. Next up Charlie’s Angels.
Scott Adkins:
Why work? This was probably early 2000s. Right? The Matrix had just happened and the y work in the matrix, it kind of works because you’re in the matrix, right? But it was all the rage. But then you get and Drew Barrymore doing some stuff that would be impossible to do without wires. So that does not happen in real life where you run up someone and do a flash kick and some sort of them. I’ve done that quite a few times in quite a few of my movies, but I wouldn’t fancy trying on a Saturday night outside the pub is not going to go my way I don’t think especially with tie jeans on. She’s using some sort of kung fu style. He was all the rage at this point, because the matrix was such a big hit. kung fu is great for a woman to do as well. It suits it’s very graceful. Yeah, it looks it looks brilliant being performed by a lady. She’s doing a lot of this stuff by yourself. I mean, she seems to be doing otherwise, you can actually jump up and do the splits over someone and then I have seen someone kick off somebody and flip over and kick someone behind them. That’s a very difficult move to do. Even for an experienced stunt man. It is possible and even to do on the wire is a good achievement. Did a pretty good job there she back kicked that guy. When you do the back kick. You really want to have your back facing as you can. Hip came out too much but the follow up kick after the back ends a nice inside crescent kick. Good low angle as well.
Scott Adkins:
That has got to be the old put the shoe on the hand technique and smack him in the face with it. That’s an old old favorite that one. And that kick in your app, when an actor gets involved and does as much as they can themselves whether you’re on a wire or not, I always respect that she could have probably said, just to have the stunt double do all of it. But she did quite a bit of this on her own. In fact, most of it, it’s still not easy. I hate being on a why that stuff hurts. She made a good account of herself. She did well. Next up undisputed to last man standing. When I got the role for this film, originally, that was thinking of someone like Dolph Lundgren, you know, the big Russian, but the director wanted me to play the part. So I put on a lot of muscle, I knew that Michael Jai White was going to be the hero, and I’m supposed to be the bad guy. And how the hell am I going to be able to intimidate this guy looking like I do now. So a lot of training went into this to become foraker. But the extra way to the extra muscle. It made it more difficult to do all the fancy kicks and everything.
Scott Adkins:
It’s funny, because what you end up doing is I know I’ve got the blood in my mouth. And I’ve got to take the first hit and the second here, but I don’t want to let the blood out of my mouth until the third so you have to hold it for the correct moment. Then let the blood fly in between the next five punches or whatever it is. I’m trying to get the gumshield to come out of my mouth. I’m trying to loosen them with my tongue so that when he hits me with the last punch, I can spit the gumshield up in the air. See, boy because an MMA guy and this was one of the first MMA films to come out. MMA is mixed martial arts and it’s basically using whatever style works. So when it first started, you had hoist Gracie, who was a jujitsu guy, and he tore through the division. He took everyone out with jujitsu and everyone was like, okay, jujitsu is the most dominant and best martial art. And for a long time, the UFC was all grappling at that point, wrestlers came in. And still to this day, it’s thought if you can control where the fight takes place, whether it takes place on the feet, or whether it takes place on the ground, if I can control that, I’m going to win the fight. So main disciplines of MMA would be boxing, Thai boxing, because we use in the elbows and knees as well. jujitsu once it goes to the ground, but a jujitsu guy, they need to get into the ground first. So if you’re a jujitsu guy that doesn’t know wrestling, you’re going to find it hard, I guess these wrestlers to get them to the ground.
Scott Adkins:
I remember that Mike and he’s a tough guy. And he’s a legitimate martial artists that back kick. That back caught him flush, but has apologized after that. He was not happy. So this is a kick that I’m most known for a lot people call it the boy kick kick. But actually, it’s called the guyver kick reason it’s called the guyver kick is it was first performed by a guy called Akira Noguchi who was the stunt man for in the guyver suits for a movie called guyver, the dark hero, and he did this kick. And he actually gave it to me on one of the movies we did before this special forces, he was the fight coordinator. So I feel I have legitimate ownership of the movie, because he gave it to me, I’m gonna watch that again one more time, just for my benefit. Forget about EULA. That is a good looking kick. That’s one of the kicks that you would group under the label of a suicide kick. For anyone that wants to do that kick, you’ve got to accept that you’ve got to land on your back. Yeah, it’s another kick, that would never work in a real situation, there’s zero power in the bit that hits him because your whole body waves move in this way. And he just flicked up without it’s just a touch. But that’s what’s good about performing this kick for the movers is I can actually try and hit the guy’s face, probably I won’t. But even if I do, it’s going to be very, very slight. So you’ve got to jump up and lean back. I’m going to go high with the first leg. And then as he comes back up is actually tougher for the other guy, the other guy is going to sell this kick as he has to duck under and come up and find the second part of the kick, react to it. You’re working as a partnership, the two of you together, it’s more like dancing than real fighting.
Scott Adkins:
That’s one of those times when you get one of the stunt men just to run into break fall of the actors. We didn’t want to land on the hard wooden floor. We prefer to land on the Bulgarian stunt guy, this movement here where I duck under his punch and I hit him in the stomach. I’m aware that the camera is behind me. And if I don’t show the technique by covering the camera with my back, that’s going to be the wrong thing to do. So, you know, I I’m under by I’m showing that make the last kick that I do on him there is a 540 they call it. So I’m actually landing on the foot that I’m kicking him with. What we should have done was just finished the film there, and boy who was the best, and he didn’t have to find chambers again and get beaten. She just left of that. No, it’s not a true depiction of an MMA fighter true MMA fight is as is a it’s very much a stylized martial arts version of what an MMA fight would be that kick the guy, the kick would not work in the cage for real, but it look great. And you know, it’s a bit of fun. Next up is rush hour, he may cut me loose. Let me go. Now, Jackie Chan is the master of using furniture and whatever elements around him in the scene, he will absolutely go to the set. And he’ll figure out exactly how he’s going to use the surroundings in the fight. And he’s brilliant at that. He’s going to use as many things inventively as he can. He directs, does his own fights, does his own stunts, he writes, the guy does everything. He’s a legend, a living legend.
Scott Adkins:
Going over on the chair, like the quintessential Jackie Chan stuff, and then fighting over this gun, and he has his whole team around and the guys that he’s fighting are members of the Jackie Chan stunt team. It’s like a dance. But it perfectly fits Jackie Chan star, which is always a comedic way of doing things. First time I ever saw Jackie Chan was in a film called the protector. And it was an American movie. And for whatever reason, they decided that they wanted him to be like Clint Eastwood. They didn’t want Jackie Chan to be Jackie Chan. I mean, he was famous for a reason was famous for the comedy slapstick stuff and the fights that he was doing. And they tried to completely change him because they didn’t think that that would work for an American audience. And I was unimpressed. When I saw it, I thought, who’s this guy trying to be Bruce Lee? And the best thing that Brett Ratner did when he brought Jackie Chan over to do the Russia movers was just say to Jackie, you take care of your fights. You do that thing. You’re amazing. Gotta just do what you do. And of course, the rest is history because America completely fell in love with Jackie Chan. And that’s Canelo one of the Jackie Chan stunt team, amazing kicker. You know, someone who knows what they’re doing, if they’ve got a gun, they’re not going to have that gun close enough for you to grab it. You need to just do whatever they say and hope that they don’t shoot you. But if he’s stupid enough to come close enough with that weapon, then there’s a lot of things you could do to disarm the gun, I guess kinda like what Al Pacino said in the Irishman. Right. You charge the gun? You run from the knife. If you’re Jackie Chan, you’ll be breakdancing around the gun. Chris Tucker, getting in on the action. Good job, Chris.
Scott Adkins:
You did the crane kick a little bit. And they I don’t know how many times they’ve done. But I’m willing to bet that they’ve probably done a few takes because the stunt man that’s about to get kicked by Chris Tucker, you can see that he puts his arm across his chest because he’s thinking I don’t want to take I don’t want to take another one of these these really hurt because he’s not holding back Chris Tucker, and look at him. And Matthew leather said sometimes actors, they have no respect for statement. And I just really enjoy picking them hard. Classically, the way it works in Hong Kong is they’ll make everything up on the day. And he’ll look around and they’ll think, okay, I can use this maybe, and maybe we can use that. But he’s got the luxury of having his whole stunt team around him like 10 or 20 people. And he and they are very good themselves. I mean, and they’ve become action directors in their own right. He will say to them, come up with some ideas. I’m going to go we’re going to go for lunch when I come back whenever he wants to give me an idea. But yeah, it cannot be underestimated. I mean, the Jackie Chan stunt team, they are the best. I got invited to Shanghai to the Jackie Chan action awards. And my film undisputed for was in competition, and I ended up winning Best fight sequence and Best Actor. And Chris Tucker was there to give me the award. That was one of the greatest days of my life to get that award from Jackie Chan. If you’re gonna get an award for fighting from anyone. You want to get it from Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker.
Scott Adkins:
Next up debt collectors. We had half a day to film this fight. Not enough time. I’m an Englishman, and this one and I’m fighting these Americans who are taking the piss out of me so I’m not too happy. I’m going to give these Americans a good kickin, because like good old King George always used to say. Again, this is fighting more than one person. It’s always hard to choreograph to that’s one of those shots where it’s nice and it holds starts off on one end. And then the camera spins to the left to reveal the other guy. And you can see his name’s Dennis. And he’s having to wait, but look like he’s kind of dealing with the last punch he got. But he’s having to wait for the right time in order to come in and be in the correct position to make the spin kick work. But if he was a little bit more to the right, he would have blocked me and he wouldn’t see the kick, but also is not too far left because the kicker look like a mess. And then we’ll have to do another take. Yeah, you wouldn’t want to improv in the moment and be like, well, I just decided to throw a hawk when I was gonna throw a straight, you know, someone’s gonna get hit. It has to be precise. If you’re going to adjust something and change the choreography for the camera, you need to forget what you previously know. And now we’re going to do the new version. And some people find it hard to forget what they’ve been practicing for. However many days if they were lucky enough to have rehearsal, so yeah, you need to be able to change it, but don’t change it without the other guy knowing. Because then somebody is gonna get out. These are veteran stunt guys. Some of them, you know, they’ll get on a bit, but that was part of the fun of the scene. They’re older guys, but they’re still going to do the fighting. It’s not easy.
Scott Adkins:
So that’s Anthony the longest he was in the original Roadhouse, and he’s seven, say, I’ve got a sidekick. And I don’t want to hurt him. Because we’re all there. We’re all trying to do a job. I need to find that sweet spot of kicking him hard enough. So that looks like I’m actually trying to hurt him. But don’t kick him too hard. Luckily, we only did one take and it was fine. I was cool, because not that I’ve bottled anyone for real? I don’t know. But I would imagine that sometimes the bottle won’t break. So it’s cool. That doesn’t break on that guy. And then it does break on the other guy’s head. I mean, he’s a mixed martial artist, this character but the flavor of this fight scene. We wanted it to be like a barroom brawl, which it is and we were inspired by something like Roadhouse or westerns back in the day with big looping punches. So yeah, I’m throwing some spin kicks in there. So he’s like a is a kickboxer with jujitsu experience. But for this particular fight, we just wanted a nice brawl.
Scott Adkins:
He took one for the team there, that was a great little stunt, a nice low angle to see all the the props and the glass come towards the camera, always try and make it as exciting and possible fill the frame with beautiful movement, I don’t see the location until the day of the shooting. So we’ll go in a gym, and we’ll choreograph the fight. But then when he gets to the location, he may well have to adjust things because you know, the table wasn’t where you thought it was going to be. So you have to be able to rearrange things if you have to was very collaborative. And for this particular film, I’m working with a guy Jesse v. Johnson, I’ve worked with many times before, I think this was our seventh film or something like that. And the reason is that it is a collaboration. So when it comes to the action, he absolutely trusts me. I just I’m so experienced with fight scenes. Now, I’ve been doing this since I was 23. It’s a great relationship with Jesse because I take care of the fights. And he helps me with the rest of it. Most of these clips that we have watched and stuff and that would never happen. But when we have fights in the films, it’s good to make it more exciting. Jackie Chan does his thing. It’s kind of slapstick II with the comedy, it’s great for him. The Bourne stuff is actually probably the most realistic of all of it. It’s a shame we couldn’t see it properly. And you know, even in my film, the debt collectors, it’s pretty simple stuff. barroom brawl, you probably not going to throw a spin kick in there. But you know we did that because we just want to make it a little bit more entertaining for the audience. Okay, thanks for watching these clips with me. I had a great time and I’ll see you again.