Yuen Woo-ping

Yuen Woo-ping is one of those rare artists whose fingerprints are all over cinema without most casual viewers ever knowing his name — and honestly, that's kind of beautiful. Growing up in a martial arts family (his father Yuen Siu-tien was a legendary performer himself), he absorbed the craft from childhood and eventually became the guy Hollywood called when they needed fight choreography that felt genuinely impossible. The Matrix's bullet-dodging, wire-fu sequences? That's him. Kill Bill's sword battles? Him again. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon's gravity-defying poetry? You guessed it. What gets me is how he brings a choreographer's musicality to action — every punch and kick has rhythm and intention, not just impact. He's been doing this since the 1970s Hong Kong cinema golden era, and somehow never lost his edge across decades and continents.

Name (English)

Yuen Woo-ping

Name (Japanese)

ユエン・ウーピン

Reading

ゆえん・うーぴん

Born

January 1, 1945 (age 81)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Capricorn / Rooster

Origin

Guangzhou, People's Republic of China

Occupation

film director / choreographer / actor / screenwriter / film actor

Awards & achievements

• American Choreography Awards

Motto

Private

• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%A6%E3%82%A8%E3%83%B3%E3%83%BB%E3%82%A6%E3%83%BC%E3%83%94%E3%83%B3

Tags

• film director
• choreographer
• actor

Last updated

2026-06-02

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.