Tang How-yuen is a disciple of kung fu master San-thye. San-thye wins a martial arts tournament, only to be killed by evil kung fu master, Master Li. Tang tries unsuccessfully to fight Chung, and leaves the evil master unharmed. Tang, along with San-thye's wife and daughter head after the killer to seek revenge. When they find him, Chung has repented and has cut off his own leg as penance. The master's widow becomes ill, so Tang goes to work for a gang in order to get her medicine. However, whilst in their employ, he is blamed for the death of a young boy, and San-Thye's widow is poisoned. Tang and the one-legged master join forces to defeat the evil lord who poisoned San-thye's widow.
Like Chan's Spiritual Kung Fu, Dragon Fist was filmed in South Korea in early 1978 but was unable to be released or produced because the studio went bankrupt and was running out of money. As a result, both Lo Wei productions only had cost-cutting measures after Chan returned from his loan deal with Seasonal Films, where he made Snake in the Eagle's Shadow and Drunken Master alongside director Yuen Woo-ping. During the production, Chan reportedly had his nose broken repeatedly, joking "Do you think I was born with this nose?" Unlike most of Jackie Chan's early films, Dragon Fist had a more serious tone, with little in the way of comedic moments.
Soundtrack
Like many other Hong Kong kung fu films, the film was scored with various musical cues from American films, mainly Jerry Goldsmith's 1966 score for The Sand Pebbles.
DVD releases
On 15 February 2001, Seven 7 released the French language theatrical version entitled Le Poing De La Vengeance, with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1. It contains no other language options.
On 22 October 2001, Eastern Heroes released the film in the UK, uncut. However, it's poorly cropped from 2.35:1 into 1.78:1 and only contains an English dub.
On 4 June 2002, Columbia Tri-Star released the film in the US, in Full Frame with English and Cantonese language options. However, it contains a heavily edited version produced by Aquarius Releasing and is dubtitled.
On 24 February 2006, Universal Japan released the film in Japan, in 2.35:1 and with a Cantonese soundtrack. This version was the first completely uncut release on DVD, however, it does not feature any English subtitles.
On 11 June 2007, Hong Kong Legends released the film in the UK, in 2.35:1 and uncut in Cantonese language with newly translated English subtitles.
In 2018, UK company 88 Films released the film on blu-ray. It contains the original Mandarin, Cantonese, and English language tracks in mono and in a newly remastered 5.1 DTS-HD MA format. The blu-ray also contains subtitles for each track option. It is uncut and remastered in genuine HD.
Box office
The film grossed 1,004,000 at the Hong Kong box office in 1979. In South Korea, the film sold 103,261 tickets in Seoul City.
