"Don't tell me how good your skills are, how brilliant your master is and how profound your school is. Kung fu - two words - one horizontal, one vertical. If you're wrong, you'll be left lying down. If you're right, you're left standing. And only the ones who are standing have the right to talk."

For all intents and purposes, the film began as a biopic of one man – to be more specific, Ip Man, the influential kung-fu master who was instrumental in spreading the Wing Chun style around the world and who was perhaps better known for being Bruce Lee's master. But in the midst of exploring Ip Man's life, Wong must have been suddenly struck by the thought - What exactly makes Ip Man so special? Or even better, why should a movie set in the golden age of martial arts be solely about one grandmaster?

And so, despite Leung's omniscient voice-over, 'The Grandmaster' is in fact not about Ip Man alone. Be warned therefore, if you are expecting a movie focused on Ip Man, because you're likely to be sorely disappointed – as Tony Leung reportedly is – that you're likely to know more about the Man from the Donnie Yen films.

Indeed, the narrative is the film's biggest handicap, though to be fair, it only becomes apparent later on. The first half-hour begins strongly with a rightful focus on Ip, and key highlights include his initiation into martial arts by his master Chen Heshun (Yuen Woo-Ping) and his loving marriage to Zhang Yongcheng (Song Hye-kyo). Ip's first challenge would come with the arrival of Gong Yutian (Wang Qingxiang),a venerable kung fu master from northeastern China looking to consolidate his power in the southeast even as he retires.

After Ip goes on to win the battle of minds with Gong, the latter's daughter Gong Er (Zhang Ziyi) stands up to challenge Ip yet again in a bid to restore her family's reputation. That duel also marks a turning point for the movie, which shifts away from Ip and explores the vendetta that ensues between Gong Er and her father's power-hungry protégé Ma San (Zhang Jin) against the backdrop of the Japanese occupation of China.

Against the better advice of her elders, she forsakes her betrothal to avenge the death of her father at Ma San's hands, which culminates in a thrilling battle set at an old railway station in Hong Kong one New Year's Eve. Where is Ip Man's involvement in all this? Admittedly there is little.

Though Wong does bring Ip back into the picture towards the end of the film, his audience is likely to have grown too emotionally detached from the character. A scene towards the end that portrays supposedly the last time Ip met Gong Er is infused with the director's signature sense of longing and regret as the latter reveals her feelings for the former, but how that bears relevance to what Wong is trying to say about Ip or Gong Er's tumultuous lives is too obscure.

In fact, throughout the film, Wong offers little insight into the person of Ip Man. What might have been a meaningful portrait of his relationship with Yongcheng is lost when the latter is practically forgotten in the second half of the movie. We learn little too of Ip's relocation to Hong Kong, and how he built up his reputable school for Wing Chun. All things considered, a more coherent portrait of Gong Er actually emerges from the movie.

Rather than regard it as a Ip Man biopic therefore you'll be better off seeing it as Wong's philosophical musings on martial artists. Fans of the auteur will recognise these familiar themes from his previous works, but Wong's treatment is still unparalleled in conveying regret, longing, and unspoken desires – whether is it Ip Man and Gong Er's mutual affection for each other, or Gong Er's lament for a life less fully lived.

Le Sourd's visuals are also particularly ravishing in the action sequences, designed with much imagination and flair by veteran choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping. The opening sequence that sees Ip Man take on a whole gang of men along a rain-soaked street is filmed with utmost clarity on the beauty and precision of the moves, with the subsequent duels between Ip Man and Gong Yutian as well as Gong Er equally breathtaking to behold.

Keenly aware of the actors' limitations, Yuen goes for elegance over spectacle. Nonetheless, both Tony Leung and Zhang Ziyi also perform impressively given their lack of a martial arts background, the months of training to get them prepared physically for their respective roles paying off in the grace and confidence by which they execute their moves.

Nonetheless, Zhang easily trounces Leung in the film's dramatic scenes, the former's combination of grit and vulnerability making Gong Er a more compelling figure than Ip Man. The fault of course isn't Leung's alone, as his usual penchant for nuance and understatement unfortunately working against his portrayal in a narrative that pretty much relegates his character's account as a marker of the passage of time.

Of course, narrative was never a strong suite in Wong's films, which typically were mood pieces boosted by his signature artistic flourishes. These trademarks are still very much alive in 'The Grandmaster', which is easily one of the most beautiful kung fu movies ever made. But plot plays a much more important role here than in Wong's other films, since it is ultimately through Ip Man's experiences in life that we come to understand his deeper introspections. This is where Wong's film stumbles, relegating Ip Man to a sideshow instead of placing him front and centre – and given all that hype and expectation of Wong's Ip Man biopic, the cut we see here can only be regarded as a disappointment.

THE GRANDMASTER is an arthouse retelling of the Ip Man story, here directed by Wong Kar Wai, the man who is loved by critics but who always fails to impress me. As far as I'm concerned, the excellent Donnie Yen trilogy has already portrayed the life and career of the martial arts expert in the best way possible, and THE GRANDMASTER can't hope to compete. It doesn't. It's a film shot through with the director's usual stylings, emphasising visual beauty and careful photography throughout, but messing up the telling of Ip Man's life story in the process. It seems oddly low budget throughout, skipping over huge chunks of history and focusing instead on character rivalries and philosophy. The fight scenes, which should be electrifying with Yuen Woo Ping behind them, are sloppily and shot too close up, leaving them confusing more than anything. The CGI effects are remarkably poor, like the silly fight next to the speeding train. An ageing Ziyi Zhang also fails to raise any interest. The boring, drawn-out dialogue scenes are what really drag this one down.

It's 1936 Foshan, Southern China. Ip Man (Tony Leung) is a master of Wing Chun and the hope of the South. He catches the eye of the Grandmaster of the North Gong Yutian who makes Ma San his successor. However the hot-headed Ma San is sent home back north. Gong Yutian takes on Ip Man and loses in a philosophical battle. His daughter Gong Er (Zhang Ziyi) challenges Ip Man to regain the family honor. In the fight, he saves her from a fall and she wins. During the war, the Japanese invade Foshan. Ip Man loses two daughters and his fortune while refusing to collaborate. In 1950, Ip Man moves to Hong Kong struggling to provide for his family back home. However the border to China is closed and he would never see his family again. He finds Gong Er practicing as a doctor in Hong Kong. She had taken a vow to never marry, have children or teach martial arts to avenge her father by killing Ma San who collaborated with the Japanese and killed her father.

The movie looks beautiful. I don't like every slow motion scenes especially the pedestrian scenes. Director Kar Wai Wong seems intend on overstylizing the movie for the sake of style. Much of it is completely unnecessary. On the other hand, the fights are almost always a thing of beauty. The story of Ip Man is cumbersome and lacks passion. Tony Leung is way too cool and it's hard to penetrate the cool outer exterior.