Berlin 2013: 'The Grandmaster' Shortened by 15 Minutes for International Release

BERLIN –Wong Kar-wai has just finished the international version of The Grandmaster, with the auteur trimming 15 more minutes off the cut released in China last month.

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The latest version, which will be shown to a selected group of European journalists in Paris before making its bow as the curtain-raiser of the Berlin Film Festival on Feb. 7, represents a further condensation of a film of which the first cut ran to four hours.

Wong eventually edited the film to 130 minutes for its Jan. 8 release in China, where it has since generated healthy box office earnings of US$45 million. The director has hinted in interviews last month that the longer version will be released later as a director’s cut.

Revolving around a fictionalized account of the early years of real-life Wing Chun martial arts expert (and Bruce Lee’s mentor) Ip Man (played by Tony Leung Chiu-wai), The Grandmaster is shown in Berlin as an out-of-competition entry, with Wong serving as the chairman of the festival jury this year.