Flying Ninjas Hidden Dumplings: Ninjai and Kill Bill

This is pretty old topic, but it's still interesting.

"Seeing Double"- from Martial Arts Magazine

Many of us martial artists seek out jobs in the movie industry, especially as stunt doubles. But Satya Bellord, martial arts double for Uma Thurman in the movie Kill Bill, was in a much more enviable position. Kill Bill’s action director, the legendary Yuen Wo Ping, and director Quentin Tarantino sought her out.

Black Belt: What’s the difference between a martial arts double and a stunt double?

Satya Bellord: The martial arts double specializes in martial arts, especially moves that require a higher skill and energy level. A trained martial artist develops an inner strength that isn’t there in an actor or stunt person whose martial arts training is limited.

BB: How did you get the job on Kill Bill?

Satya Bellord: I was working with my brother and sister on a couple projects of our own when we got an email from our old friends Yuen Wo Ping and Fish Fong. They told us about this movie project and how they were having a hard time finding the right martial arts doubles for the lead characters, especially Uma Thurman. We had told them in the past that we wouldn’t be interested in stunt work and that we only wanted to do our own projects unless they came up with significant co-starring roles. But it soon became clear to us that Yuen Wo Ping, Fish Fong and the "Kill Bill" production was in a tight spot.

BB: Why couldn’t they get somebody else? Didn’t they hold auditions?

Satya Bellord: By the time they contacted us they’d already been holding auditions for months in China and the United States, but they couldn’t find a really good martial arts double for Uma. The talent was there in China, but all the potential doubles were too short and Asian-looking to pass for Uma. In the U.S. they found some people who were tall enough, but Yuen Wo Ping wasn’t satisfied with their level of skill. Anyway, they asked us if we would at least come to LA to meet Tarantino and other people on the project, we agreed.

BB: What’s your martial arts background?

Satya Bellord: My siblings and I were born in Hong Kong and spent a lot of our childhood studying in Far East convents where martial arts was a big part of every day life. So we’ve been training since childhood, specializing in taekwondo, wushu, tai chi, and yoga. Our training in the last twelve years or so has been especially intense, we’ve been training anywhere from five to seven hours a day, six days a week.

BB: I understand you guys have been really fortunate to have had as your full-time Wushu coach for the last ten years Liang Chang Xing, the former captain of the first Beijing Wushu team.

Satya Bellord: Yes. And that wushu team is still renowned as the most skilled team ever. Jet Li was one of the younger members of that team. They were champions of China ten years in a row. I’ve never seen anyone who possesses the perfection of form and spirit Chang Xing has. Even after years of training with him, I am still awestruck at how graceful yet powerful his moves are. Chang Xing has been training us in wushu for over a decade. He is also the main action director for our projects Karma Kula and Ninjai: the Little Ninja.

BB: What’s the most important factor in making a fight sequence look good?

Satya Bellord: I understand the financial reason movie studios use non-martial artist actors in the starring roles. And if you have a really good action director, director, good martial arts doubles, and good camera and editing techniques, you can make fight sequences look good. But nothing can compare to fight sequences that have really first-class martial artists. The big budget martial arts-centered movies we see nowadays can look good, but I still don’t think the action can compare to movies starring real martial artists like Bruce Lee, Jet Li, Jackie Chan and others. Qualities that develop over a lifetime of training come across on the screen and can’t be faked.

Another key is to stay away from what I call “fighting in a bubble.” That’s where a participant is just in their own little bubble doing their moves and they’re not really adjusting to or communicating with their opponents. The most frustrating situation is where all the different opponents are in their own little world focused on doing what they’re supposed to be doing and expecting the other players to adjust to them.

BB: What was the hardest part of being Uma’s martial arts double?

Satya Bellord: It was actually very easy except for one thing: keeping my head down. The martial arts double is supposed to try to keep her head down, otherwise people might recognize it’s not the star. But I had a hard time doing that in the main martial arts sequence where I was moving down a corridor killing guys left and right in. Quentin told me after the first take that it was really great, but he asked me to do a take where I’m not looking so strongly at the bad guys I was slicing because I was facing right into the camera. So on the second take I tried to lower my head and gaze, but it really threw me off. It didn’t have the same energy and power. I’ve been so used to being the strong warrior who keeps her head up and faces her opponent head on. There is a saying in Chinese, "A lowered head and a bent back mean low level of skill." I explained to Quentin that in martial arts, power comes from focus, and the more you focus on each move, the more powerful it is. In other words, your body twists to face the person you’re cutting, your arm reaches out with the sword to slice him, your hips snap to the left as that sword comes down and your eyes zoom in on your target and make sure that blade goes right through that sucker with one clean fast slice (laughs). Fortunately Quentin appreciated how much better and powerful the sequence was when my head was up and my gaze focused on the opponents. So he had me stick with that. He later told me that it all worked out great.