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On the Origin of the "Influencing Machine" in Schizophrenia

"On the Origin of the 'Influencing Machine' in Schizophrenia" (Über die Entstehung des „Beeinflussungsapparates“ in der Schizo-phrenie) is an article written by Austrian psychoanalyst Victor Tausk. He read it to and discussed it with the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society in January 1918. It was first published in 1919 in the German-language journal Internationale Zeitschrift für Psychoanalyse and, after translation into English by Dorian Feigenbaum, in The Psychoanalytic Quarterly in 1933.

The article describes Tausk's observations and interpretations of several persecutory delusions that plagued some of his patients who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. They believed their thoughts and bodily sensations were controlled by a machine that defied their technical comprehension and secretly influenced them from a distance, often claiming that it was operated by a group of people who were persecuting them. The accused users of the machine were almost always males and, in many of the cases Tausk witnessed, physicians who had treated the patients.

The paper has become a classic in the psychological understanding of schizophrenia and, according to consensus among today's psychiatrists, remains Tausk's most enduring contribution to the study of mental illnesses.

Presentation
For schizophrenic patients the boundaries between the self and the exterior world, or between the self as subject and object are blurred, and they may feel that their experience of the subjective self is reduced to the extent that they are completely under the control of an external force. According to Tausk, the loss of ego boundaries in schizophrenia is accompanied by a regression to pregenital narcissistic states, in which the child could not yet distinguish between the self and the exterior world and believed that their parents or God knew all their thoughts.

Tausk observes the gradual transformation of an influencing machine in a young female patient's delusions: Initially manifest in the exact form of her own body, the influencing machine became increasingly mechanical until it lost any resemblance to her physique. He concludes that influencing machines are always a projection of the patient's own body onto the exterior world and that the libido motivating the projection has regressed to an infantile pregenital stage.

The patients often show a remarkable interest in learning about current technology so that they can explain the operation of the influencing machine. Yet, even with the benefit of this understanding, the machine always has a mystical quality beyond explanation. Its described effects include:

 * Causing the patient to see two-dimensional images as if projected onto their surroundings
 * Creating and removing thoughts in the patient's mind by means of waves or rays
 * Producing odd sensations and physiological changes in the body, with particular attention to the sex organs, through electricity, magnetism or other action at a distance.

The patient imagines the machine's presence only after a psychotic experience has occurred. The delusion therefore fulfills the patient's need for a causal explanation of otherwise inexplicable events, and indicates that schizophrenia is in an advanced stage of development.

Notable cases
The best-known example of an influencing machine is that of James Tilly Matthews who believed he was being controlled by a device called the "Air Loom." Matthews was a tea merchant and political activist before he was admitted to the Bethlem Royal Hospital after shouting "treason" in the British House of Commons in 1797. He was a prolific writer and artist and described the "air loom" in great detail. His descriptions were published as a book in 1810 by John Haslam entitled Illustrations of Madness.

Literature
In the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the narrator, "Chief" Bromden, believes that the psychiatric ward in which he is committed (including the staff) is a machine in the service of a broader "Combine" – his name for technological society. This portrayal has been described as one of the best-known fictional examples of an "influencing machine" patient.

Activist Jerry Mander's book Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television argues for the complete removal of television from our lives because of its ill effects. Mander gives the example of Tausk's "Influencing machine" as being a parallel for television: "Doubtless you have noticed that this 'influencing machine' sounds an awful lot like television ... In any event, there is no question that television does what the schizophrenic fantasy says it does. It places in our minds images of reality which are outside our experience. The pictures come in the form of rays from a box. They cause changes in feeling and ... utter confusion as to what is real and what is not."


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File:Village China Shop.jpg

The outside of the Village China Shop in Pioneer Village.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: File:Village China Shop.jpg


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Steven Greenberg (rabbi)

Steven Greenberg (born June 19, 1956) is an American rabbi with a rabbinic ordination from the Orthodox rabbinical seminary of Yeshiva University (RIETS). He is described as the first openly gay Orthodox-ordained Jewish rabbi, since he publicly disclosed he is gay in an article in the Israeli newspaper Maariv in 1999 and participated in a 2001 documentary film about gay men and women raised in the Orthodox Jewish world.

Greenberg is a Senior Teaching Fellow and Director of Diversity Project at CLAL – the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, and the author of the book Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition which received the Koret Jewish Book Award for Philosophy and Thought in 2005.

In 2011, Greenberg performed a same-sex commitment ceremony, but he believes that formal kiddushin for same-sex couples is against Jewish law.

He was listed number 44 on the 2012 The Daily Beast and Newsweek list of "America's Top 50 Rabbis for 2012".

Early life and education
Greenberg, the son of Conservative Jewish parents, was raised in Columbus, Ohio. When he was about 15, he began studying with a rabbi. He attended Yeshiva University in New York as an undergraduate and then as a rabbinical student. When he was 20, he went to study at Yeshivat Har Etzion, a hesder yeshiva in Alon Shvut in Gush Etzion near Jerusalem. He received his BA in philosophy from Yeshiva University, and his rabbinic ordination from the rabbinical seminary of Yeshiva University (RIETS) in 1983.

While at Yeshivat Har Etzion, he was attracted to a fellow student and concluded that he was bisexual. He went to consult with Rabbi Yosef Sholom Eliashiv, an eminent rabbi in Jerusalem, telling him: "Harav, I am attracted to both men and women. What shall I do?" And the rabbi replied according to Greenberg: "My dear one, my friend, then you have twice the power of love. Use it carefully." Greenberg remembers that he left with the trust that it would all work out. However, he realised that the rabbi wasn't permitting him to have sex with men, but was telling him that his desire was not ugly in and of itself.

Greenberg did not acknowledge he was gay until he was 28, and even afterwards continued to date women for another seven years. In 1993, he wrote the article "Gayness and God", admitting that he is gay, and published it under the pseudonym "Yaakov Levado" (meaning Jacob alone) in Tikkun magazine, but only came out six years later in an article titled "In the name of partnership" published in the Israeli daily newspaper Maariv on March 5, 1999.

Career
Early in his career, Greenberg held an Orthodox pulpit on Roosevelt Island in New York City. Since 1985, he has been a Senior Teaching Fellow and Director of the Diversity Project at CLAL – the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership, an interdenominational Jewish think tank, leadership training institute, and resource center. He is a co-founder and director of Eshel, a support, education and advocacy organization for orthodox LGBT Jews that saves lives and families. He is also on the faculty of the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America, a project of the Shalom Hartman Institute.

From 1996 to 1998 he spent two years as a Jerusalem Fellow with the Mandel Institute, studying educational policy issues and researching rabbinic attitudes toward homosexuality. Greenberg participated in the critically acclaimed 2001 documentary film Trembling Before G-d, featured at the Sundance Festival. The film about gay men and women raised in the orthodox Jewish world helped break the silence around homosexuality in religious Jewish circles.

On November 10, 2011, Greenberg officiated a civil marriage according to the laws of the District of Columbia in Washington, D.C. It was widely misreported Greenberg performed a religious ceremony; Greenberg has repeatedly agreed that same gender kiddushin (Jewish marriage) is incompatible with Jewish law.

2011 same-sex commitment ceremony
Greenberg officiating at a civil marriage between two men in the United States, first reported by +972 Magazine on November 11, 2011, attracted controversy and was misunderstood and rejected by many within the Jewish community. Many were confused and thought that he had performed the rites of a Jewish wedding (kiddushin).

Greenberg described the wedding as a "same-sex commitment ceremony", commenting that "while it was a wedding according to the laws of the District of Columbia, it was not a kiddushin," adding "my position was and still is that kiddushin is not appropriate for same-sex couples." Two weeks later, he wrote in an article in the Jewish Week, "I did not conduct a 'gay wedding'. I officiated at a ceremony that celebrated the decision of two men to commit to each other in love and to do so in binding fashion before family and friends. Though it was a legal marriage according to the laws of the District of Columbia, as far as Orthodox Jewish law (halacha) is concerned, there was no kiddushin (Jewish wedding ceremony) performed."

On December 5, 2011, in response to the ceremony, more than 100 rabbis signed a statement calling gay marriage a "desecration of Torah values", saying: "We, as rabbis from a broad spectrum of the communities around the world, wish to correct the false impression that an Orthodox-approved same-gender wedding took place. By definition, a union that is not sanctioned by Torah law is not a wedding, and by definition a person who conducts such a ceremony is not an Orthodox rabbi."

Personal life
Greenberg currently lives in Boston with his family.

Publications
Greenberg has been a frequent commentator for the media and has published several articles on Jewish law and church and state issues.

In a 2001 article "Between Intermarriage and Conversion: Finding a Middle Way" published in CLAL, Greenberg proposes using the rabbinic concept of ger toshav, (resident alien), to provide an accepted place for non-Jewish partners of intermarried couples, allowing them to experience "the joys of living in a Jewish home without insisting on conversion". As a marriage of a Jew and a ger toshav would not be legitimate under halachic law, Greenberg suggests using "cultural creativity" to find "new rituals that partake of Jewish resources and speak honestly about what is actually happening", the same as for gay couples, where in his opinion "kiddushin, the traditional ritual for the Jewish wedding, simply doesn't apply".

In 2004 Greenberg's book, Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition was published, meeting with critical acclaim. In particular it addressed permitted and forbidden sexual behaviour: "While the common understanding of the verse 'Thou shall not lie with a male as one lies with a woman' [] has been taken to refer to both active and passive partners ... it would appear that the verse directly refers only to the active partner engulfing his penis in the body of another man. According to this analysis the verse prohibits one, and only one, sexual practice between men, namely, anal intercourse, and speaks specifically to the active partner. There is no mention of any other behavior that this verse would prohibit." In Greenberg's reading "the verse prohibits the kind of sex between men that is designed to effect the power and mastery of the penetrator. Sex for the conquest, for shoring up the ego, for selfaggrandizement, or worse, for the perverse pleasure of demeaning another man is prohibited," and he adds that reading Leviticus 18:22 "as a law against sexual domination and appropriation ... offers gay people a way to reconnect to God, Torah, and the Jewish people". Greenberg says that he interprets the passage in this way "because it offers me a way of coming back to Judaism. It's a radical reading, but if you believe that God hates what you are, why would you go to such a temple?"

In addition to it, Greenberg's interpretation of Leviticus 18:22, "the very verse that was for centuries read as requiring the ongoing demotion of women through the marking of intercourse as humiliation and thus femininity as degraded could be read as a full-fledged critique of the maledominated social hierarchy! The only way to redeem intercourse from its inevitable dominations is to press for gender equality on the deepest of emotional planes, to work formally toward ending the gender hierarchy, and to heal the ugly misogyny at its foundation".

Wrestling with God and Men received the 2005 Koret Jewish Book Award for Philosophy and Thought, considered one of the highest honors for authors writing prose on Jewish themes, and was a finalist for the 17th Annual Lambda Literary Awards.

Reception
Some orthodox Jews have criticized Rabbi Greenberg and questioned his orthodox credentials. After Greenberg came out, Rabbi Moshe Tendler, Rosh Yeshiva at Yeshiva University stated: "Being an Orthodox Rabbi and actively gay is an oxymoron ... [It is] the exact same as if he said, 'I'm an Orthodox rabbi and I eat ham sandwiches on Yom Kippur'. In Tendler's opinion "it is very sad that an individual who attended our yeshiva sunk to the depths of what we consider a depraved society" and called Greenberg "a Reform rabbi". Commenting on Greenberg's role in "Trembling before G-d", Rabbi Avi Shafran, a public relations professional for Agudath Israel of America who scolded the movie for not showing Orthodox Jews who have undergone conversion therapy to change their sexual inclinations, wrote: "Rabbi Steve Greenberg, billed as 'the first openly gay rabbi,' [a]ddressing the Torah's strong prohibition of male homosexual acts... suggests to the camera, without elaboration: 'There are other ways of reading the Torah.' What Rabbi Greenberg apparently believes is that elements of the Jewish religious tradition are negotiable, that the Torah, like a Hollywood script, can be sent back for a rewrite. That approach can be called many things, but 'Orthodox' is not among them."

In his review of Wrestling with God and Men for the Edah Journal, Rabbi Asher Lopatin affirmed Greenberg's "importance as a voice within the Orthodox community", and calls him "a brilliant, thoughtful and courageous rabbi" and his book "a brilliant work of creativity and research", he writes that "Wrestling with God and Man [sic], and Rabbi Greenberg's voice in this book fall outside the bounds of Orthodoxy" for three reasons: Because Greenberg "is not committing himself fully to Orthodoxy", because he "does not follow Orthodox methodology", and because he "is not sufficiently halakhically creative", not having "combined — in a novel way to be sure — [his] commitment to his homosexual identity and way of life with the binding nature of halakhah". At the same time, Lopatin is confident, that "Greenberg can write the Orthodox book that will show us that he is committed to staying the long and difficult course of persuasion that Orthodoxy demands".

title: Steven Greenberg (rabbi)


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Roanoke Star

The Roanoke Star, also known as the Mill Mountain Star, is the world's largest freestanding illuminated man-made star. It was constructed at the top of Mill Mountain in Roanoke, Virginia in 1949 by the local merchants association to draw publicity and trade to the city. The star was initially intended to be lit only during Christmas seasons, but was popular enough with the citizens of Roanoke that it is illuminated every night year-round. It stands 88.5 ft tall and weighs 60000 lbs, rests 846 ft above the city of Roanoke, and is visible for 60 mi from the air. Its 2000 ft of neon tubing are typically lit entirely in white, but have the ability to shine solely in red (historically for tragic events), or in red, white, and blue (for patriotic holidays). The star has become a symbol of Roanoke and the source of its nickname "Star City of the South", and it along with its accompanying scenic overlook are popular tourist destinations in the area.

History
Mill Mountain is a 1703 ft peak that stands detached from surrounding ranges and lies fully within Roanoke's city limits. The mountain has been used for recreation nearly since the city's beginnings; a resort hotel and observation tower each opened at its top in 1892, an early amusement park was built at its base in 1903, and beginning in 1910 visitors could pay a quarter to ride an incline railway straight to the summit. By the mid-20th century, however, all of those attractions had closed or burned, and the city was debating to what degree the mountain should be developed.

In 1949, in an attempt to provide Roanoke with nationwide publicity and increase commerce in the city, the Roanoke Merchants Association devised the idea to erect a giant illuminated star on the top of Mill Mountain, overlooking the city's downtown. The group began a fundraising drive with downtown merchants (the anticipated beneficiaries of the plan), with the goal of raising $25,000. After contributions from the city and the Merchants Association itself, the final cost of $28,000 was raised, and work on the project commenced. The Roy C. Kinsey Sign Company was contracted to build the star, while the Roanoke Iron and Bridge Works designed the steel support tower and 2000 ft of neon tubing were manufactured by the Corning Glass Works. In its completed form, the star measures 88.5 ft in height and is mounted on an eight-story-tall steel structure weighing 60000 lbs, resting on a base made using 500000 lbs of concrete. It is considered the largest free-standing, man-made, illuminated star in the world, and when lit, can be seen from 60 mi away.

The star's debut was planned for November in anticipation of the upcoming Christmas shopping season, but construction and weather delays threatened to push the opening back. The star was completed on time, however, and on Thanksgiving Eve, November 23, 1949, Roanoke mayor A.R. Minton hit the power switch for the first time (though in reality the switch was a dummy; Bob Kinsey of the Roy C. Kinsey Sign Company threw the actual switch from behind a circuit box). Former U.S. Congressman Clifton A. Woodrum spoke at the ceremony and compared the attraction to the Star of Bethlehem, quoting the Book of Matthew by saying, "When they saw the star they rejoiced with exceeding great joy." Another attendee at the dedication was actor and Roanoke native John Payne. Payne had a close connection to another Roanoke landmark; as a child growing up in the city, he provided the winning entry in a contest to name the Patrick Henry Hotel.

While it was originally planned for the star to be illuminated only during Christmas seasons, it was popular enough with the city's population that the Merchant's Association decided to keep it lit year-round. The association paid the electric bill until 1955 when the city began assuming the cost.

Initially, the star was illuminated entirely white. From 1957 until 1976, the star's color changed from white to red for a period of two nights to indicate a traffic fatality in the city. It remained red for three nights following the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and for five after the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Additionally, the city voluntarily left the star dark during the 1973 energy crisis. As part of the bicentennial celebration in 1976, the design was changed to an outer single star of red encompassing inner double-stars of white and blue. After the September 11 attacks, the star was kept in a red, white, and blue configuration for nearly six years, until April 22, 2007. On that day, officials changed the color configuration to all-white "as a symbol of healing and hope" after the Virginia Tech shooting. Red, white and blue colors were restored May 24, 2007 and remained that way until returning to all white on September 12, 2011. The star has remained white since, with the exception of switching to red, white, and blue each Memorial Day, Flag Day, Independence Day, September 11, and Veterans Day. The star has undergone maintenance on a number of occasions. The steel structure has been painted and received minor repairs in 1971 and 1987. The star itself was painted in 1979 and 1998, and electrical repairs were performed in 1997 and 2007. A 2019 inspection determined that the steel structure was in excellent shape for its age; however, in 2021, an internal study done by the city showed significant rust and damage to the anchors of the sheet metal base that hold the neon tubing. The lights themselves are difficult to maintain, and the entirety of the steel structure is covered in lead paint, which according to the 2021 report would cost $3 million to remove. , the city was undecided what renovation (or, potentially, replacement) steps would be taken, but City Manager Bob Cowell has said no action would occur in time for the attraction's 75th anniversary in 2024.

While at its inception the star had its detractors, including those who thought it tacky or believed the money could be spent in more constructive ways, it has since become a fixture for Roanokers and is considered "the city's front porch light". The star's scenic overlook rises 846 ft above the Roanoke River below, and its dramatic views of the Roanoke Valley makes it a popular destination for area residents to take visiting friends and family. The star, overlook, and Mill Mountain Zoo are accessible both from Roanoke and from a spur of the Blue Ridge Parkway, and the mountain features a network of trails for hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding.

title: Roanoke Star


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File:Pioneer Village Hardware Museum The Sovereign Jewel.jpg

The Sovereign Jewel is a stove that serves as an excellent example of how Americans in the 1880's would go to great lengths to make works of art out of ordinary household objects.


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File:Pioneer Village Post Office.jpg

This post office was built in Charleston, Utah in 1905 and served as the towns post office until 1955.

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Reni Raion

Reni Raion (Ренійський район; Raionul Reni) was a raion (district) in Odesa Oblast in south-western Ukraine, in the historic Budjak region of Bessarabia. Its administrative center was the city of Reni. The raion was abolished on 18 July 2020 as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Odesa Oblast to seven. The area of Reni Raion was merged into Izmail Raion. The last estimate of the raion population was In 2001, population was 40,680.

The raion was predominantly Moldovan and the Ukrainian language was rare. The raion of Reni, in its boundaries at that time, including the city of Reni, had 40,680 inhabitants in 2001, including 19,938 self-identified Moldovans (49.01%), 7,196 ethnic Ukrainians (17.69%), 6,136 ethnic Russians (15.08%), 3,439 Bulgarians (8.45%), 736 Gagauz (1.81%) and 36 self-identified Romanians (0.09%). The inhabitants of the Reni raion were 37.88% Russian-speaking, 40.9% Romanian-speaking, 7.26% Ukrainian-speaking, 6.76% Gagauz-speaking and 6.61% Bulgarian-speaking. Most of villages (five) are Romanophone while there was one village populated by Gagauz and another one was populated by Bulgarians. The city of Reni had 20,761 inhabitants in 2001, including 6,694 ethnic Ukrainians (32.24%), 6,126 self-identified Moldovans (29.5%), 5,589 ethnic Russians (26.92%), 1,012 Bulgarians (4.87%), 736 Gagauz (1.81%) and 22 self-identified Romanians (0.11%). The city of Reni was mostly (70.54%) Russophone, 13.37% Romanian-speaking, 12.5% Ukrainian-speaking, 1.52% Gagauz-speaking and 1.33% Bulgarian-speaking.

At the time of disestablishment, the raion consisted of one hromada, Reni urban hromada with the administration in Reni.

title: Reni Raion


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Iron Monkey (1993 film)

Iron Monkey is a 1993 Hong Kong martial arts film written and produced by Tsui Hark and directed by Yuen Woo-ping, starring Donnie Yen, Yu Rongguang, Jean Wang, Angie Tsang and Yuen Shun-yi. It is not related to the 1977 Hong Kong film of the same title.

The film is a fictionalised account of an episode in the childhood of the Chinese folk hero Wong Fei-hung and his father Wong Kei-ying, and their encounter with the "Iron Monkey". In 1996, a separate film titled Iron Monkey 2 was released, but it is unrelated to the 1993 film.

Plot
The plot centers on a masked martial artist known as Iron Monkey. Iron Monkey is actually the alter ego of a traditional Chinese medicine physician called Yang Tianchun. During the day, Yang runs his clinic and provides free medical treatment for the poor, which he subsidises by charging his rich patients. At night, he dresses in black and travels around town to rob the rich and help the poor. Once, he breaks into the governor's residence and makes off with a hoard of gold. The guards and four Shaolin monks are unable to stop him. The governor orders the chief constable, Fox, to hunt down Iron Monkey and to arrest anyone who is linked to him in any way. Fox appears to be a bungler who is not aware that Iron Monkey is actually the physician treating his injured men who fought with Iron Monkey the previous night.

In the meantime, Wong Kei-ying, also a physician and martial artist from Foshan, arrives in town with his young son, Wong Fei-hung. Wong Kei-ying fights with street thugs who attempt to rob him. Some soldiers who have been observing the fight nearby suspect that Wong is Iron Monkey, and they arrest him and his son. During the trial, the governor orders Wong Fei-hung to be branded for defiance, but Iron Monkey shows up and disrupts the proceedings. Wong Kei-ying is eager to prove his innocence, and he fights with Iron Monkey. Neither of them is able to defeat his opponent, and Iron Monkey escapes. The governor is impressed by Wong Kei-ying's skill, and he holds Wong Fei-hung hostage to force Wong Kei-ying to help him capture Iron Monkey within seven days.

The locals despise Wong Kei-ying for assisting the governor in capturing their hero, so they refuse to sell him food or provide him with shelter. Wong eventually arrives at Yang's clinic and is taken in by Yang and Miss Orchid, while he is still unaware of Yang's true identity. With help from Fox, Yang manages to bring Wong Fei-hung, who has fallen sick, out of prison and keeps him in his clinic. Wong Fei-hung learns new martial arts from Yang and Miss Orchid during his stay with them.

Meanwhile, a Shaolin traitor named Hin-hung, who has become an imperial official, arrives in town with his followers. Hin-hung takes over as the new governor. Iron Monkey and Wong Kei-ying run into Hin-hung and his men in two separate encounters, and they are severely wounded by him. They retreat back to the clinic, where Wong is surprised to discover that Yang is actually Iron Monkey. They assist each other and recover from their wounds quickly. Concurrently, Hin-hung orders his men to search the town for Iron Monkey and Wong Kei-ying, but Fox gets to the clinic first to warn Orchid. It turns out that Fox has known Iron Monkey's true identity all along, and he has been secretly helping Iron Monkey.

Hin-hung's monks eventually find their way to the clinic, and they engage Orchid in a fight. When Orchid proves far too skillful for the monks, they drug her and attempt to rape her. She is saved by Wong Fei-hung, who continues the battle with the monks using the staff movements he learn from Yang and Orchid. Although Wong Fei-hung is able to defeat the Hin-hung's best monks, he is captured and tortured. Orchid escapes to warn Wong Kei-ying and Iron Monkey.

Iron Monkey and Wong Kei-ying (also wearing the Iron Monkey costume) break into the governor's residence to rescue Wong Fei-hung and defeat Hin-hung's men and monks. They have a final confrontation with Hin-hung on top of burning wooden poles. After an intense fight, Iron Monkey and Wong Kei-ying defeat Hin-hung and knock him down into the inferno below. At the end of the film, the protagonists learn that a new governor has taken office, and they hope that he will be a good official. The Wongs leave town for Foshan while Yang and Orchid see them off. Fox says that he would like to visit the Wongs, but that he is too busy "trying to catch that Iron Monkey". After the film, screen captions inform viewers that Yang and Orchid are married, and that Wong Fei-hung, inspired by his father and the Iron Monkey, later becomes a hero among the Chinese and restores honor to the Shaolin Monastery.

Cast

 * Donnie Yen as Wong Kei-ying
 * Yu Rongguang as Yang Tianchun / Iron Monkey
 * Jean Wang as Miss Orchid
 * Angie Tsang as Wong Fei-hung
 * Yen Shi-kwan as Hin-hung
 * James Wong as Governor Cheng
 * Yuen Shun-yi as Fox
 * Lee Fai as White Eagle (Hin-hung's student)
 * Hsiao Ho as Disfigured Swordsman (Hin-hung's student)
 * Chun Kwai-bo as Shaolin monk
 * Chan Siu-wah as Shaolin monk
 * Chan Chi-man as Shaolin monk
 * Yip Choi-nam as Shaolin monk
 * Cheung Fung-lei as Governor Cheng's mistress
 * Shut Mei-yee as Governor Cheng's advisor
 * Duen Wai-lun as Rich patient
 * Dang Tai-who as Chief of thieves' gang
 * Wong Kim-ban as Member of thieves' gang
 * Ling Chi-hung as Constable
 * Lam Chi-tai (extra)
 * Dion Lam (extra)

Reception
The film's domestic release was delayed due to producer Tsui Hark's insistence on filming some additional comedic scenes after Yuen Woo-ping had finished the film. According to an interview with Tsui on the Iron Monkey DVD release, this delay may have had a negative effect on the film's box office earnings.

The film was given a wide release in the United States by Miramax Films, backed by director Quentin Tarantino. It opened in October 2001 on 1,225 screens, earning just over $6 million in its opening weekend and more than $14 million overall. It received good reviews in America and became the 11th highest-grossing foreign language film in the United States. The film received favorable reviews from critics and holds a 90% rating on the film review website Rotten Tomatoes. The film was ranked #99 in Empire magazine's "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" in 2010.

Changes in the United States release
In its release in 2001, numerous controversial edits and changes were made to the film for the United States release, to the dismay of Hong Kong cinema fans. Miramax made several changes that the company felt would make the film more marketable to American audiences:

 * As most Americans are unfamiliar with the story of Wong Fei-hung, his name was removed from the original Chinese title.
 * The subtitles were tailored to diminish the political context of the story.
 * Some scenes were trimmed to tone down the violence.
 * Originally, some fight scenes had been sped up in places through undercranking. The United States release slowed these scenes down to a more normal pace.
 * Several comedic scenes, particularly ones interspersed in the fight scenes, were removed to give the fights a more serious feel. Although such comedic devices are common in Hong Kong cinema, the editors felt that they might appear odd to American audiences.
 * A new soundtrack was composed that emulated the classical score to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and in doing so, the Wong Fei-hung theme song was eliminated.
 * New sound effects were dubbed for the fighting to make them more realistic (as opposed to the more traditional exaggerated Hong Kong sounds).

Home media
In Hong Kong, the film was initially released by Megastar (later Deltamac) in a basic version. This version was released in the United States by Tai Seng. Later, it was re-released in Hong Kong by IVL in a digitally remastered edition in the Donnie Yen & Yuen Woo Ping Action Collection.

On 26 March 2001, the DVD was released by Hong Kong Legends in the United Kingdom in region 2. On 1 March 2004, the DVD for the film was released in a two-disc platinum edition. One year later, the Epic Action Collection DVD was released on 26 December 2005 in a four-disc set, which includes two other martial arts films - Wing Chun and Tai Chi Boxer - also directed by Yuen Woo-ping. Five months later, The Donnie Yen Collection DVD was released on 29 May 2006 in a four-disc set, which includes another two martial arts films - New Dragon Gate Inn and Once Upon a Time in China II. Miramax (with assistance from Lionsgate on some versions) released their version on DVD in the United States and also on Blu-ray on 15 September 2009, with the English audio in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and the Chinese audio in Dolby Digital 5.1.

title: Iron Monkey (1993 film)