Martial arts legend Jet Li’s toughest fight yet? Finding inner peace | CNN

EDITOR’S NOTE: Keeping you in the know, Culture Queue is an ongoing series of recommendations for timely books to read, films to watch and podcasts and music to listen to. Jet Li’s work has always carried some degree of risk. Performing many of his own stunts, the martial arts star has fought opponents on shaky bamboo ladders (“Once Upon a Time in China”), leapt from tall buildings (“Romeo Must Die”) and dodged fireball explosions (“High Risk”). But no amount of training could have prepared him for his real-life brushes with death. Li was vacationing with his young family in the Maldives when tsunami waves triggered by the devastating 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake suddenly hit the beach. “I have my wife and two daughters in that moment,” he recalled, saying they all felt “very close to death.” “The water is here,” he said, gesturing to his chin. “If it was a little bit higher, 20 inches, then I would have died.” The 63-year-old martial arts star was speaking candidly about his near-death experiences in a video call from LA, where he had been promoting his new memoir “Beyond Life and Death: The Way of True Freedom.” A year after the tsunami, Li ha

May 19, 2026 → May 19, 2026