What was the last classic martial-arts film you watched?

[Chu Liu Hsiang]

On 3/16/2020 at 4:49 AM, One Armed Boxer said:

'Naughty Boys' is required viewing!

http://www.hkmdb.com/db/movies/view.mhtml?id=6818&display_set=eng

 

On 3/16/2020 at 2:00 PM, Graeme Of Death said:

That sounds a belter haha doubt it's easy to find though.

Lackey and The Lady Tiger is another one with Mars in a lead role, also got Hwang Jang Lee in it. Never seen it though.

Thanks guys. The hunt is on! It will not be an easy one for sure. 

[DrNgor]

On 3/18/2020 at 3:21 PM, paimeifist said:

The fights aren't great, they mainly just serve as showcases for Beardy and the Kid. Beardys fighting performance is very similar to Knockabout, but not nearly as polished or met with equal talent like it is in that movie.

Was Eddie Ko the villain in this, too? Interestingly enough, I've heard people point this out as one of the better post-DM kung fu comedies. That said, I've never had a lot of interest in watching it.

[paimeifist]

30 minutes ago, DrNgor said:

Was Eddie Ko the villain in this, too? Interestingly enough, I've heard people point this out as one of the better post-DM kung fu comedies. That said, I've never had a lot of interest in watching it.

Interesting, I knew I’d heard of it, but didn’t know what the consensus opinion was on it. I’ve been out of the loop for a while.

 

I would say it’s not one of the better non-Jackie kung fu comedies. It doesn’t even compare to Ninja in the Dragons Den, for just one example.

 

Opinions differ, but I would speculate that some Beardy “fanboyism” could play a part in how well liked this movie is, as he didn’t get all that many lead roles that I’m aware of. Also, the kid does pull some jaw dropping movies, I must admit.

[One Armed Boxer]

On ‎3‎/‎17‎/‎2020 at 12:00 AM, Graeme Of Death said:

That sounds a belter haha doubt it's easy to find though.

On ‎3‎/‎19‎/‎2020 at 7:53 AM, Chu Liu Hsiang said:

Thanks guys. The hunt is on! It will not be an easy one for sure. 

On ‎3‎/‎2‎/‎2020 at 6:54 AM, ShawAngela said:

At least, there is the Fortune Star/Joysales dvd release. I don't know if it's still in stock in at yesasia or buyyoyo or any other site, but it seems to me that I saw it on ebay.

It's the Fortunte Star/Joysales release that I have of 'Naughty Boys' as well, this is the one -

https://www.yesasia.com/global/naughty-boys-dvd-hong-kong-version/1022299423-0-0-0-en/info.html

 

 

 

[Graeme Of Death]

I'm scared if I start searching for "Naughty Boys" I'm not going to get Mars doing some kung fu.

[Omni Dragon]

8 hours ago, Graeme Of Death said:

I'm scared if I start searching for "Naughty Boys" I'm not going to get Mars doing some kung fu.

 

 

Spoiler

 

[Writ]

Here are some few comments of ones I've watched recently:

Jade Tiger (1977)

I watched this film on the same day I watched Fritz Lang's Man Hunt (1941) and it made a pretty good double feature in that they play with each other's themes. It's all about propaganda and the people who are affected by it. Is it wise to be proud of where you're from when where you're from is evil? Do you know what evil is when you've been brought up to think your evil is good? Definitely an underrated Shaw film.

Dragon Inn (1967)

I hadn't watch a King Hu film in so long that I forgot he was pretty much the Chinese Sergio Leone. Absolutely amazing film.

The Shadow Whip (1971)

Posted to Letterboxd:

I appreciate, even love the simplistic plots in most Shaw films. The silly and ridiculous ones I love just as much. But I start to draw the line when the plots get straight up stupid like the one in this film. There's an exchange between two characters which more or less plays out like this:

"I'm looking for Fang Chengtian"

"I don't know who he is! Why are you looking for him?"

"I want to kill him to get revenge"

"What did my uncle Fang do to you?!"

But hey, it's got some pretty awesome fight choreography especially for an early 70s flick (even if there's some unfortunately obvious under-cranking), it's got a top form Ku Feng hamming it up and the absolutely magnetic Cheng Pei Pei who completely owns the screen.

The 18 Bronzemen (1976)

Posted to Letterboxd:

I suspect that Joseph Kuo is actually a pretty good director, but it's a bit hard to tell when you watch his movies because they're kinda butchered up. If it isn't because you can only find his films in English dubs which are absolutely horrible, the films also tend to be severely cropped as well. While this is true for a lot of non-Shaw or non-Golden Harvest kung fu films, what sets Kuo's films apart from most of those ones is that he tended to have some pretty decent stories alongside the almost non-stop martial arts action. In one film, you get a master that has to fight 7 kung fu masters in a row. In another, you've got a villain with the "invincible armor" technique. In this one, you've got the cool concept of having to fight bronze statues to leave the Shaolin temple on top of a revenge story full of twists and turns. The camera movements and reactions indicate a purposefulness in his direction, but the cropping kills any sense of composition essentially mooting this point. The action is thick and fast as was the norm for many indie kung fu flicks back in the day, but unfortunately again the cropping destroys some of the great choreography. You'll occasionally have the main guy in the middle on the screen essentially fending off limbs coming out the sides of the screen. Even in it's butchered form though, at the very least the final fight which is 3 vs 1 appears much clearer and is an absolutely masterclass in kung fu choreography.

Return of the 18 Bronzemen (1976)

I actually like this one more than the first film. This film actually subverts many of the conventions of kung fu films. Our main guy cheats his way to becoming leader of the Manchus, but even then he can't get everything he wants. He trains at Shaolin temple so he can bully people and then the film almost treats his training as a good thing. What's really messed up is that the monks know he is evil and because he can't leave without passing the Bronzemen test, they make the test just hard enough for him to fail. He trains more then the test gets harder and this just keeps happening until the end where the monks let him leave without allowing him the honour of branding himself with the drain cauldron. And then there isn't a final fight. I'd love to watch this in the Chinese dub if I could find it because I have a feeling that this might be one of the overlooked greats of the genre.

The Secret Rivals 2 (1977)

Not much to say. Hwang Jang Lee and John Liu do their thing and their thing is an awesome thing.

Chinese Hercules OR Freedom Strikes a Blow (1973)

I like the story - main guy kills a guy then works at a dock and promises never to fight. Dock has problems with large businesses bullying them and the dock workers fight back. Big business has one huge dude that no one can beat. I just think the direction is lacking and the script oversimplifies things which could've been fleshed out. Good fights though. I rarely want to see old school kung fu flicks remade, but this is one of the ones I think could be remade with a better script and could be way more awesome than the original.

Stranger from Shaolin (1977)

Posted to Letterboxd:

English dubbing aside, this is actually a very fun film. The solo training scenes with Cecelia Wong showing off her wing chun form are pretty damn great, and the final showdown would be masterful if it wasn't for the fact that they seemingly forget one of the fighters part way through and he literally disappears for the rest of the film. Script wise, it's pretty spotty, but we hardly come to these kung fu flicks expecting too much anyway. One of those great 90 minute time wasters, but for kung fu fans, even without the great fight scenes we'd have fun just seeing different takes on familiar characters.

The Leg Fighters (1980)

This one is very fun and the focus on kicking makes the choreography in this one really unique. It might be the pacing which kinda kills this one for me because I do like the characters and watching them muck around is really fun. But I dunno, maybe the focus shifts too much from our main 2 guys? Ha Kwong Li is as charismatic an actress as you can get and she's pretty great. Such a shame she isn't in more films.

Hitman in the Hand of Buddha (1982)

Hwang Jang Lee knows how to direct! This has really great pacing making sure to separate the amazingly and creatively choreographed fights with good characters moments. This almost feels like an ancient Chinese version of a Guy Ritchie world where you have characters like "the country bumpkin" or "the beggar" or "Uncle 33" etc. Only wish we could've seen Hwang direct his Shaw Brother's passion project as I'm sure that would've also been great. As far as kung fu movies go though, this is definitely essential.

[saltysam]

10 Brothers Of Shaolin

Great cast including Don Wong Tao, Phillip Ko, Judy Lee,Chang Yi, Beardy unfortunately make for a passable but not great taiwanese by the numbers effort. Lovely widescreen german print with an english dub option ,no original audio.

[ShawAngela]

Way of the dragon.

I wonder why I didn't like it the first time I watched it in French language...Maybe because the lines were too insipid and the jokes too silly in French, I don't know...

However, I enjoyed it much more today !

[Graeme Of Death]

Ah that would make sense

[paimeifist]

Revisited the 7 Grandmasters over the weekend. I don’t need to say much about this one, it’s a classic.

 

The fight between Jack Long and Corey Yuen is one of the best damn fights to ever bless a screen.... I wonder how many times they smacked each other with prop spears and halbreds trying to film that.

[Killer Meteor]

It was one of Siskel and Ebert's "Dogs of the Week"

Starts at 7:35

 

 

[saltysam]

The Invincible

Early 70's Wang Yu potbolier keeps get interrupted by soppy singing interludes ,probably to make up the running time. Lung Fei is here but not one of Jimmy's best

 

Iron Fist Adventures

For a kung fu movie there's too much emphasis on guns in another early 70's Wang Yu actioner. A few of his regular supporting cast are here including Yueh Tien, no Lung Fei though. Again pretty average Wang Yu here though final fight isn't bad.

[paimeifist]

Warriors Two.

 

First time seeing this one. Fantastic movie, fun to see a classic with so much focus on Wing Chun. I just realized as I watched Beardy thinking “he always fights the same way...” Well, he always shows some pretty damn good Wing Chun! This was unique for an old HK movie in that several characters used the style though. Was cool to see a kicker like Casanova Wong allow his kicks to be supplementary to his scenes rather than the focus. 
 

My favorite fights of the film were Lau Kar Wing vs Lee Hoi San, and Sammo dual weilding swords vs the sword twins, fantastic stuff. Lau Kar Wing pulled some amazing monkey style, without making it too gimmicky. As always, I wish I got to see more of Lau Kar Wing.. I’ve pretty much only seen him as supporting characters, and I’d consider him one of my favorite screen fighters. The biggest role I’ve seen him in is Knockabout. 

Oh and the flying kick at the end is one of the best flying kicks ever recorded I believe..had to rewind that one a couple of times.
 

All the fights in this one are great though. The story is good up until the last twenty minutes or so. They seemed to rush the “revenge” once Beardy dies (which I didn’t expect, surprisingly)... There was no reason to think they could beat the bad guys yet, but hey, that’s a minor gripe for Fu movie.

[Graeme Of Death]

Probably my favourite Fung Hark On performance that one. One of my favourite Kung Fu films, think I'll watch it during the isolation

[paimeifist]

2 hours ago, Graeme Of Death said:

Probably my favourite Fung Hark On performance that one. One of my favourite Kung Fu films, think I'll watch it during the isolation

Yeah he was good in this! His character was down right creepy, which didn’t really fit the movie, but made him stand out even more.

You may be the guy to ask. When I was watching this, I was reminded of a movie where Fung Hak On performs pretty well using the snake style. Any idea which movie that may be?

Edited March 26, 2020 by paimeifist

[Killer Meteor]

Snake Deadly Act?

[Graeme Of Death]

Hmm not sure, I've never seen Snake Deadly Act. 

Snake in the Eagles Shadow? It's so long since I've watched a lot of these films

[TibetanWhiteCrane]

Only Snake Deadly Act comes to mind.

[SMK]

1 hour ago, Graeme Of Death said:

Hmm not sure, I've never seen Snake Deadly Act. 

Snake in the Eagles Shadow? It's so long since I've watched a lot of these films

For me, having a bad memory makes rewatching a movie I've only seen once, many years ago feel new again. I use to average watching 1 movie a day, then doing a full blown review on the film each day. That was back in 2005 on my original site. Even reading some of the reviews I did, I don't recall the movie. 

[Graeme Of Death]

1 hour ago, SMK said:

For me, having a bad memory makes rewatching a movie I've only seen once, many years ago feel new again. I use to average watching 1 movie a day, then doing a full blown review on the film each day. That was back in 2005 on my original site. Even reading some of the reviews I did, I don't recall the movie. 

Yeah I kinda wasted a large part of my life just watching different types of films when I should have been doing other things. Changed all that now thankfully   I'll still try and watch one film a week on my own and with the wife a classic that she's not seen. So Warriors Two and Dawn of the Dead coming up haha

With the plague going on and having to stay in been watching one a day to pass the time.

Up until 88 Films started bringing out the Shaw Brothers films again I hadn't watched a kung fu film in probably over 10 years. So with them having similar plots, the same actors, set etc a lot of them just blend into one or I have absolute no recollection of it all.

Watching the Avenging Eagle the other day might as well have been the first I'd seen it.

Edited March 27, 2020 by Graeme Of Death

[Graeme Of Death]

Warriors Two 9/10

Docked a point for some truly shite Sammo comedy, Casanova Wong's annoying sideys and for Dean Shek being in it,

One of my favourites with a quality ensemble of bad guys (Lee Hoi San, Fung Hark On, Tiger Yueng and Yeung Wai) 

Nice straight forward plot with superb fight scenes.

[ShawAngela]

Thanks to @NoKUNGFUforYU, I have had the luck to watch the movie 7 Grandmasters in Mandarin with English subtitles and I ENJOYED IT A LOT !!

What an excellent non stop action movie !!

I'll talk more about it in my future review...

I noticed that during the movie, there is a musical theme that reminded me a lot of the theme of the series Roots, but it seems to me that Roots was produced long after this movie, or am I mistaken ?

Edited March 28, 2020 by ShawAngela

[paimeifist]

The 7 Grandmasters is indeed one of the best. I recently revisited it as well.

 

Against the Drunken Cats Paws

Take a very zany kung fu comedy and a Chor Yuen wuxia plot, and mash them together, and this is what you get.

Entertaining movie, with some ridiculous but fun characters, and some really good fights. The plot was simple, but made to be overly complicated with the way it was laid out. Flash backs, jumping between different characters quickly, eventually kind of smashing them all together at once, and a “big twist” at the end.

Honestly, with the kind of plot expectations I have with a movie like this, it was better than expected. The characters were fun, including but not limited to: Poisonous Dwarf, One Armed Dragon (who has a metal tube thing attached to his nub), and a tough little kung fu kid.There is a very Dean Shek-like  police inspector character who you do not want to like, but he’s such a damn good screen fighter, you have to. He also ends up redeeming himself and being like-able, which is very unique for that kind of character. The comedy was mostly annoying, and only really effective when it was unintentional.

The only cast members I was familiar with are Kam Kong, and Chia Ling, who’s name is recognizable but I can’t really remember what I’ve seen her in. The stocky Kam Kong put in a good fighting performance, but had to play an annoying “bumbling idiot” character, made much worse by the English dub. Chia Ling was very impressive, I think she has to be one of the best female fighters of classic Fu. Everyone in the movie was impressive in fighting though, including a middle aged chunky woman who performed as good as many in shape men. 

The last half an hour is a pretty satisfying fight-fest. 
 

If you’re a fan of these kind of movies, it’s worth checking out.

Edited March 28, 2020 by paimeifist

[ShawAngela]

1 hour ago, paimeifist said:

and Chia Ling, who’s name is recognizable but I can’t really remember what I’ve seen her in.

Don't tell me that you haven't watch Queen Boxer, or Ming Patriots, or Female chivalry, or Assassin, or Lady constables ??!!

She is one of the best female fighters together with Angela Mao (they were both in the same training school) and Shan Kuan Ling Fung...