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

[ChillyChong]

Return of chinese boxer.

Pretty good Wang Yu effort although not on level of his earlier big hits. Some good and at times even great action and interesting characters. Pity no subs in br, hopefully one day there will be better release. Dub is awful few times, particularly during japanese tournament I had trouble understanding what announcer said. Well it did not bother that much really in the end.

 

[DrNgor]

The Eagle Claws Champion (Taiwan, 1974: Wu Min-Hsiung) - aka On the Black Street - I found this low-budget Taiwanese effort--released internationally by Joseph Lai and IFD films--to be surprisingly entertaining. Not quite a diamond in the rough, but better than a lot of these others low budget chop-sockey programmers. Jimmy Heung (brother of Charles) plays Chung Ho, a talented fighter and local champion whose father (Ku Chun, of Kung Fu Zombie) disapproves his son's focus on the martial arts. One day while drinking at the local restaurant with his buddies, Chung Ho beats up a rich guy (Melvin Chang, of Dragon and Tiger Joint Hands and The Sand Pebbles) and his gwailo friends when they try to leave the establishment without paying their check. The rich guy returns with even more gwailo friends to get revenge, but Chung Ho takes them all out and beats the rich guy to death. Chung Ho is arrested and sentenced to prison.

While serving time, Chung Ho discovers that his father, already ill, died from the shock of seeing his son get arrested. Chung decides to give up kung fu and turn over a new leaf. But when he gets out of jail, he learns that violence will follow him everywhere. Despite his attempts to earn an honest living, old enemies (including Tsai Hung) won't let him live peacefully. And when he learns what his sister (Li Hsiang, of Bruce Tuan's 7 Promises and what appears to be a number of sexpot roles) is doing to pay their bills, Chung will be tempted to fight again.

The main question that pervaded my mind while watching this is "When exactly is this film set?" I mean, the kung fu tournaments are of the "fighter jumps on a platform to challenge the winner" variety, which I assume were out of vogue by the post-WW2 era. The gwailo actors are all walking around in polo shirts, which existed in the 18th century, but were mass marketed to the populace in the 1930s. The restaurant scenes are clearly set in contemporary eating establishments. But at what point did men in China stop wearing tangzhuang as your normal everyday clothing? I guess this is set in the 1930s China, but I'm guessing that they really just made do with whatever was lying around.

The film was directed and choreographed by Wu Min-Hsiung. Wu Sifu had been a fairly prolific choreographer in Taiwan during the late 60s and early 70s. This was his last film as action director, after which he spent the rest of his career as a director, making movies like Green Dragon Inn and One Foot Crane. I actually enjoyed his work here, which falls somewhere in the middle between basher style fighting and shapes-oriented choreography. You can tell all the actors are trained martial artists and are trying to fight with traditional styles, but not quite in the overly-complex, acrobatic way that would define choreography in the late 70s. There was a video on Youtube of a tournament fight in the 1950s between a White Crane master and a Tai Chi master, and the action here looks a lot like that. I found it refreshing. Also, one of Chung Ho's buddies is a good kicker. Tsai Hung is muscular enough here that he feels like a precursor to Billy Chow's General Fujita.

[SDJ]

The Shaolin Plot
Like a lot of people, I didn't see this until the blu-ray came out. I heard all the criticisms (lame/undeveloped protagonist, saggy overly long second act, etc) and prepared myself accordingly. The movie's more fun if you think of the evil prince and skullet Sammo as the actual main characters. Because they basically are. Some pretty ferocious (especially for 1977) fights, and mostly free of the insane undercranking Sammo would use later. Cool extravagant Shaw-esque set design that now looks and feels kinda otherworldly. Easy to fall asleep to whenever action isn't happening, but I liked it.

Duel to the Death (rewatch)
They don't make em like this anymore. Occasionally poignant, but there's a strong undercurrent of "possibly written by a 10 year old." (The black void net room, the prosthetic legs plot twist, the exploding ninja head, etc etc.) Anyway, so fun, stylish, well paced and not one minute longer than it needs to be.

Edited March 8 by SDJ

[DrNgor]

Land of the Brave (Hong Kong, 1974: Stanley Siu) - aka Chinese Kung Fu; Enter the Kung Fu Dragon - Another entry in the "those evil Japs" series of Fist of Fury knock-offs, rip-offs and similarly inspired films. This time, we the Japanese setting up a puppet government in a city whose economy revolves around a power plant. They give power to the local traitor, Mr. Chang (Fung Ngai, of Fist of Fury and Shaolin Martial Arts). His lecherous son (Leung Siu-Wah, of Clones of Bruce Lee) is put in charge of rounding up the local girls to send to the front lines as comfort girls. Chang also sends hitmen to try to kill the leader of the local guerilla force.

Standing in their way is Chi-Ko (Nick Cheung Lik), a member of the resistance. He has the best kung fu out of everybody in the film and is a born leader. He leads a raid on the comfort girl convoy, killing the Japanese and rescuing the girls. This prompts Mr. Chang to employ a number of professional fighters, including a Mongolian dude in a tiger-print vest (Tong Tin-Hei), two Manchurian fighters (Lee Man-Tai and Tang Ti), and (what I guess is) a Russian fighter (Gigo P. Tevzapza). After a failed assassination attempt on both Mr. Chang and the Japanese commanding officer (Chu Gam), Chang retalliates by having Chi-Ko's family murdered. Now...it's personal.

Although the heroes and villains are about equally matched throughout the film, there is a strong feeling of bleakness as the movie progresses. By the film's end, there is only one character left standing. A lot of the good guys get killed over the course of the movie and characters that would normally have plot armor in these sorts of movies do not. The movie is supposedly set over the course of the entire Sino-Japanese War (1937 - 1945)...I think. It's not quite made clear. What is clear is that the movie does feature stock footage and direct references to the Hiroshima bombing, with the villains realizing they've lost and trying to flee before the guerillas catch up to them. I did like that part of the story.

The fight scenes were staged by Leung Siu-Chung (father of Bruce and Tony) and Lam Hak-Ming. The latter has been a frequent collaborator of Sammo Hung over the course of his career, often working as assistant and second-unit director on Sammo's movies, or assisted Sammo when he was working as the action director. The choreography is pretty solid by basher standards. It doesn't quite push the limits of this particular sub-genre, but the fights are lively. Like Superior Youngster, Nick Cheung Lik steals the show with his footwork (also, both films end with a fight scene aboard a ship). Wilson Tong shows up in an important supporting role as the liaison between Mr. Chang and the Japanese, but his fighting is pretty generic. Kitty Meng, who seemed to be more popular with sexier roles, plays a school teacher who's part of the resistance and fights a lot, fulfilling the quota for kung fu fighting females.  Land of the Brave doesn't break new ground, but it hits the familiar beats with the necessary amount of energy.

EDIT: I did the IMDB Parents Guide for this: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0198631/parentalguide/?ref_=tt_ql_stry_4

Edited March 8 by DrNgor

[DrNgor]

Buffalo Hsiung (Taiwan, 1974: Tyrone Hsu Tien-Yung) - aka The Assignment - A wandering bum with good kung fu (Lu Ping, of The Fist that Kills and Shaolin Kung Fu Mystagogue) arrives in a village, where he's abused by the local populace, including the town boss, Mr. Kao (Wang Fei, The Demons in the Flame Mountain and Shaolin Angel and Shaolin Devil). He is rescued by a pretty young clotheswasher (Sally Chen, The Sword and Lady Karate), a cargo pusher (Chen Hsin-I, the film's choreographer) and a rickshaw puller (Lung Tien-Hsiang, The Boxer's Adventure and Sword Stained with Royal Blood). He swears brotherhood to the three and leaves the village.

Two years later, the bum, Ma Chai-Kung, returns as a rich government official with an entourage of trained fighters. He is a helper of the local warlord. He abuses his post by getting revenge of Mr. Kao and taking over the town, after which he starts sending his men to assassinate political rivals. He employs his blood brothers, but they eventually tire of working for an ungrateful sot who refuses to treat them as brothers and join the opposition.

The film is almost non-stop fighting, much of which comes across as fairly random. I know people also refer to "basher" choreography as "punch-and-block" choreography. This film feels like a literal interpretation of the latter. The action is very much "punch and block (and punch)," lacking in the manic energy of the best movies from this period. If you notice closely, there almost almost always a quick pause between each move performed: punch, block, pause, face punch, pause, kick, pause, punch, block, pause, stomach punch, pause, another stomach punch, pause...etc. The actors are pretty good fighters, especially Lung Tien-Hsiang as the high-kicking rickshaw puller. I think the action direction needed a little more "Umph!" and the story needed to be a bit more developed.

[ShawAngela]

I just watched my German dvd of The two cavaliers1973. I don't have luck : none of the versions I have, both Hoker and the German one, have any English subtitles. I wondered a long while to try to discover which movie it was, because the German title was something like Wang Yu hater als granit, or something like that, and it's only when I recognized the beautiful Kuo Hsiang Chuang that I was able to finally find the English title of the movie.

This is a great non stop action movie, with two excellent punching stars, Chen Sing and Wang Yu. Kuo Hsiang Chuang doesn't have the luck to show her great skills, here, which is too bad, but she plays her boss' character very well. Ko Hung is here too, and he exchanges some kicks and punches with Chen Sing and Wang Yu.

 

[Ronin]

Enter the Dragon (1973)

First time re-watching this in years. A friend gifted me a digital copy of the new 4K remaster and it looks fantastic. I enjoyed this more now than I ever have in the past, it has aged like a fine wine. Not much else to say about a certified classic. I still wonder what the world would be like now if Bruce Lee was still alive...

[sadisgate]

The 8th Leader (1978)

A Korean flick that wasn't subbed. I had to make due with auto-translate which means about 90% of the dialog was uninteligible gibberish. As far as I can tel the plot involves a woman trained by an old guy to kill the three men who killer her parents (or grandparents as they quite old). Also some guy in a straw hat also fights the men but I have no idea why. The quality was shoody and the fights not all that great. The man character moves kinda slow but beats the first two guys pretty easily anyway. The final fight was at least fun as the main baddie was pretty athletic and litterally stomped straw hat guy into the sand like he was bugs bunny or something. Might have been more fun if I had a clue what was goung on.

 

[ShawAngela]

I just finished to watch Bandits from Shantung 1972, after many years.

I still enjoyed it as much as before, but it looks like this movie is really short : the Joysales release shows a 1h18 running time.

Does anyone know if the German version is longer?

Chang Yi plays the hero who fights alone a group of bandits lead by Pai Ying. A lot of familiar faces, here : Hu Chin in a too short role, Chin Yuet Sang, Sammo, Yi Yuan, and I just discovered that Wilson Tong played in it, but I didn't even recognized him, I had to look at hkmdb to see which character he played!

Nice swordplay movie.

[saltysam]

I've got the german dvd,same running time. The old uk vhs was also short, think it's just a short movie

[kuenfist]

20 hours ago, ShawAngela said:

I just finished to watch Bandits from Shantung 1972, after many years.

I still enjoyed it as much as before, but it looks like this movie is really short : the Joysales release shows a 1h18 running time.

Does anyone know if the German version is longer?

Chang Yi plays the hero who fights alone a group of bandits lead by Pai Ying. A lot of familiar faces, here : Hu Chin in a too short role, Chin Yuet Sang, Sammo, Yi Yuan, and I just discovered that Wilson Tong played in it, but I didn't even recognized him, I had to look at hkmdb to see which character he played!

Nice swordplay movie.

The german DVD has the same runtime, but a better picturequality.

[ShawAngela]

I just finished to watch The Manchu Boxer 1974, that I watched many years ago.

Though Liu Yung is credited as the main actor, he only fights at the end of the movie, but what great fights : first against Wilson Tong (very elegant in his black clothes) and then against Kim Ki Ju and a girl. I noticed that he had some poses looking very much alike Bruce's ones.

I wonder whether Kim Ki Ju ever played a good guy in a movie...  

Kao Chiang could have been credited as the main actor too, since he has more fights than Liu Yung and his character is part of the fact that Liu Yung finally decides to fight at the end.

Ti Lung's wife Tao Min Ming plays in the movie, she is very beautiful there, and at a moment, I thought that she looked very much alike Liu Hui Ling, maybe it's the haircut and the make-up.

Once again, Sammo plays a bad guy, Japanese colluding with Kim Ki Ju in order to help this latter to win a martial arts tournament.

This movie should get a bluray release too ; actually, all Golden Harvest martial arts movies should!

The English title is The Manchu Boxer, but the Chinese title has the character for "Seven" in the title ; as after they become friends, Liu Yung calls Kao Chiang "Seventh Brother" or at least "Seven something", I thought that it was Kao Chiang who was meant to be the lead, but I searched for the translation of the Chinese title and it translates as "The champion boxer of the Seven Provinces", which would fit better the plot, since Sammo and Wilson Tong kill the champion of each of the seven provinces before the tournament in order that Wilson is the last opponent to Kim Ki Ju and let this latter win the tournament.

Edited March 13 by ShawAngela

[ShawAngela]

After having heavily disliked it when I first watched it in the 2010's, I finally watched again this evening the movie The cheeky chap 1980.

I surprisingly enjoyed it much more than years ago. Of course, I still dislike Wei Pai's character, but the plot was interesting and Wei Pai wasn't was bad as I remembered. The fights are very good. In my memory, Candy Wen was killed at the end and Wei Pai was left alone with his regrets, but 

Spoiler

it was all the contrary. He dies after taking revenge for the man he saved a while ago and hence, atones for his sins

I love Wei Pai, and I finally appreciate this movie. 

Does anyone have ever heard or found or watched the movie The devil and the ghostbuster, which he plays in along with Ku Feng? It's the only movie of his filmography that is missing in my collection, along with Bruce King of Kung Fu. Is this latter any good and worth the hunt? 

And I still have to watch Phantom Killer.

Edited March 14 by ShawAngela

[DrNgor]

A Girl Fighter (Taiwan, 1972) - 3.5/5 - https://abeautifulfilm.blogspot.com/2024/03/a-girl-fighter-1972.html

[saltysam]

Karado The Hong Kong Cat

     Young Cheung Nik believes in truth and justice so when he moves to a town with his mother he isn't too impressed to find out the place is being run by gangsters led by Tiger played by Bolo complete with an epic moustache/Things are further complicated when Karado finds out his brother James Nam is part of Tiger's gang. Mainly filmed in a field and a quarry, this non stop bashing cheapo effort is entertaining, it's got Fang Yeh and his whip and his mate Shan Kwai.No Kwok Choi or Sun Lan though

Edited March 16 by saltysam

[ShawAngela]

Yesterday, I watched Warriors of the Water Margin 1984.

It was a nice little movie about Sun Jiang being prisoner and his friends from the Water Margin coming to the rescue.

As a Mainland movie, it has a lot of wushu in it, and there is a female fighter who doesn't belong to the 108 heroes, but fights against the Councellor Kao, who refuses to let the 108 heroes alone, even when he knows that the king has offered them an amnesty.

When I was watching this movie, I couldn't help but think what he would have become had the Shaws decided to make another movie about the 108 heroes. The guy playing David Chiang's character was good, but I still had David's image in my mind...

The last three fights in the tournament oppose Wu Song, Yen Ching and another of the heroes against Kao's best men. These were the best fights of the movie, in my opinion, though the other ones were interesting enough to keep me entertained.

[DrNgor]

20 minutes ago, ShawAngela said:

Yesterday, I watched Warriors of the Water Margin 1984.

It was a nice little movie about Sun Jiang being prisoner and his friends from the Water Margin coming to the rescue.

As a Mainland movie, it has a lot of wushu in it, and there is a female fighter who doesn't belong to the 108 heroes, but fights against the Councellor Kao, who refuses to let the 108 heroes alone, even when he knows that the king has offered them an amnesty.

When I was watching this movie, I couldn't help but think what he would have become had the Shaws decided to make another movie about the 108 heroes. The guy playing David Chiang's character was good, but I still had David's image in my mind...

The last three fights in the tournament oppose Wu Song, Yen Ching and another of the heroes against Kao's best men. These were the best fights of the movie, in my opinion, though the other ones were interesting enough to keep me entertained.

This is the one also known as The Marshes of Liang Shan Po.

[ShawAngela]

I just finished to watch The kung fu kid 1977.

I bought the vcd in 2009, and had never watched it until this evening, what a mistake! This is an excellent movie, with great fights and a big twist in the plot near the end.

Chen Hui Min holds the movie very well and has a touching love story with Nora Miao.

There are a lot of familiar faces here : Tina Chin Fei as the Big Sister, Fung Hark On in a small role, Tung Lin as the inspector who employs Chen Hui Min as a decoy, Chiang Kam and Sun Lan in small roles and Tien Feng as the Big Boss. 

Looking at the cast on hkmdb, I saw that there is also Tino Wong and Wong Shu Tong, but I didn't spot them.

The ending is very sad, but I still recommend this movie for those who haven't watched it.

[Ronin]

Beach of the War Gods (1973)

Re-watch, but it had been so long that it was almost like watching it for the first time. Overall a solid film, with a spectacular end fight between Jimmy Wang Yu and Lung Fei that really elevates it. The interplay between Hsueh Han and Tien Yeh's characters was cool and I wish it had been developed more.

[ShawAngela]

I watched Mystery of Chess Boxing 1979 yesterday.

I know that some people say that this is a great movie, but for me, it was just another martial arts movie in my collection. I enjoyed it, but there are other movies that I find better than this. The scenes where Li Yi Min is bullied by the other students were too long for me, and it wasn't clear why Simon Yuen was killed and this crime wasn't shown : does anyone know if it's part of what is missing in the print? Is it also because of the damages that it seemed to me that sometimes, the scenes "jumped" to each other?

What I enjoyed the most in this movie were Jack Long's fights and the ending fight where he joins Li Yi Min to defeat Mark Long.

[SDJ]

Not 100% sure but it's gotta either be missing print or maybe a scene they didn't get around to shooting before the 0.5 seconds of production time ended. The fact it's missing is jarring but it would just be some stunt double Simon fight scene anyway. 

Edited March 23 by SDJ

[DrNgor]

The Invincible (1972) - 3.5/5 - https://abeautifulfilm.blogspot.com/2024/03/the-invincible-1972.html

[Josh Baker]

Mystery of Chessboxing 

Saw this at a screening at Genesis Cinema. 

Not bad, the final fight saved a lot of misgivings I had for it earlier on. 

It was a new transfer, the print was severly beaten up with missing frames and audio, so we have to be grateful it was even managed to be restored. 

One of the supporting actors had a coke nail, which was fun to spot. 

[Jizzmaster Jerry]

On 3/23/2024 at 8:07 PM, Josh Baker said:

Mystery of Chessboxing 

Saw this at a screening at Genesis Cinema. 

Not bad, the final fight saved a lot of misgivings I had for it earlier on. 

It was a new transfer, the print was severly beaten up with missing frames and audio, so we have to be grateful it was even managed to be restored. 

One of the supporting actors had a coke nail, which was fun to spot. 

Chessboxing is not meant to be a good movie I don’t think.  It’s made to be fun.  Made for a very particular kind of fan.  A bit of quantity over quality but overall the fights are good.  I imagine this was shot back to back with 7 Grandmasters and that was the small scale epic and Chessboxing was just made for some extra cash.  And the fact that Kuo put some effort into it shows how much he cares for the fans. Which is why I think it’s rightfully considered one of the all time classics even though it’s not as good as 7 Grandmasters or a lot of other classics.  And of course  Ghostface Killer is a legend.  Rolling around calling out his techniques.  It’s goofy I can watch it again and again.  
 

Edit- actually it looks like 7 Grandmasters was 77?  I thought it and Chessboxing were both 78.  So probably not shot back to back but Chessboxing obviously is a super cheapo flick which I have to give bonus points for since it turned out pretty good.  
 

Decided to pop this in after commenting.  The second fight is incredible.  Mark Long is at least.  Looking forward to revisit this. Excited to watch it.  I managed to forget about it for the last decade.  Used to watch it all the time.  
 

ok now I remember why I love this movie.  It’s Ghostface Killer.  He’s amazing and the star of the show.  He has a lot to say.  One of the best villains. 

Edited March 26 by Jizzmaster Jerry

[saltysam]

The Thunder Kick

Larry Lee has promised his mother he won't fight.His promise lasts about 5 minutes before he's beating down on a hat wearing Bolo and the slimy as ever Sun Lan. In the meantime James Nam and Mars have turned up from afar and offered Larry's mum a house,as you do. From here on in the story switches focus to a town being run by 3 rogue brothers, and Larry isn't having that.

The german DVD is uncut but has a huge amount of 4:3 inserts to make it uncut. This classic basher needs to be restored in full widescreen, multi language options and on a 4k Ultra HD Special edition. Not enough Sun Lan or Kwok Choi in this one though.