Anyone Else Here Appreciate FEARLESS FIGHTERS (1973)?

[Guest Dahnamics]

wow..

thoughts?

[Guest jmungus]

thoughts?

thx for the reminder. yeah, cool movie, not of the highest grade, but very good, crazy fun nonetheless [adding title to rewatch-list].

[Guest Tosh]

I caught the last half on cable a couple months ago, glad I didn't buy it, worth a rent.

[Guest GwaiLoMoFo]

Didnt care for it myself. A few cool scenes (dude throwin leaves into the tree) but standard low budget affair. The inventive weapons were cool, but overall it was kinda crappy. I agree maybe worth a rent, but not a buy.

[Guest silver hermit]

this was a film that the dubbing almost ruined

[Guest Lei Kung]

I saw a trailer for this on some other release a while back. It looked like any other low buget kung fu movie, but it kept pausing to say "WATCH FEARLESS FIGHTERS!!!!!!!" like some sort of mind control or something.

[Guest schleg64]

I just saw "Fearless Fighters"(AKA "Hero of Heroes")the other day on Image's DVD label. What a riot! Lots of fights with characters that have exotic weapons and cool names (One Man Army, Soul Ripper, Lethal Whip, Solar Ray of Death). The print looks fantastic for its age (a 1971 released in the US in 1973) and the dubbing is good, if hokey (James Hong and Robert Ito are two of the voices). Has anyone else sen this film? What do you think of it? Is the original Chinese version out anywhere on DVD?

[Guest HAZ]

I thought it was a blast & a well produced dvd. If only Image could have done such a good job with their Shaw releases. I don't think there's any OG Chinese print.

[The Dragon]

FF is one of those films you can really have a lot of fun with, sor of like The Invincible SuperChan. The video is a great remaster and the action is not too bad for it's time. If we call the old swingy armed battles bashers, what shall we call these types?

[Guest Killer Meteor]

I think there was a video of the Chinese version, under the title A Real Man

Not a bad film but a bit ponderous in places.

[The Dragon]

Not many takers on Fearless Fighters? Don't deny yourself an opportunity of great old school fun.

[Killer Meteor]

Does the original edit exist, either in Mandarin or a HK based original English dub. The Image DVD is taken from a re-edited and re-scored US version, with US dubbing

[KUNG FU BOB]

Oh, I didn't know it's edited. I own it, but haven't watched it yet.

Killer Meteor, have you heard that it's missing footage? Or is it only the audio that's been tampered with?

[Bruce Long]

I haven't seen the Image version, but the Ocean Shores VHS version, titled "The Ninja Killer", is 90 minutes.

[Killer Meteor]

I haven't seen the Image version, but the Ocean Shores VHS version, titled "The Ninja Killer", is 90 minutes.

I think the Image is just 83min. On the commentary, the US producer talks about cutting down the film - and creating one huge plot hole at the end!

[Guest Markgway]

Wow. He had the front to do a commentary??

[KUNG FU BOB]

From what I've read (maybe Mark reviewed this here?), they said it was a good commentary too. I guess it'll be somewhat interesting to hear an American distributors POV. Though I am mightily bummed that it's dubbed only and cut. :S

[Stephe]

Not many takers on Fearless Fighters? Don't deny yourself an opportunity of great old school fun.

I saw my first kung fu movie, Supermanchu, in either 1973 or 1974. After

that was a double feature of Fist of Fury and Enter the Dragon. Soon

after, I saw Five Fingers of Death, The Karate Killers (aka Stranger from

Canton), Blood on the Dragon, and The Fearless Fighters (aka A Real Man).

I gotta admit, until I saw my first Venoms film (I think it was Kid with

the Golden Arm) four years later, Fearless Fighters was my fave karate

flick. I thought the superimposed arms of the One Man Army character

were cool, and I found the scenes where people toss things at each other

hilarious. For example, one guy is shot at by five archers. He catches

all the arrows, and with one move, returns all five, striking each

archer dead center. Best is near the end where one character throws the

liquid of a mug of beer at another guy and this second guy catches it in

his own mug and drinks it!

That, in turn, reminds me of the super-outrageous scene in Blood on the

Dragon, where Jimmy Wang Yu is sitting on a tree branch 15 or 20 feet in

the air -- of a tree that has no lower branches! -- eating a plum or

other seeded fruit, and when a soldier says, "Come down here, you

bastard!" Jimmy spits the plum pit into the soldier's mouth, breaking the

soldier's teeth. I once saw a kung fu movie where the characters called

each other bastard over 30 times (I counted!). It might have been Blood

on the Dragon, but I'm not sure.

Rant over. Hee hee. Fearless Fighters brings back great memories.

[loempiavreter]

Looks like my type of movie... added to my watch list!

[ThunderScore]

U.S. producer Richard Ellman did (IMO) a great job in promoting FEARLESS FIGHTERS in 1973. Love that trailer and the old library music used in the English version, one of the few recorded stateside - in this case supervised by Lo Pan himself, James Hong.

Although nothing new or special here, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I have a soft spot for these early releases (DEEP THRUST, SEVEN BLOWS OF THE DRAGON, KARADO, etc.) and have been re-visiting a lot of these titles as of late.

THE NINJA KILLER was the Ocean Shores re-titling of FEARLESS FIGHTERS with a new (inferior) English track...

Not long after, Video Treasures unleashed this awesome VHS with cover art by the legendary Ken Barr:

It was a great day when Image Entertainment released a nice wide DVD with an interesting commentary by Richard Ellman...

Edited December 10, 2016 by ThunderScore

[One Armed Boxer]

Yes! I actually picked up the Image DVD of this many years ago based on the strength of the review site master Mark Pollard posted. You can check it out here -

http://www.kungfucinema.com/reviews/review-fearless-fighters-1971

[GOLDEN DRAGON YIN-YANG]

I did. Saw this on VHS so long ago.

GD Y-Y

[DragonClaws]

Never seen this film befor, love the old 1970's U.S promo you posted ThunderScore.

[The Dragon]

I have this, the reproduced poster art and remastered DVD.

Very nice.

[ThunderScore]

Also distributed at the time FEARLESS FIGHTERS was released...