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THE 2nd ANNUAL WONG FEI-HUNG KUNG FU MOVIE REVIEW


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On 6/7/2020 at 9:01 AM, Neil Koch said:

The Hong Kong DVD/Blu Ray has been out for a while.

https://www.yesasia.com/us/search/enter-the-fat-dragon/0-0-0-q.enter+the+fat+dragon_bpt.48-en/list.html

I have heard it's not very good.  The release date got pushed back several times and finally it just went to streaming/DVD.

Watched this tonight and you heard right. This seemed like more a tribute to early-mid 2000s Jackie Chan kung fu comedies than anything. Ugh. It had its moments but I ended up pausing halfway through to watch the movie set scene from the original, which still held up really well. I think they just needed a reason to put Donnie Yen in a prosthetic suit because outside a quick shot of him watching Bruce Lee and getting nunchaku at the end, this was just Donnie Yen being Donnie Yen. Not that that's a terrible thing, the guy still hits his signature kicks like a boss in his mid-fifties! I was just expecting something different.

Edited by Setsuna
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On ‎6‎/‎13‎/‎2020 at 12:05 AM, Setsuna said:

I probably should have looked closer because you're right, my timeline there is off. I completely forgot how much time she had taken off between Yes Madam and the Royal Warriors series until she turned up again in Supercop. That really is a shame. In my mind, they flowed together until she drifted into Heroic Trio - Tai Chi Master and mid-90s OTT wirework and choreo.

I also really enjoyed Super Cop 2 as well. Wing Chun I'll have to revisit at some point. Just looking at her imdb page now and it really is surprising how few straight action movies she made. I could have sworn there were a lot more movies, but maybe that's just because she made such a big impression on me?

She "retired" from 1987-1992 when she was married to the head of D&B Studios, Dickson Poon.  That was pretty common for HK actresses at the time.  Like Brigitte Lin retired from acting after she married the owner of the Esprit clothing company.

And I love Heroic Trio, but I can see why some people wouldn't.  It is VERY Hong Kong cinema - over the top and changes genres/tones constantly.

Edited by Neil Koch
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513CFBVT7GL._SY445_.jpg
 
Film: The Mystery of Chess Boxing
Picked by:J.T.

"One of the RZA's favorite movies and the film that gave Wu Tang Clan member, Ghostface Killah, his nickname.

Speaking of the RZA, his El Rey intro for Enter The 36 Chambers of Shaolin is one of the most fascinating minute and a half vids you will ever watch."

 

 

The Mystery of Chess Boxing AKA Ninja Checkmate (1979)
Hong Hwa International Films
Directed by: Joseph Kuo
Cast: Jack Long, Mark Long, Lee Yi Min
Reviewed by: Execproducer
 
The Mystery of Chess Boxing is a Taiwanese knock-off of Golden Harvest's Jackie Chan film Snake in the Eagle's Shadow , even featuring actors that appeared in that film. It's low-budget evident on-screen, it is nevertheless very entertaining. Director Joseph Kuo, known for his ability to make something out of not much ( see the low-budget classic 7 Grandmasters) delivers a flawed but very watchable film.
 
After a Lau Kar-leung style opening credits sequence where two of the films stars demonstrate their skills, we meet the films third star, an evil former Qing official named Wan Chun-Shan (Mark Long), better known to his enemies as Ghost-Faced Killer, so called due to his penchant for announcing his presence by tossing a ghost-faced amulet at his enemies feet. He is on a kill-crazy rampage of revenge against the kung fu masters that sought to end his reign of terror. There are many face-offs throughout the film as the Ghost-Faced Killer pits his Five Elements style against the various styles of the kung fu masters he kills. The fights are plentiful, mostly short, and fun to watch. All of the masters are worthy foes but just not quite up to GFK's level.
 
Contrasting the deadly seriousness of GFK is Ah Pao (Lee Yi Min), a young man in town to join the Chang Sing kung fu school. Though his reason for learning kung fu is classic revenge for a murder, the character is basically a Jackie Chan style likable goof who in a fight is luckier than he is good. And that will remain the case until he finally meets the right master to teach him, a chess master named Chi Siu Tien (Jack Long) who also happens to be high on GFK's list. Though accepted into the kung fu school, he spends most of his time being bullied by the senior student and doing menial work in the kitchen. It is there that he meets Master Yuen (Yuen Siu Tin AKA Simon Yuen) , someone he doesn't take seriously until he witnesses his skill.  Master Yuen tells Ah Pao that he can't teach him kung fu but he can help him develop physically and then guide him to the right master.  After being expelled from the school, Master Yuen sends Ah Pao to Chi Siu Tien and he begins training for the ultimate showdown.
 
The film is far from perfect. There are a few bad edits and clearly large parts of it are missing. Simon Yuen, who passed away shortly after the film was released, abruptly disappears and his absence is explained away as his character being killed by the GFK off-screen. When Ah Pao learns of it, we immediately cut to him relaying that info to Chi Siu Tien. But somewhere in between a bruised and bandaged Ah Pao has taken a beating we never see.
 
The chess boxing aspect is really not developed at all. Chi Siu Tien tells Ah Pao that learning chess is meant to teach him patience. During the final fight, after realizing that GFK is repeating the same moves against Ah Pao that he had just used against him, Chi Siu Tien starts calling out chess moves to use as counters but it isn't anything that we have heard before so it is just words.
 
There are also  some fantastic moments. When the master of the Chang Sing School  learns that the Ghost-Faced Killer has found him, he closes the school and attempts to send his students away. Refusing to go until forced by their master, the students, one after the other, pay their final respects and then leave.        
 
Overall, this is a film that would likely be an obscurity even to modern fans of the genre if it hadn't been illuminated by a certain group of rappers from Staten Island. Definitely worth a watch or five. 
Edited by Execproducer
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On 6/20/2020 at 3:20 AM, Execproducer said:

The trailer is in Chinese with English subs. As far as I know, the only version available is the English dub.

Yes.  I have been only able to find the English dub even amongst the slightly disreputable and highly capable bootleg guys I know.  

The English dub is pretty bad and omits most of the Xianqi strategy employed in Ah's training. 

Ah's training is a lot like Daniel's in The Karate Kid where Ah learns sequences of moves designed to counter the GFK's stance switches but doesn't realize how good he's gotten until Master Chi gives callouts and Ah's muscle memory does the rest.  

The fights in the movie are among my favorites.

Edited by J.T.
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1 hour ago, J.T. said:

The English dub is pretty bad and omits most of the Xiangi strategy employed in Ah's training. 

 

I agree and there is just enough in that trailer to back that up. Unfortunately, we have to work with what we have available.

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BONUS REVIEWS!!!!!

Reviewed by: Setsuna

Alright so we are heading into the modern indies here with a look at a couple movies done by Eric Jacobus, who is (part of?) The Stunt People. I followed a lot of their very early work back in the early 2000s and was a frequent commenter on their board, where they had a pretty strong community of people who loved martial arts films. I was pleasantly surprised to see that he’s still making the odd indie short film from time to time so let’s take a look at a couple of the more recent features.

 

Rope A Dope 2 (2015)

 

A sequel to a 2013 project where the main character The Dope (played by Jacobus) Groundhog Day’ed himself into taking out an entire gang. This one sets up the twist early – both he and the antagonist are reliving the same day. Simple premise and zero dialogue, as we watch the two continue to add tools to their repertoire. Some of the physical comedy hits, some misses but what can you expect from a short with zero budget? My favourite part of this is that the love of old school kung fu movies is strong. The homeless man whose cart Jacobus is constantly raiding turns out to be an old hermit/mentor character and there are lots of nice touches in the fights that hit you with the nostalgia. There’s one scene where Jacobus holds a pan over his head while the enemies all whack at it that would be right at home in an early 80s Chan film.

 

After earning the old man’s cane(we’re like 8 minutes in total), The Dope is ready to take on the bad guy’s crew. The final 6-7 minutes is a fight scene and it is blistering! The end sets up a potential trilogy that I hope we get some day because this was great. Highly recommended.

 

Blindsided : The Game ( 2018 )

 

It’s immediately apparent that this is a much more ambitious project. Everything’s cleaner, it’s shot better and just looks like a proper film. I’ve never given Jacobus much credit outside of his action scenes since it usually seems like he’s just hamming it up, but I thought he did a good job here. He plays a blind man here (Walter ) and his mannerisms really sell it well. It probably hurts that this was done after Daredevil because he’s going to remind you of Murdock, but it’s more an homage to Zatoichi than anything else, which becomes clearer as the movie progresses. Speaking of more ambitious – ROGER YUAN has a role as the shopkeeper who’s in debt to some loan sharks. Walter fights them off at the beginning and yeah, right away, I wish Jacobus could have been the action choreographer in something as big as Daredevil. The guy gets what makes great martial arts scenes. Not that Daredevil didn’t have some great action scenes but I always wanted more, better-choreographed and editted fights. The only one I can really remember at the moment is the hallway fight which was undoubtedly fantastic.

 

Action-wise, this one does not have nearly the quantity I expected. I’m going to be honest, I have not seen many of the Japanese martial arts films but this seems to fit the mold with short, explosive scenes mixed throughout. There are some dumb moments and it features possibly the worst poker game every played where they could have gotten to the point without like five straight all-ins. As a whole though, I really enjoyed this.

 

I thought Eric Jacobus was connected to a Jackie Chan film at one point and it’s too bad that he hasn’t gotten a bigger break. The guy clearly lives and breathes martial arts movies. Just checking his twitter while making this review and he’s going through Royal Warriors (the Michelle Yeoh movie I wish I’d been given in the WFH movie review ?  ). Seems like he’s moved more into motion capture than anything else, and is a bit strange, but aren’t we all?

 

 

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I'm friends with Eric on Facebook and he is a bit of an oddball (he loves full motion video games from the 90s like I do) but his motion capture career is going really well.  He did the movements for Kratos in the last God of War game.

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That's very cool to hear. I wish I'd known that when I played the game, or even better if I'd seen it in the credits that would have been a total mark out moment for me.

The last line about him being strange - I meant it to come off as endearing because the guy is like a low-key idol for me in life. Dude never gave up on his dream of being in action movies and I guess has made a good career out of it for himself. He is what 20 year old me would have said I'd wanted to be but didn't have nearly enough drive to stick with it ( or even get started aside from a couple homemade beat'em ups with friends.)

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Today is Lieh Lo (RIP) and David Chiang's birthday.  Celebrate, mother fuckers!

El Rey had the good taste to show Executioners From Shaolin yesterday hopefully in Lieh Lo's honor.

Five Shaolin Masters was on last weekend to rep David Chiang.

Edited by J.T.
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1 minute ago, Execproducer said:

FYI, I'll probably try to wrap this up by Thursday night. Still time for someone to do that Bruce Lee 30 for 30 if they wanted.

I am trying to tinker, but I have a lot of shit going on right now.   Don't be surprised if it just shows up after the thread wraps.

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  • 3 weeks later...
maxresdefault-3.jpg
 
 
Film: Hapkido
Picked by: Execproducer

"Classic Angela Mao. Her fifth film (I think?) working alongside Sammo Hung and her first with Carter Wong. Directed by Feng Huang, who would ultimately direct nine films featuring Mao, the film is about three Chinese students studying Hapkido in Japanese occupied Korea. With the familiar kung-fu film template of clashing schools, evil Japanese and bonds of brotherhood. And when one of your 'brothers' is Angela Mao, asses are getting kicked for sure "

 

Hapkido (1972)
Golden Harvest
Directed by: Feng Huang
Cast: Angela Mao, Carter Wong, Sammo Hung, Whang In-Sik
Reviewed by: J.T.

It is a damn shame that no one is really familiar with Angela Mao outside of her role as Bruce Lee's asskicking sister in Enter the Dragon.  She's been in a ton of movies and deserves to be mentioned with the likes of martial arts leading ladies like Pei-Pei Ching, Chia Ling, and Etsuki Shiomi.  Here we have her showcasing her skills in a pretty formulaic yet entertaining actioner, Hapkido from 1972.

The premise is dirt simple as it should be.  Chang Cheh 101.

Three Chinese students studying with Master Shih Kwung-Chan (played by Hapkido's real life founder Ji Han-Lee!) have mastered their training after five years of study and decide to leave Korea and return to China to set up their own school.  Unsurprisingly, their excellent teaching draws the ire of the rival Black Bear school run by typically despicable Japanese stereotypes and violence ensues.  Our noble trio naturally want to live peaceful and productive lives but the Japanese simply won't let them behave, so they must go out and whoop ass to defend themselves, their school and their village.

One of the things that really stands out about Hapkido are the fights, and that's a good thing.  Unlike the highly complex choreography from Venom Mob films, the fights in Hapkido are about a realistic looking as you could get without someone possibly getting injured on film.  The strikes are brutal and the throws are particularly nasty looking and it's great!  There is one memorable scene where Mao defends herself against a katana wielding enemy with a fucking steel bar and I'd be surprised there weren't any real bruises after Feng Huan yelled, "Cut!" 

It is so awesome to see Angela Mao dominate the screen the way she does.  She is lithe and powerful and commands the screen like few before her or after her.  If there is a true Godmother of Kung Fu movies, it is probably her or maybe Pei-Pei Cheng.

The other thing that sets Hapkido apart from the rest is the cast.  Not only do you have a youthful Sammo Hung in his fighting prime in this joint, you also have a budding Carter Wong and the proverbial metric crap ton of cameos including Yuen Biao, Jackie Chan, and Billy Chan!

I have never been able to find a good copy of Hapkido, so I thank whomever picked this awesome movie and finally forced me to seek it out so that it may have an honored place amongst the giants of my collection.

 

 

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Sorry for the delay but getting back to work has been brutal. That is the last of the official reviews though I still have a couple of bonus things to finish up and I promised someone I'd review their first pick because it was their back-up that ended up being reviewed.

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9 hours ago, Execproducer said:
maxresdefault-3.jpg
 
 
Film: Hapkido
Picked by: Execproducer

"Classic Angela Mao. Her fifth film (I think?) working alongside Sammo Hung and her first with Carter Wong. Directed by Feng Huang, who would ultimately direct nine films featuring Mao, the film is about three Chinese students studying Hapkido in Japanese occupied Korea. With the familiar kung-fu film template of clashing schools, evil Japanese and bonds of brotherhood. And when one of your 'brothers' is Angela Mao, asses are getting kicked for sure "

 

Hapkido (1972)
Golden Harvest
Directed by: Feng Huang
Cast: Angela Mao, Carter Wong, Sammo Hung, Whang In-Sik
Reviewed by: J.T.

It is a damn shame that no one is really familiar with Angela Mao outside of her role as Bruce Lee's asskicking sister in Enter the Dragon.  She's been in a ton of movies and deserves to be mentioned with the likes of martial arts leading ladies like Pei-Pei Ching, Chia Ling, and Etsuki Shiomi.  Here we have her showcasing her skills in a pretty formulaic yet entertaining actioner, Hapkido from 1972.

The premise is dirt simple as it should be.  Chang Cheh 101.

Three Chinese students studying with Master Shih Kwung-Chan (played by Hapkido's real life founder Ji Han-Lee!) have mastered their training after five years of study and decide to leave Korea and return to China to set up their own school.  Unsurprisingly, their excellent teaching draws the ire of the rival Black Bear school run by typically despicable Japanese stereotypes and violence ensues.  Our noble trio naturally want to live peaceful and productive lives but the Japanese simply won't let them behave, so they must go out and whoop ass to defend themselves, their school and their village.

One of the things that really stands out about Hapkido are the fights, and that's a good thing.  Unlike the highly complex choreography from Venom Mob films, the fights in Hapkido are about a realistic looking as you could get without someone possibly getting injured on film.  The strikes are brutal and the throws are particularly nasty looking and it's great!  There is one memorable scene where Mao defends herself against a katana wielding enemy with a fucking steel bar and I'd be surprised there weren't any real bruises after Feng Huan yelled, "Cut!" 

It is so awesome to see Angela Mao dominate the screen the way she does.  She is lithe and powerful and commands the screen like few before her or after her.  If there is a true Godmother of Kung Fu movies, it is probably her or maybe Pei-Pei Cheng.

The other thing that sets Hapkido apart from the rest is the cast.  Not only do you have a youthful Sammo Hung in his fighting prime in this joint, you also have a budding Carter Wong and the proverbial metric crap ton of cameos including Yuen Biao, Jackie Chan, and Billy Chan!

I have never been able to find a good copy of Hapkido, so I thank whomever picked this awesome movie and finally forced me to seek it out so that it may have an honored place amongst the giants of my collection.

 

 

Shout Factory put out a good DVD a few years ago of Hapkido and Lady Whirlwind.  It's out of print now, but you may be able to find it on eBay.

http://hkfilm.net/dvdrevs/madouble.htm

Supposedly, Fortune Star charges a lot for the rights for US companies to use the Golden Harvest library, even for one-off showings at festivals.  Which is probably why we keep getting the same 4 Bruce Lee movies over and over and nothing much past that.

Also if you are in the NYC area, Angela Mao runs a restaurant (I think in Long Island) and is cool with talking about her films, taking pictures, signing autographs, etc.

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I have been to Long Island dozens of times over the years. How did I miss eating at Angela Mao's restaurant?

I may have to drive up to New York this weekend to correct that injustice.

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On 7/14/2020 at 11:04 PM, Execproducer said:

Sorry for the delay but getting back to work has been brutal. That is the last of the official reviews though I still have a couple of bonus things to finish up and I promised someone I'd review their first pick because it was their back-up that ended up being reviewed.

I'll still be contributing off and on to the thread as work and COVID allow.  

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  • RIPPA unpinned this topic
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Thanks you! I was gonna post that earlier but forgot. 

TCM has been going through horror anthologies so I snagged Dead of NIght earlier, along with Dementia 13 and Spider Baby before they started that. Twice Told Tales is on right now and is good in a kinda soft-boiled Corman-Poe manner. 

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