Category: Martial Arts

The Guy With The Secret Kung Fu (1980) – Two Ming Martial Arts Experts spend their days helping the weak

The Guy With The Secret Kung Fu (1980) – Two Ming patriots spend their days helping the weak and rescuing damsels in distress. This alum gets them in trouble, though, as they are captured and then volunteered to go after the fearsome Dragon Gang, a tribe of bandits that have been terrorizing the land. They must fight their way through the ranks, including a Taoist monk and his nearly invulnerable “demon,” before they can finally face off against the beautiful and sinister leader of the Dragon Gang.

Terrible acting, bad sound effects, plot pits (they have far passed the level of simple plot holes), bad dubbing (they don’t even dub everything), obviously out-of-place scenery, repeated clips to increase length, punches that obviously don’t hit. Man, this movie has got it all. From the moment bamboo connected with brick to make a metal clang, I knew this movie was going to be brilliant. It even has a borderline-zombie character. – tpotter-6

Director: Kei Law
Starring: Fei Meng, Nancy Yen, Chung Chien Li

Plot:

Karate Kids follows Brothers, Zack and Woody (portrayed by real-life brothers Chris Petersen (actor) and Patrick Petersen). They are young karate students who embark on a weekend camping trip with their grandfather J.J. (Charles Lane (actor)). Along the way they meet a new friend, Carol Forbinger (Sally Boyden (singer)) and her parents (Rick Lenz and Sharon Clark). When the Forbinger family encounters a tough-talking backwoods mother (Ann Sothern) and her two bumbling sons (Joe Spinell and John Davis Chandler) who decide to hold Carol captive believing they can collect a sizeable ransom, the “karate kids” must find a way to use their martial arts skills to rescue the Forbinger girl with a little help from their grandfather and some new friends they meet along the way.

Cast and Crew:

Directed by Curtis Hanson (L.A. Confidential, 8 Mile), co-written by Alan Ormsby (Cat People, Children Shouldn`t Play With Dead Things) with the legendary actors Ann Sothern and Joe Spinell (Maniac) and Chris Petersen.

A lightning bolt strikes the grave of Bruce Lee. However, that is as much as Bruce Lee has to do with it. When Han Ji-hyeok dies mysteriously in Las Vegas, his brother Han Wook rushes there to make inquiries. He learns that Ji-hyeok was the victim of an opium ring. Unable to get the police to help him, Han Wook works alone in his attempts to bring the drug smugglers to justice.

Originally entitled “The Stranger” and directed by Umberto Lenzi (under a Korean pseudonym), who helmed the infamous grossout cannibal flick “Make Them Die Slowly”, “Bruce Lee Fights Back from the Grave” is the most hilariously awful installment in the Bruceploitation subgenre of 1974-80. It doesn’t even star one of the three well-known Bruce Lee impersonators (Bruce Li, Bruce Le, and Dragon Lee). “Bruce K.L. Lea” is actually Jun Chong, a Korean taekwon do instructor based in Los Angeles. He’s terrible as far as imitating Lee’s mannerisms goes, but he’s a fine kicker. You have to enjoy this for what it is. PLEASE don’t expect a Bruce Lee movie! He only made four films–“Fists of Fury”, “The Chinese Connection”, “Return of the Dragon”, and “Enter the Dragon” (“Game of Death” doesn’t qualify)–and he wasn’t identified by a name other than Bruce Lee in any of them. Not Li, not Le, not Lea, not Lai. The story has nothing to do with Bruce Lee fighting back from the grave, either. Jun Chong does not play Lee nor a character based on Lee, but rather a Korean martial artist who comes to Los Angeles to find out how his best friend died…only to discover that he’s being stalked by a weird assortment of bad guys (a Japanese swordsman played by future “Revenge of the Ninja” star Sho Kosugi, a tall, bald black man with a cape and an earring, and a cowboy among them). As I mentioned, Chong does a kind of dimestore Bruce Lee impression during the fight scenes (thumbing his nose, going “waaaaahhhh!”), and the dubbing is truly hilarious–even for a martial arts movie. Particularly amusing is the evil cowboy’s voice; he sounds about as masculine as the guy who wore the stetson hat in the Village People. Now that you know what to expect…enjoy! – InjunNose

Director: Doo-yong Lee
Starring: Jun Chong, Deborah Dutch, Su-cheon Bae

Kung-fu princess versus Evil Wizard

A teenage princess learns kung fu so that she can return from exile inside a magic mountain to claim her kingdom from usurpers. On beautiful Phoenix Island, the Golden City is ruled by a kind and benevolant emperor and his three loyal guards who have combined their skills into an unbeatable form of kung-fu. One day the Golden City is attacked by General Black and his evil wizard, who storm the palace. With a number of notable exceptions, the plots of many of the kung-fu films being churned out in the 1970s were fairly standard. Often productions went forward with only the most basic outline of a script (usually based on Chinese Legend or stories performed in Peking Opera), which is why many of the plots usually boil down to basic revenge stories. It’s always interesting, therefore, when productions have a bit more ambition in their story, and Return Of The Kung-Fu Dragon certainly has some ambition – though it is throttled significantly by weak production values and editing

10,000 fist pump sound effects? Check. Ultra goofball character with more slapstick comedy than a normal person can tolerate? x10. Old dude with super beard who uses it in his King-Fu style? Check. Character development? Non-existent. Cheesy sets? To the max. Pure fun… the way I could do it with my own home camera and a small band of boot-stompin’ Fu fighters – Dr. T. Roy Brown

Director: Chi-Lien Yu
Starring: Lingfeng Shangguan, Chung Chien Li, Sing Chen