DVD review - Kung Fu Hustle

Kung Fu movies, I love them, I maybe don't watch them so much nowadays and maybe I'm out of the loop but there don't seem to be as many coming out any more. At least not in the west, I am sure they are just as plentiful as they ever were in Asian cinema but I am just not seeing them advertised at the cinema here anymore or in DVD rentals at all. They are kind of like the 80's style action blockbusters, I just don't seem to see quality examples of the genre much around lately.


Now historically I am sure that Bruce Lee was the original martial artist that made it into the movies in Hollywood. He had to work hard to get what he could from the business but had a hard time trying to popularise Kung Fu movies and getting roles. I remember the TV series Kung Fu, I enjoyed it as a kid and I am sure I had a Kung Fu annual at some point. However that was a prime example of Lee being held down by the TV Execs. He came up with the idea for the show and they chose the non-Asian David Carradine to play the role of the half Chinese "Grasshopper" Kwai Chang Caine. 

David has a few more geeky claims to fame, he played Frankenstein in Death Race 2000 and Bill in the, Tarantino written and directed, Kill Bill movies. He actually learned martial arts later in life inspired by his role in Kung Fu. I'm just glad that inspired him and not his driving in Death Race 2000 😏 



  

Lee played the role of Kato in The Green Hornet. I never saw that at all as a kid, I don't know if the UK TV networks ever bought it. I don't recall it from the time but Green Hornet & Kato popped their heads out of the window in one of the Batman TV shows from the 60's. They also appeared as guests in one show solving a crime together. I only know this as an old customer of mine ripped me the whole series onto DVD-Rs for me but I left them at work when I was made redundant. Needless to say as the Batman series is now out on DVD it's on my to-buy list. I may well look into getting the Green Hornet series too, it only ran for one season though with 26 episodes running from September 9, 1966,  through to March 17, 1967. I am not sure if this series is even available now though. All I could find were a couple of movies, The Green Hornet and Fury of The Dragon cobbled together to cash in after Lee died 😢 I did discover that Kevin Smith had written a Batman/Green Hornet comic that followed up from the TV show story!! And there was a 1940's TV series of the Green Hornet where the master from Kung Fu plays Kato!

    

 I have the movie from 2011 and that was pretty cool. Hey another thing, off tangent, but did you know that Britt Reid aka the Green Hornet is a relative of The Lone Ranger?? He shares the same family name as Britt's father was the Lone Ranger's nephew. True story! 


As far as movies go the only one I really recall of Lee's was Enter The Dragon. (It was sadly practically his last, he died during filming of his next movie The Game of Death). It's a classic of the genre, no nonsense, no jokes just serious action. If you want this movie with jokes and silliness check out The Kentucky Fried Movie, it has a parody called A Fistful of Yen which is hilarious.

So Lee was historically first I think but for me I am sure that I was aware of Jackie Chan before I knew of him. I could be mistaken of course, my memory is naff as heck. I recall he was in a movie called Battle Creek Brawl (1980) that was on in the cinemas in the UK and I was too young to go and see it. This was the age of the video rental shops though and I did watch a ton of Chan movies over the years. Some I can recall are of course Drunken Master, Armour of God, Wheels on Meals and Police Story. His films were different from Lee's with the added element of humour, lots of fart jokes and terrible dubbing and sound effects. Also insane stunts, remember the crazy out takes scenes at the end of each film? It's surprising Jackie is still going with all the crazy bumps he's taken over the years. He's still making good films too. Check out my review of The Foreigner, it's got no humour in it at all but it's a cool serious film and Jackie is great in it.

    

Sho Kosugi is a name I remember too, with a number of "Ninja" movies from the early 80's being pretty good viewing at the time.

Of the 80's/90's action heroes Jean-Claude Van Damme was the most martial arts focused, with films like Blood Sport, Kickboxer, A.W.O.L, Double Impact and Street Fighter but his movies branched out from that with gun fights so I don't think of him as a total martial arts hero really. 



Fun fact: I found out he studied ballet for 5 years!! Well I never!!

Played Colonel Guile in Street Fighter and was the inspiration for Johnny Cage in Mortal Kombat too!

A more recent series of films I liked were Ong Bak with Tony Jaa.

 The knees and elbows thrown in those are insane, it just looks damned painful watching it!! Those fight stuntmen earn every penny of their money and they probably deserve more really I reckon! I've not seen any other films by him though and there doesn't seem to be any martial arts action star that I know of bringing out a succession of great movies.  There are a few one-offs like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and the Ip Man series, both of which are pretty entertaining. 

This film Kung Fu Hustle starring Stephen Chow who also did Shaolin Soccer is pretty huge though, looking it up I found out it was the highest-grossing Chinese-language film in the history of Hong Kong until it was surpassed in 2011. It came out in 2004!! Wow, time files huh?