::Shaolin Spot::

Shaolin Chamber

2005-07-30T16:07:00.000-07:00

I want to thank everybody that his visited this site in the past, and for some reason still come here from time to time. My new site SHAOLIN CHAMBER is up and running, if you haven't checked it out yet, please do. Broadband needed to fully enjoy the site, tons of video clips and more. ENJOY, and may BUDDHA BLESS YOU!

NEW WEBSITE!!!!!

2004-12-24T03:31:00.000-08:00

Very good news for everybody that has been coming here and like what i've been doing..i just registered a domain name..signed up with a webhost..and am now hard at work, working on my NEW site... i will continue the "blog style commmentary" on the frontpage of my new site..PLUS ..i will be doing movie reviews which will include video and audio clips from the movie as well as screencaps/images ...

PLUS ..alot new features that i havent even got into here at Shaolin Spot.

So ..if you enjoyed what i was doing here..you can expect more of the same..well actually..you can expect ALOT MORE!

MY NEW WEBSITE IS ShaolinChamber.com

PLEASE keep checking back here at Shaolin Spot to when i finally go live with my new site..or just keep checking over at ShaolinChamber.com to see if it's up and running.

I really do appreciate any and all of you that have been coming here and enjoyed the links,news,stories,reviews and more... believe me..it will only get better!

Hope to see you soon at ShaolinChamber.com!

Shaolin Spot's Mini Poll Results!

2004-12-22T13:26:00.000-08:00

So far it's Sammo 9/Jackieo 0 ...and i think i would have to agree..i for one definitely think Sammo made better quality old school kung fu movies...Magnificent Butcher,Odd Couple,Warriors Two,Knockabout,The Victim,Encounter of the Spooky Kind,Iron Fisted Monk,etc. ..and as far as Jackie his best were Shaolin Wooden Men,Snake in the Eagle's Shadow,Snake and Crane Arts of Shaolin,The Young Master,etc..

Wow..now that i really look at the two and compare..it was a waste of time putting up the poll..lol ...Sammo wins Hands Down!

Sammo Rules!ImageShack.us" />

Shaw Bros Movie Posters

2004-12-16T04:39:00.000-08:00

Here is a site where you can see tons of Shaw Bros movie posters..and ..well...thats about it...i don't think they are for sale...i guess the guy just made the site showing them off just to make people like you and i jealous..and to maybe show how bad ass he is for having all those posters!

Well it worked, i'm jealous!

check out the posters Here!

-----------------------------------------------------------

Here is a open directory listing of a bunch of shaw and non shaw kung fu lobby cards and posters...but the only bad thing is the guy put the word SAMPLE accross everyone..still they are cool to look at.

Here is an example of one for the movie Invincible Armour.

To see more click Here!

Ong Bak

2004-12-15T04:12:00.000-08:00

Now i'm assuming that everybody that is coming here to Shaolin Spot has already heard of this movie..and i'm betting because of the hype that surrounded this movie when it first came out, alot of you have already bought and seen it, like me!

Well for those of you that haven't seen it yet...watch the trailer for it Here!

AND

watch a 7 min clip made up of some of the best action that takes place in the movie Here! (avi format)

OK now..i have read where people were comparing this movie to the Jet Li classic FIST OF LEGEND ..and asking which is the better martial arts movie...well to me Fist of Legend definitely is a classic kung fu/martial arts movie..one of the best i have ever seen...while Ong Bak is a very good muay thai/martial arts movie..it is altogether different..

Fist of Legend while filmed in 1993 is more of a throwback to the classic kung fu movies that i'm sure most of us seen as we were growing up..and still watch to this day.

Ong Bak features muay thai fighting, which to me was the first time i had ever seen this type of martial arts..i have heard about it before but just had never seen it.

The star of Ong Bak, Tony Jaa is unbelievable in what he can do with his body..i couldn't even imagine to attempt just one of the moves he pulls off in the movie.

Incase you're wondering..NO there was no wires used in the making of Ong Bak..that is all Tony Jaa's natural ability ...Believe it or not!

So if i was told i would be locked in a room for 1 year with a tv and dvd player..and i had to choose 1 dvd between Fist of Legend or Ong Bak as my only source of entertainment (well besides my hairy palm)..i'd have to say i'm going with Fist of Legend.

Got Balls?

2004-12-15T03:37:00.000-08:00

This looks like it would hurt...

Right in the sack!! ....OUCH!

White Hair Evil Fox Villians

2004-12-14T14:31:00.000-08:00

This is the best listing of "white haired villians" i have ever seen..this Flash file was created by Flashlegs Pete Jr ..who by the way has a site selling some of the most hard to find kung fu movies ever! I highly recommend checking out their site Here!

To watch this Flash..click the pic!

Don't forget..all movies mentioned in the
flash can be bought right at Flashlegsrare.com

Kung Fu Hustle

2004-12-14T13:39:00.000-08:00

If you are a fan of Stephen Chow...i know you are dying to see his latest movie which opens in theaters December 23 in China,Honk Kong,Malaysia and Singapore ..so unless you live in one of those places..you will be waiting for the import dvd to drop or wait for Sony to release this here in the U.S.

I have only seen a couple of his movies...but really enjoyed them..i've seen A Chinese Odyssey 1: Pandora's Box,A Chinese Odyssey 2: Cinderella and of course Shaolin Soccer.

**both the Chinese Odyssey movies are on sale right now at HKFlix.com for $4.95 each!

He has so many more movies that i want to see ..i guess someday i will check them out.

Anyways..after just seeing the FULL TRAILER to his latest movie Kung Fu Hustle..i have to say..it looks like he has another hit on his hands. He really knows how to implement the use of CGI along with martial arts, just check out the trailer to see what im talking about..i watched it a couple times, i can't wait to see this one!

Go to the English version of the Official Kung Fu Hustle site Here.. and watch the trailer with english subtitles!

David Chiang

2004-12-12T23:46:00.000-08:00

One of the most informative looks at the life and career of David Chiang before,during and after the Shaw Bros.

Most of today’s Hong Kong viewers would know of David Chiang for having played Luke, the ill fated would be revolutionary of ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA II starring Jet Li. Few would guess that twenty years before OUATIC, it was Chiang who was one of the top martial stars of his time, cutting down and fighting dozens of enemies at a time, jumping about like a graceful gazelle, a dashing cool dude with a wily smile on his face. Paired with the majestic Ti Lung they were the great "Deadly Duo" of Hong Kong martial cinema, the stars of a dozen "Blood Brothers" movies that were the most violent and intense martial potboilers of the early seventies and they ruled the Hong Kong action movie screens. Yet as the Blood Brothers period came to an end and time passed on, his partner Ti Lung went on to have a successful movie career maintaining his flawless reputation, but Chiang’s career began to decline and even worse he, along with (Jimmy) Wang Yu, became one of the most under appreciated kung fu performers of all. Later fans of the genre found his physical skills unsatisfactory, complained about the tacky seventies fashions which he often wore and were a bit annoyed by his screen persona. The fact remains though that Chiang was not only a major player in his time but an able screen-action performer as well as an award winning actor with an original screen persona who often outshone Ti Lung. He was the real heart and centre of some of Chang's Blood brothers movies.

David Chiang was born Yim Wai in 1947, the second son of two famed actors Yim Dut and Hong Wei. Later on his widowed mother having remarried with a movie producer she gave birth to another son. All three siblings were destined to a have a great movie career: the first Paul Chun as a renown character actor and the youngest Derek Yee as an actor/director. Young Wai received a college education in Hong Kong but had already started appearing in movies as a child actor, most notably THE CALLS OF THE NIGHTBIRDS, LITTLE ANGEL OF THE STREET and YOUNG VAGABOND the two latter also featuring his elder brother Paul Chun (then known asYim Cheong) and produced by his step-father. He also appears to have received some Peking Opera training - not enough to make him a top performer the likes of Jackie Chan or Sammo Hung but more than enough to gave him an unusual agility and solid physical skills. Following graduation, he started working as a stuntman in the movies.

Chiang had graduated to fight-instructor by the time he was spotted by Shaw Brothers leading martial art director Chang Cheh, who brought him into the studio in the winter of 1966 where he then groomed him for a couple of years. By the time he emerge he was known as David Chiang Dai-Wai,. The meaning of his stage name and it’s origin appear to be rather obscure: Chiang he may have taken it for no other reason than it was a very recognizable name (because of Taiwan president Chiang Kai Shek) with a star quality feel to it. His original first name being Wai , “Dai” was added to make it mean “True Greatness”, “Dai-wai” being also the direct transliteration of the English name “David”, it may also have been deemed a suitable stage-name for him because his small frame and scholarly looks were evocative of the Biblical David of the David and Goliath famed. Having an English name may also have served to give him a suitable urbane and sophisticated air that played well with his deceptively scholarly, effete look. Regardless Chiang Dai wei can be glimpsed in GOLDEN SWALLOW (1968) as well as THE INVINCIBLE FIST (1969), but his first major role was in the gangster flick DEAD END (1969). He graduated to full martial star the following year with WANDERING SWORDSMAN and especially VENGEANCE, the first of Chang Cheh’s "Blood Brothers" movies pairing the deadly duo of Chiang and Ti Lung. It was also a watershed movie of Hong Kong martial arts cinema that defined and cemented Chang Cheh’s cinematic approach for years.

For a couple of years the Blood Brothers movies were all the rage, Hong Kong’s top ranking box office champions with such films as HEROIC ONES, THE SINGING KILLER (both 1970), THE NEW ONE ARMED SWORDSMAN, THE DUEL, DUEL OF IRON FIST, THE DEADLY DUO, THE ANONYMOUS HEROES (all 1971) and THE ANGRY GUEST (1972). Ti Lung and Chiang were paired splendidly together – a wonderful contrast to one another - Ti Lung big, majestic, very masculine and impetuous; Chiang small, urbane, dashing, wily yet secretive and introverted. Chiang had very much an effete, romantic quality to him but instead of being ineffectual and passive as these types of characters tended to be within the frame of Chinese literature, he could go on a rampage or quietly undermine an opponent with his sneaky, mysterious ways. This gave him an air of ambiguity, as nobody knew where he stood for a while.

With the sudden arrival of Bruce Lee in late 1971, the Blood Brothers movies lost some of their steam - their formula began looking tired and Chang Cheh appeared to be losing interest Still, Chiang remained very active by performing in a handful of Chang martial extravaganzas such as THE WATER MARGIN (aka: SEVEN BLOWS OF THE DRAGONS), THE FOUR RIDERS, TRILOGY OF SWORDSMANSHIP (all 1972) and the PIRATE (1973). He was continually paired with Ti Lung but the drama and the chemistry between them wasn't quite the same as in the old Blood Brothers movies. He also played a small but crucial role of a dashing, charismatic young gang boss in BOXER FROM SHANTUNG (1972) which was the starring debut of Chang Cheh’s latest discovery, kung fu star Chen Kwan Tai. He was also the star of a couple of Chang’s contemporary dramas such as YOUNG PEOPLE (1972), GENERATION GAP (1972) and FRIENDS (1973).

1973 also saw Chiang as part of the trio assembled along with Ti Lung and Chen Kwan Tai in Chang Cheh’s most ambitious martial movie drama to date: BLOOD BROTHERS aka: DYNASTY OF BLOOD. In 1974 he was picked by Shaw Studios to play the Chinese lead in the Shaw Brother/ Hammer hybrid horror/kung fu production LEGEND OF THE SEVEN GOLDEN VAMPIRES, which was Chiang’s one shot at international stardom. It showed him in good fighting form and speaking fluent if accented English, but unfortunately his role was pretty much limited to being of the helpful and disposable amiable ethnic man-servant variety.

That same year, a world-wide economic crisis struck Hong Kong and that along with the disarray of the martial art’s genre following Bruce Lee’s death, forced Shaw Brother to reduce their expenses which they did by letting go of some of their major stars, including David Chiang - although he would always remain closely associated with the studio on a freelance basis. His first independent effort was trying his hand at directing a social drama of all things - titled THE DRUG ADDICT, which turned out to be a flop.

For the following decade Chiang would alternate between movies for Chang Cheh/ Shaw Brothers, some freelance work and his own productions. His Chang Cheh movies included SAVAGE FIVE (1974), FIVE SHAOLIN MASTERS (aka FIVE MASTER OF DEATH), ALL MEN ARE BROTHERS (both 1975), SEVEN MEN ARMY, SHAOLIN TEMPLE (both 1976), NAVAL COMMANDOS and MAGNIFICENT WANDERER (1977). Most of these films appear to have been routine efforts from Chang when compared to his earlier works with Chiang, capitalizing mostly on a stellar kung fu cast. In 1976, Chiang once again tried his hand at directing with the CONDEMNED. Probably in the hope of revitalizing his by now sagging career, Chiang then teamed up with another martial star whose hour of glory had passed, (Jimmy) Wang Yu, and the pair founded their own Taiwan based film company: their first film being ONE-ARMED SWORDSMEN which Chiang also directed. Truly his own master now, Chiang starred in his own self-production that he made at a frantic pacing. Chiang found his best work of the period with martial director Lau Kar Leung who had choreographed him in all the Chang Cheh movies of the early seventies, with SHAOLIN MANTIS (1978), which not only offered him the opportunity to deliver perhaps his best screen-fighting performance, but also to play quite an unusual part as an unwilling Quin dynasty spy sent to infiltrate a family of Ming dynasty rebels. In one of his other notable Shaw Brothers films, he shaved his head so as to play the titular character in ABBOT OF SHAOLIN (1978).

Curiously enough, in a couple of the freelance works he did for an independent company, Chiang changed his name first to Gareth Lo before settling on John Keung (Keung being the Cantonese version of Chiang). The truth of the matter was that “John” had been his true personal English name all along, while David was but his stage-one that he now tried to discard. Nevertheless he continued to be known as David Chiang by western fans of Hong Kong. Among nearly a dozen freelance films there is YOUNG REBEL co-starring and directed by his old partner Ti Lung, as well as DEATH DUEL, the film debut of his younger brother Derek Yee (1977) .

In the second half of the seventies as martial art films evolved towards more and more comedic, Chiang moved with the time, starring in a handful of such films. He had already done MAGNIFICENT WANDERERS back in 1977 and now under the wing of director/ character actor Eric Tsang he did THE LOOT (AKA BLOODY TATOO) (1980) and The CHALLENGER. In 1981 he even directed one himself called LEGEND OF THE OWL produced by his brother Paul Chun. As marital films then came less popular he also gradually started doing pure comedy as well as drama and switched from leading man to character parts. By the time the martial art era came to a definitive close with the folding of the Shaw Brother’s movie operation, Chiang had given up on kung fu for some time already. Beside his acting work, he also focused much more on directing with a string of movies done through the later eighties and early nineties consisting primarily of comedies - SILENT LOVE (1986), MR HANDSOME (1987) DOUBLE FATTINESS (1988), MY DEAR SON (1989), WHEN EAST MEETS WEST (1990) and WILL OF IRON (1991). He also planned or produced a handful of films as well including JUST HEROES, a movie that involved a dozen of Chang Cheh’s close associates in order to help finance his planned retirement and the Jackie Chan twin’s movie TWIN DRAGONS. After a hiatus of several years he came back one last time to directing with MOTHER OF A DIFFERENT KIND in 1995.

His most noticeable acting performances since the mid-eighties include: a Cinema City ghost comedy TILL DEATH DO WE SCARE (1982), an action comedy with Sammo WHERE’S OFFICER TUBA (86), SHANGHAI 13 (his last movie for Chang Cheh (1986)), ANGEL (1989), ONCE UPON A TIME IN CHINA II (1992), WHAT PRIZE GLORY (1994) and LEGEND OF SPEED (1999). He also has done some TV work. In total, Chiang has acted in more than 75 movies so far: (around 30 by Chang Cheh alone). He has also appeared in YES MADAM, TWINKLE TWINKLE LUCKY STARS (both cameos, both 1985), IT'S A MAD MAD WORLD, SOUL (both 1986), TIGER ON A BEAT (1989), MARY FROM BEIJING (1992) and THE ADVENTURERS (1995). So although his glory days as a top ranking martial art/action star were relatively short in duration, he has had a long-lived and deserving career that continues to this day.

Written by Yves Gendron

***Here are some random pics of David Chiang from him as a young child to pics of him at home with his family upto the present time as recent as pics taken last month.

Click on thumbnail pics to open them full size

***Here are some random Video Clips of David Chiang on Asian T.V. -interviews,tv series,etc.

Movie clip at 13 years old from 1960

TV Series from 1992

Interview from 1993

TV News Interview from 11/10/2004

TV Show from 11/19/2004

Eagle's Claw

2004-12-12T11:51:00.000-08:00

I finally watched a movie this week!!! After working 6 days this week i rarely had time to watch one...either busy online or just too tired to sit still staring at the T.V. ...but last night when i got home from work..i noticed the amount of movies i was getting in the mail from orders was piling up and that i needed to start watching some of these movies before it gets out of hand..lol

So i popped in Eagle's Claw!

I bought this movie for 2 main reasons..
1. It start Don Wong Tao who i enjoyed watching in The Secret Rivals and The Hot, The Cool, And The Vicious.
2. The director of this movie is Lee Tso Nam, so i was expecting another good story besides some good action.

ADDED BONUS: This movie also featured the great Leung Kar Yan, whom i had no idea was in the movie until i started watching it...his role was nothing like his Knockabout or The Victim roles..he played a villian and was all too serious in this movie!

As i started to watch this movie..i noticed the 2 words "Eagle's Claw" was being said quite a bit..and i had a feeling it would continue throughout the movie..so i started the movie over and this time started counting how many times it was being said.

The words "Eagle's Claw" were said a total of 64 times, at one point it was said 4 or 5 times within a few seconds of each other..at least for someone like me that has a bad memory i was sure not to forget what movie i was watching...lol.

For those that haven't seen this movie yet..here's a quick and short summary of the plot courtesey of HKFlix.

Plot:
The deadly art of Eagle's Claw is challenged by the master of the Mantis Fist School, provoking rivalry between the two schools and their students, and resulting in a death match.

When you first see the villian appear on the screen they show a shot of his feet(cool shoes) then his cane and then his long silver hair and face with a cool wizard type hat...he looked like a straight up Pimp..which to me equals COOL! I love those "out of the ordinary" characters.

I also liked how before he would start to fight he would slam his what looked to appear to be a wooden cane into the ground and it would stand upright. He seemed he to have slammed it so hard that the wooden cane went in and stuck in the concrete...Very Cool!

The fighting in this movie to me was just a bit above average..nothing real exciting or over the top then just your basic kung fu. The mantis fist in this movie to me didn't really look all that "mantisy" lol.. i have seen better mantis fist.

But the story, like i was expecting was much better then the actual quality of fights..it had a nice twist towards the end that kind of caught me off guard, a twist that only works the first time you see it of course.

So if i wanted to introduce someone to kung fu movies that might have said " aw those movies are all action with no plot" then this would be one that i WOULD recommend them to watch..along with some of the other Lee Tso Nam movies that i have seen including The Green Jade Statuette.

So overall this movie comes in at above average but that was mainly do to the story and that pimped out Mantis Fist leader!

SCORE:3.8/5

** Here are some random screencaps..click on thumbnail pics to open them up full size

Just Some Random Stuff

2004-12-11T02:35:00.000-08:00

*This isn't exactly "monkey fist style" ...but it is a real Monkey doing martial arts! Check it out Here!

*Crouching Behindya Hidden Well ... LOL ..check this one out Here!

*Not the best quality video..but check out this Korean Martial Arts montage..some good stuff!

*G.I. Joe "Kung Fu Grip"..i never knew how revolutionary this was...check this out!

*A baby getting its first lesson in kung fu..from his dad who doesn't know kung fu...lol...check out his "Tiger Style" ...Here!

*Timex kung fu..takes a licking but keeps on ticking! watch Here!

*Bear kung fu...funny..watch Here!

*Kung Fu Cat fight...watch Here!

*Anti-Drug Kung Fu ad...very funny...watch Here!

*Playstation 2 Kung Fu commercial...watch Here!

Dog Judo

2004-12-10T13:30:00.000-08:00

VS.

Well i'm not sure what to think of this...is it funny? is it strange? maybe a little bit of both..
Check it out Here!

The ULTIMATE Kung Fu Comic Book!

2004-12-10T04:20:00.000-08:00

Here is the ultimate kung fu comic book for that old school kung fu movie lover! Everything you love about those classic movies are put into print..instead of hearing those very cool english dub lines you can read them..Very nice looking cover,pages,characters.....tons of characters...here's an example of a few of the characters from Kagan McLeod's Infinite Kung Fu comic's!

Here is a random review i found of Infinite Kung Fu.

Infinite Kung Fu (Great Lakes Ninja Brotherhood comics)

No comic, I repeat NO COMIC, has ever brought the kung fu as much as this one. As soon as I read about it, I had to get some copies and luckily got the last few right from the source before it went to a re-printing. This baby is like reading 'Five Deadly Venoms' or any of those Wu-Tang Flicks, specifically the REALLY GOOD Wu-Tang flicks. As you can see from the picture on the left, the style is immensely strong, and immune to nearly any weapon. The artist and writer (Kagan McLeod) drops mad style on this here, and the story is even better - in the distant future, the earth has gone back to a more primitive culture (with technology all gone!), except the dead have risen and are ready to EAT BRAINS! Well, maybe not, but eating brains kicks ass. These zombies do want to kill, though. Anyway, it's every man for himself, and this story follows one individual as he learns the ways of kung fu.

Not only is the story crazy insane kung fu, but the supporting characters along the way slam. There is his master, who can do all kinds of crazy shit (I don't want to spoil it!) Then there's Moog Joogular, a funked-out kung fu master who witnesses our lead character in the future and travels back in time to assist. Of course, his assistant, the Foxy Brownish Thursday Thoroughgood, is also a nice hit of flava, and the evil general Bao Chong-Zi, the master of the deadly Centipede Sting Punch.

Along the way, you've got more crazy kung fu stuff than you could imagine, as well. Some of my favorite scenes include the kung fu fight in issue 1 where our hero (Lei Kung) snaps a zombie's neck from far away, Moog Joogular's severing of his own head and arms (and re-growing them) in a kung fu demonstration in issue 2, and the styles learned in the brutal beast chamber in issue 3. And did we forget? At the end of each book there are kung fu movie reviews, sketchbooks, and sometimes kung fu games and activities for your enjoyment! Honestly, this is one of the hardest reviews ever to write, because I want to comment on every single page of the story, the art in it, and the dialogue, because it's all so banging. Here's a little sample, after Lei Kung is tricked into drinking anti kung-fu venom:

Moog Joogular: I'm afraid so. You won't be able to use kung fu for three months.
Lei-Kung: Three months?! The contest is tomorrow!
Moog Joogular: I can't help you Lei-Kung. But you can help yourself.
Lei-Kung: How?
Moog Joogular: You've already witnessed me break down poison internally. It is a difficult technique to master, but with the proper kung-fu training, it can be done.
Lei-Kung: An inner duel! My opponent is the poison!

This book easily jumps into one of the top five story arcs EVER in comics in the Old School Beat book, just remember, the more you love flicks like "Master of the Flying Guillotine", Wu-Tang flicks and Shaw Brothers joints, the more you'll like this. And oh yeah, some of Kagan's art graces the cover to Big Pimp's Kung Fu Studio. Damn son, go out and pick this book up while you can!

reviewed by Bad Funkmatron

Be sure to check out the site for more information ..check out ALL the characters featured and read their bios. You can also buy direct from the website at $3 an issue. There are a total of 7 issues out so far with more to come.

FREE Gordon Liu Signed DVD!

2004-12-10T02:49:00.000-08:00

That is the "Free" offer right now over at Shaw.Intercontinental.com ..but if you ask me...how the hell is it FREE...you have to probably spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars on Celestial movies in order to get your "FREE" signed DVD!

Just think if your favorite Shaw actor ever is Gordon Liu..and you would do anything to get a Signed DVD from him..so you decide to spend your whole savings on DVD's..let's say about $800 or so..and you're thinking "no one is going to spend this much on dvds at one time, i'm for sure going to be in the top 10 and get a signed dvd" ...but out there are 10 people that thought the same way you did..and spent just $10 more then you and put you in the number 11 spot ..

So you get no signed DVD, no money for christmas shopping,no money to pay bills...but at least you will have a shitload of movies to watch til the day you die..so i guess even though you lose..you're still a winner!

Jimmy Wong Yu-“THE” One-Armed Swordsman

2004-12-09T14:28:00.000-08:00

***I know most of you reading this think i made a typo and his name is spelled "Jimmy WANG Yu"..but actually thats not the case, find out why in this story!

Who could have thought that a Brooklyn Dodger/Chicago Cub first baseman turned Hollywood star would be partially responsible for changing the direction of Hong Kong's kung fu film industry and launching arguably one of Hong Kong's biggest martial arts movie icons? That's almost as bizarre as something I wrote for KUNGFU QIGONG (now KUNG FU TAI CHI) magazine several years ago, showing that Russia was responsible for the birth of Shaolin martial arts. In that case, as in this one, although the initial paths appeared blurry, the truth was there.

At a time when musicals and romances overshadowed action films and females ruled the Hong Kong silver screen, soon-to-be-legendary film director Chang Cheh burst onto the scene with ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN (1967). This riveting revenge thriller filled with heroic bloodshed and testosteronic violence reversed the Cantonese and Mandarin starlet-entrenched cinematic trends and marked a transition between wu xia and kung fu films. Even further, it introduced the world to a pioneering martial arts movie star: the stoically charismatic Jimmy Wong Yu.

In celebration of Celestial Picture's recent release of the fully restored Shaw Brothers ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN trilogy, which consists of ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, RETURN OF THE ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN and THE NEW ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, Jimmy Wong Yu exclusively talks to kungfumagazine.com about his one-armed swordsman experience. He also spoke about the good, the bad and the ugly of his film career, but that's a story soon to be featured in KUNG FU TAI CHI MAGAZINE.

The first thing Wong asks is to spell his name as "Wong" and not "Wang," as "wongly" written by every film poster, book, website and article for over 40 years, saying, "Apparently this is a mistake of the Shaw's publicity department in the very beginning and this is regretful. It's a mistake that's been around for a long time. Got my name "Jimmy" when went to school in Hong Kong."

In ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, Fang Gang (Wong) is a sullen orphan, a commoner, training at an upper-class martial arts school, and is constantly being demeaned by his gentry classmates, unaware that his sifu's bullying spoiled daughter (Pan Ying-tzu) is in reality infatuated with him. Yet in the heat of a childish tantrum...

Wong laughingly tells, "...she disarms me, literally. The beautiful, spoiled daughter of my master cut off my right arm. Pan Ying-tzu played this role and her character was in love with me, the hero, ever since childhood, but I had never been in love with her. In my opinion, Pan Ying-tsu was a very pretty girl and I suspect had her own character not resemble the character of her role, director Chang Cheh might have given the movie a happy ending with me loving her at the end. However, we will never be able to find out about this 'what if?' situation now."

The movie is also groundbreaking as one of the first films to emphasize the kung fu-learning process - an effective plot device used in many early Jackie Chan and director Lau Gar-leung (Liu Chia-liang) films. In his book REVIEWING 30 YEARS OF HONG KONG CINEMA, Chang mentions that the ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN afforded him another breakthrough in martial art film. "We used a hand-held camera to shoot some of the scenes," he writes. "I believed this would add more 'life and energy' visually to the movie."

The epiphynous Fang endures his fate and begins the long road to recovery, eventually mastering the little-known art of "left-handed" swordfighting and climaxing when he returns to lambaste his dumbfounded enemies. But of course in reality, as in the film, swordfighting with the left hand is not an easy task.

Wong explains, "It was difficult fighting with my left hand. I argued with Chang Cheh to have my left arm cut off instead, but he had to convince me that the hero's right arm has to be cut off and that he has to fight with his left hand to convey to the audience about his incredible will power. So I thought that made sense, and so I obeyed him and I tried to do everything with my left hand, and at that time to train myself to do everything with my left hand. However, since the weapons were real - although the blades are not sharpened - they were very heavy. I would sometimes fall holding up the sword running from one end of a bridge to where my enemies are, and I would lose balance due to my arm being tied at the back. At other times it would have made sense and not be as difficult if my arm was tied to the front instead, when the camera angle could hide it a little better."

But that wasn't the only challenge for Wong. "As I've said, it was strenuous for me during the shoot. But other than having my arm tied up and falling down, my stubble was actually make-up, which I kept swallowing to the extent that sometimes it tickled my stomach so much that I would vomit. I was also lucky that the character in the movie had bruises on his face most of the time or else I would not know how to hide all my real bruises caused during the shooting of the fight scenes."

Wong adds that what boosted the action's creativity and behind-the-scenes charm was that the film's martial arts director, Liu Chia-liang, purposely designed the fights using a broken sword, thereby requiring a shorter distance between Wong and his adversaries. This ultimately made for more intense fight scenes, as compared to typical fight scenes using normal swords or other staffed weaponry at longer distances - which points to the impetus of this film.

Wong's one-armed hero was patterned after Yang Guo, the crippled protagonist in Jin Yong's serialized novel LEGEND OF THE BRAVE ARCHER, and after Hollywood star Chuck Connor's Jason McCord character from NBC's TV show BRANDED (1965), which spawned a film version - BROKEN SABRE - the following year. Apparently screenwriter Ni Kuang was a fan of Connor's TV show THE RIFLEMAN (1958-63), and when his next show BRANDED came out, it struck a nerve. McCord is wrongly accused of being a deserter, and when he's stripped of his rank, his commander breaks McCord's sabre in half, tossing the bottom half out of the fort gate. As McCord stoically exits the fort and the gates close behind him, he picks up the broken sabre, examines it, ponders his fate, and thereafter uses it as a weapon to fend off evildoers throughout the show's duration. There's a similar scene in ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN where Wong is staring at his sword, pondering his fate. It's probably safe to say that Chang was also a fan of the show, since one of Chang's favorite American shows was Richard Boone's HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL (1957-63), which inspired Chang to direct HAVE SWORD WILL TRAVEL (1972).
While most Hong Kong film fans know that John Woo started off as Chang's assistant director, they probably don't know that another important Hong Kong/Hollywood film director was inspired by Chang's work - and specifically by the ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN. That is Ronny Yu, who has directed such films as BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR, BRIDE OF CHUCKY, FORMULA 51 and FREDDY VS. JASON.

Yu shares with me, "As a kid, when my dad took me to the moviehouse, the first film I saw was King Hu's COME DRINK WITH ME, and that implanted Hu in my mind; but when I saw Chang Cheh's ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, well, that just blew me away. Having polio and all the harsh realities that came with that back then in my everyday life, I associated with Wong Yu's handicapped hero, and I realized that I could do things regardless of the physical handicap. It inspired me to get into film.

"Where David Lean (BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957), LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962)) showed me epic cinema, the scope of filmmaking, Chang Cheh showed me poetry in martial arts movies. I mean, you look at his fights, the choreography, the way they're shot; his heroes die in balletic ways, a poetic dance of death. And with Wong Yu fights, the slow motion, the snowflake on the tip of the sword, so beautiful and romantic yet violent. I copied these things when I did BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR."

When I tell Yu that Miramax is doing a remake of COME DRINK WITH ME and that Quentin Tarantino is writing and directing the remake of AVENGING EAGLE (1979), which starred Alexander Fu Sheng and was directed by Sun Chang, he says, "Well, as we all know, Quentin is a big fan of Hong Kong cinema; but he's only a fan, he doesn't understand Chinese culture, martial arts, philosophy, and the virtues of the world of Jiang Hu, which I know you know a lot about. So I'm curious to see how that goes."

Yu goes on to admit that the only film he'd ever consider doing a remake of is ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, saying, "It would have to be respectful to the original movie, and not be rip off, or doing what is now simply a trend, where everyone is going for the fight look. In essence, they're only applying the wu xia movie rather than understanding what those films are really about. And I might add, I'd have you write the script because I don't know anyone else that knows more about wu xia films." I thank him for his compliment.

Because of ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN's huge boxoffice success (the first Shaw Brothers film and the second Hong Kong film to break the $HK 1 million mark), Chang and Wong revisited hero Fang two years later with the RETURN OF THE ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN (1969), which introduced a new plot device (often imitated), in which the swordsman - living peacefully in the country - is forced out of retirement when the Eight Demon Swordsmen kidnap his wife. He duly dusts off his sword and enters the fray.

Wong tells how his arm was hidden and how that changed with the sequel. "In the first film, my arm was tied up and only released during the lunch hour," he says, "and each morning and afternoon, shooting sessions were about four hours each. So my arm was tied up for eight hours/day. This became very intolerable since it took about 40 days to make. So for the second film, the make-up people or some assistants would untie me and massage my arm during lighting or set up times, so my arm was only tied up for 3-4 hours/day."

After Wong "left" Shaw Brothers, he reprised his one-armed swordsman role in the surreal Hong Kong/Japanese co-production of ZATOICHI AND THE ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN (1970) (this will be addressed in Wong's magazine article). The following year, Shaw answered with the final installment of the franchise, THE NEW ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, in which Chang cast one of his latest discoveries, David Chiang, as Lei Li, who cuts off his own arm after suffering defeat at the hands of a false martial arts master. Chang animates the action with quick zoom shots and further solidifies his "masculine brotherhood" theme with deft acting performances from Chiang and his Chang Cheh-partnered discovery, Ti Lung.

Wong reflects on how the Shaw's ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN films differed over time. "I feel that my first ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN movie emphasized more on the setting up of the background story. So there wasn't too much elaboration on each of the characters. As for RETURN OF THE ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN, more time was devoted to the inter-relationships of the characters, and more tricks could be shown in terms of the weaponry and kung fu skills. However, when David Chiang's NEW ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN was released, I thought more emphasis was placed into the production side with a lot of very 'grand' and big scenes. And although more effort was put into designing innovative and exciting weaponry and kung fu tricks, there was less put in the story and on the characters."

That being the case, Chang's ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN trilogy is truly three important stanzas in the poetry of his career and life, a career that spanned over 50 years and about 100 films, and a life that ended June 24, 2002. Wong reflects, "I admired Chang's ability in presenting men's masculinity, brotherhood, bonding and honor in his movies. And in that, I also share those same values. ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN is one of two films I did that are most meaningful to me. I also feel that the movie is also most representative of who I am because I share the same views on loyalty and righteousness as does my character."

Written by Craig Reid for KUNGFUMAGAZINE.COM

"It's Always More Fun To Join In"

2004-12-09T14:20:00.000-08:00

Check out this commercial from HetNet ...if i didn't tell you it was a commercial and you started watching it,you might think it was just a clip from a movie..that's what i thought..til the end of course..

Check it out Here!

I Know Kung Fu!

2004-12-09T14:08:00.000-08:00

Check out this short video where the kung fu sound effects actually are used to make the beat!

Shaolin Sampler Remix Here!

Ninja Madness!

2004-12-08T15:05:00.000-08:00

Check out this site for Everthing That Is Ninja!
While you are there..take the Good/Bad Ninja Test ..and find out what kind of Ninja you would be.

Ninja's Are Deadly!

2004-12-08T05:23:00.000-08:00

LOL!

China Bans Nike TV Ad As National Insult

2004-12-08T04:44:00.000-08:00

China banned a Nike television commercial showing LeBron James battling a cartoon kung fu master, as the ad insults national dignity.

The Nike commercial shows the Cleveland Cavaliers' LeBron James defeats a Chinese ancient kung fu master.

The commercial, titled "Chamber of Fear," was broadcast on local Chinese stations and on state television's national sports channel before being pulled last month.

It shows James, the Cleveland Cavaliers' reigning NBA rookie of the year, defeating the kung fu master, two women in traditional Chinese attire and a pair of dragons, considered a sacred symbol in traditional Chinese culture.

LeBron James also beat a pair of dragons in the Nike ad.

The advertisement "violates regulations that mandate that all advertisements in China should uphold national dignity and interest and respect the motherland's culture," the State Administration for Radio, Film and Television said on its Web site Monday.

"It also goes against rules that require ads not to contain content that blasphemes national practices and cultures."

Two women in traditional Chinese attire are defeated by LeBron James in the commercial.

The statement added: "The ad has received an indignant response from Chinese viewers."

The Chinese cultural symbols are all defeated in the Nike advertisement.

James and Nike based the ads for the 19-year-old's Air Zoom LeBron II sneakers on films featuring martial arts icon Bruce Lee. James is a fan of Lee's work.

"It was not intended to hurt anybody or any culture or anything like that," James said after practice in Cleveland on Monday.

"We put the ads together basically for kids."

James said some Asian reporters told him they liked the commercials. He was disappointed the ads were pulled and will prevent some of his fans from seeing him.

"That's big. I need as much fans as I can get," he said.

James, who signed a seven-year, $90 million endorsement deal with Nike shortly before turning pro straight out of high school, hopes to have things patched up with his Chinese fans in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

"I'll be there in 2008, so maybe they'll love me a little more when I get there," said James, who played for the U.S. Olympic team this summer in Athens.

Maurice Zhou, a spokesman in Shanghai for Beaverton, Ore.-based Nike Inc. said the company had no response except to say that it "respected the government's decision."

"We respect and follow the Chinese government's laws and regulations," Zhou said.

The Chinese television regulator tightened controls over programming in May by prohibiting the use of English words and imported programs that promote.

The Nike advertisement is part of fast-growing foreign efforts to cash in on the huge popularity of basketball in China and the celebrity of James and other NBA players, such as China's Yao Ming.

Last month, a series of Nike ads in Singapore designed to resemble graffiti drew attention in a nation known for civic order.

The small, page-size posters featuring anime-style images of James were pasted over the ad panels of 700 bus stops, surprising commuters who were used to very tidy shelters. At least 50 commuters complained, shelter officials said.

*** Visit the Nike-Lebron James website Here! The site features Wallpaper which were made to look like old school kung fu movie lobby cards...and you can also see the commercial that was banned in China as well. For the FULL commercial..click on "Enter The Chamber" ..then you can either watch the intro or select "skip intro" now,on the left you will see a picture of the tower with the up/down options..you can go up to each level and enter to watch the mini-commercials...
or go straight to the top level to watch the Full Commercial that was banned!

Flash Game Of The Day/Week!

2004-12-08T04:13:00.000-08:00

Very simple..but fun game!

Play it Here!

Flash Game Of The Day/Week!

2004-12-07T04:51:00.000-08:00

If for some reason unknown to man...you do not already have the Macromedia Flash Player...Get it Here!

If you are ready to play ...click Here!

Flying Guillotine 2

2004-12-05T23:36:00.000-08:00

**SPOILER ALERT**

After receiving this DVD the other day which i had ordered from Poker Industries for $9.99..i just finished watching it..this is the NEW Pan Media version which features the NEW remastered video along with the original old school english dub.

As far as the movie itself...compared to the first one..i really did enjoy this one. I read people stating they preferred the 1st one to this one and just as many people saying they preferred part 2 to the original. I seen the 1st one a few months back and to be fair it was the old Pan Media version which looked REALLY bad...at that time it was the worst picture quality i had seen on an old school kung fu movie..i think until i watched the Pan Media version of Shaolin Prince..that one was pretty bad too.

The story in this one is basically about a group of rebels led by Ti Lung trying to kill the emperor because of all the innocent people he has been killing.

Also,Ti Lung came up with a counter for the flying guillotine which was basically an Iron Umbrella, so the emperor ordered the man that originally built the flying guillotine to update it so it could not be countered by the umbrella...and he did.

So in a way the title of the movie has a double meaning..it stands for "2" as in a sequel to the original movie..also "Flying Guillotine 2" could stand for the counter of the counter the guillotine engineer came up with..he made a DOUBLE GUILLOTINE ...where once the original base of the guillotine landed on the Iron Umbrella..a second one would detach from on top of the guillotine and then land on the head of its victim.

When the rebels learned of this..the plan was to obtain the plans of the new double guillotine to then Ti Lung could work on a counter for the counter of the counter...which he did.

But what you don't know is that a counter for the counter of the counter for the original counter was made..and used at the end battle.

The action in this one didn't really take off until the end battle..some good fighting going on there.

I know i gave out some spoilers,but thats why i warned you up top.

OK..now for the actual quality of the DVD.

The cover i really liked...the picture quality which im guessing is actually the Celestial remaster print is clear...BUT the audio which gets a big plus for being the english dub..does have alot of crackling and popping...hear a sample of the audio here!

I did watch this movie on my computer with headphones on..which brings me to another plus for this version...the audio DOES come out of both the left and right speakers...cause alot of the NEW released Pan Media DVD's lately have a audio problem to where the sound only comes out the Left channel.

But really even though it does have crackling and popping..it really did not bother me too much..the audio is in sync pretty good with the video. If you are a die hard english dub fan that wants the BEST possible video quality..then i would recommend this version.

SCORE:3.9/5

Here are some random screencaps from this movie.

Celestial Remastering Process

2004-12-05T18:40:00.000-08:00

This is a older story but for those that missed it and might be interested in it..here it is.

Also explains why movies such as Chinatown Kid and Human Lanterns were not released UNCUT ..and were infact edited.

SGI® Technology Powers World’s First Large-Scale Digital Film Remastering Center

The largest commercial digital film rejuvenation and remastering project in the world is under way at the Shaw Brothers Studios Remastering Center in Hong Kong, and SGI technology is an integral part of it. The center’s client,Celestial Pictures, recently purchased a library of 760 Shaw Brothers’full-length feature films, shot from the late 1950s to mid-1980s. Opened in2002, the center’s mandate is to digitally remaster three to four films perweek in two language versions (Mandarin and Cantonese); 60 titles are beingfinished in high definition (HD) and the remainder in standard definition (SD).Hong Kongbased Celestial Pictures, a subsidiary of Measat Broadcasting in Malaysia, holds all reproduction, remake, and sequel rights and will distributethe newly remastered versions via broadcast television, videocassette, and DVD.Many of the films have been in the vault for up to 30 years, which makes settingquality standards and delivery schedules a mammoth task, requiring a true state-of-the-art facility.The center’s equipment includes SGI®‚ IRIX®‚OS-basedSilicon Graphics®‚ Octane2™, and Silicon Graphics O2+™ visual workstations and SGI® Origin®‚ family high-performance servers—chosen for reliability, speed, performance, and above all, interoperability. The solution includes products from SGI applications partners da Vinci, Thomson, and Discreet that, togetherwith the supercomputing power of SGI, provide the innovation and flexibility toswiftly move the archive of “the Hollywood of the East” from the beginning ofthe workflow to the final output.

Who Are the Shaw Brothers?

The Shaw Organization was founded in Shanghai in 1924 with the uniquevision of creating silent films for distribution throughout SoutheastAsia,with its many languages and dialects. The family business quicklyexpanded to Singapore and beyond (and into the “talkies” as well). Overthe years they amassed 35 companies, including three major film productionstudios, and numerous film distribution companies, movie theater chains,and even amusement parks. The entire film archive is considered historicallysignificant in Asia, and to connoisseurs of kung fu films everywhere, ShawStudios is legendary. Directors such as Quentin Tarantino, John Woo,and AcademyAward®-winner Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), have credited ShawBros™ films as a major influence on their work. Shaw Studios also launchedthe careers of famous Asian actors including Crouching Tiger’s Chow Yung Fat(who starred in the Shaw Bros Love in a Fallen City) and Cheng Pei-pei, whocostarred in Crouching Tiger and earlier appeared in the Shaw’s 1967 classicaction film Come Drink With Me. One of the first films the center remastered,Come Drink With Me was screened at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival. The film wasdigitally remastered over two weeks, in high-definition 1080/24p, and transferredback to film. With the surge of interest in digital preservation throughoutthe world’s film community, the remastered movie was reportedly met with greatpraise at the festival.

The Challenges of Restoration

With a brand-new film, a quality standard is expected from the originalnegative, the content is known, and the director or director of photographyis usually available to sit in with the color timer or editor. With anaging archive, almost everything is unknown and almost no one is availableto give direction. “Some of these films are 40 or 50 years old, so everytime we open up a can to look at a reel of film, it’s a new surprise,” saidThoma Thurau, former chief engineer at Shaw Brothers Studios RemasteringCenter, who worked with the various vendors to architect and integrate thecenter. “We don’t know what we’re going to face. No matter how well you storeit, film naturally will start decaying. Luckily, we’ve been able to catch itand start remastering digitally.” Plus, when the films were made, the originalnegatives were cut to accommodate censorship rules in different countries.After the release print was struck, the original negative was taped back together.The splice tape deteriorates and, over time, the frame before the splice andthe frame after the splice change to a different color value and luminancevalue than the frames that precede and follow. Thurau notes some films had asmany as 30 of these bad splices.

The High-Volume Tapeless Remastering Process

On average, each of the 760 films has 10 to 11 reels, and each reel runsabout 10 to 12 minutes.The process begins at the Thomson Spirit telecinetransfer bay, controlled by da Vinci’s 2K color correction system. Using Discreet’s backdraft™ 5.0 software on an SGI® Origin® 2200 platform as aclip server, the system is able to record each reel as a clip in its owndedicated library and partition. The operator also creates an HD D5 archivetape. The clips are then distributed to one of five revival for Discreet® systems by da Vinci—which perform an automatic pass on each reel to clean up much of the dirt, scratches, and other imperfections—via a HIPPI networkthat runs at twice real time. Each revival system is running on a Silicon Graphics Octane2 workstation with VPro™ V12 graphics, 2GB of RAM, and dual CPUs. All the transfers are done in the background using a hubless or remotesystem architecture to “look” into the system and push/pull clips. The maintransfer CPU is a Silicon Graphics® Octane® system that acts as a remoteterminal to look into the other systems to push/pull clips.

Fifty-six Linux®‚ CPUs run the automatic pass, and 12 additional MIPS®CPUs can be used in combination to assist in processing. The automaticprocess uses artificial intelligence to make pixel comparisons on eachframe, often in real time.

“One of the problems we faced early on with the kung fu films was that we were getting artifacts or pixelization during scenes containing a lot of action,” said Thurau. “An actor would be throwing a punch, and the system would think that the unusually fast motion was dirt. da Vinci’s revival team adapted the system’s algorithms to take care of this unique fastmotion issue. As a result, we were able to run all of our reels of film through the system, running on the Silicon Graphics Octane2 system, in an
automatic mode, eliminating a lot of the ‘interactive’ work—sometimes more than 50%—that our staff would have done manually otherwise.

When the auto pass is complete, staff members use revival’s interactivemode, going through the film frame by frame to complete the process.The reels are then sent to one of three Discreet® smoke® systems thatedit together the reels for compiling, audio synchronizing, title compositing, and final QC prior to the last color grading. For final colorcorrection, the remastered film is transferred to a second clip server,an SGI Origin 2200 system running backdraft. In addition, an SGI DIVO card, an option that provides digital uncompressed video I/O to output SD, iscontrolled by a da Vinci 2K. The clip servers are not dedicated to the roomsand can be logged on one of two Silicon Graphics 02+ computers acting as remote terminals for output or input anywhere in the center.

“For the sheer volume of the work we do here— often with 15 to 20 films on our system at a given time, each reel holding 15,000 frames—you can imagine the nightmare of keeping track of all the frames,” Thurau concludes. “Being able to keep it all in a single file format has great advantage. The SGI, da Vinci, and Discreet systems all fit very nicely together, creating a high-volume, flexible, tapeless, remastering center.” “...we were able to run all of our reels of film through the system, running on the Silicon Graphics Octane2 system, in an automatic mode, eliminating a lot of the ‘interactive’ work—sometimes more than 50%— that our staff would have done manually otherwise

Xiaolin Showdown

2004-12-05T18:09:00.000-08:00

For those of you who might have never heard of this cartoon..it airs Saturday mornings on the WB(check your local listings for showtime)

Maybe those of you with a young child or children..and you want to introduce them to kung fu(martial arts) ..this is a good way to do that.

For what the cartoon is about,here is a synopsis.

Xiaolin Showdown premiered on WB on January 24, 2003. This mystical, high-adventure series with choked full of current comedy references is based on the ancient mythical Xiaolin martial arts inspired by Chinese monks thousands of years ago. Omi, a young, gifted monk-in-training from the Xiaolin Temple, must show his fellow trainees - J-pop hipster girl Kimiko, flashy, street smart Brazilian Raimundo and Texas Kung Fu cowboy Clay - around the world to find and protect sacred ancient artifacts. These sacred objects with supernatural powers called the Shen Gong Wu are keys to controlling the powers of good and evil. These can only be captured after an extreme, gravity-defying, martial art-inspired "double dare" showdown occurs. Challenging the trainees is evil boy genius Jack Spicer and his custom-built robot army, along with the ancient witch Wuya - all competing for these objects in extreme Xiaolin Showdowns. It is a tight race - for the one who gathers all of the Shen Gong Wu will become an unstoppable force for good... or evil!

***Play the Xiaolin Showdown game Here on the WB! Kids website!

Gordon Liu-Chia Hui:His Shaw Brothers Days

2004-12-05T17:17:00.000-08:00

When kungfumagazine.com spoke to Gordon Liu Chia-hui several months ago, he was surprised and taken aback that most of our conversation was about martial arts, philosophy and life, with just a few tidbits about his roles in the KILL BILL movies. A man true to his roots in martial arts, where self-aggrandizement and self-promotion are not important (try telling that to other martial arts film stars or star wannabes; it makes you wonder about their true martial natures and hearts) and virtues like humility and loyalty are dying arts. However, in the name of cinema history and for kung fu film fans, Liu was persuaded (by yours truly) to speak about some of his classic films and share with us things he's never spoken about to the press - ever.

Gordon only got into film because his older kung fu brother, renowned martial arts film director Liu Chia-liang (this whole relationship thing was finally clarified in Part 1), pulled kung fu school rank on him and told him to act in film. While his roles were minor in such early films as MARTIAL ARTS OF SHAOLIN (1974), FIVE SHAOLIN MASTERS (1974), MARCO POLO (1975) and EXECUTIONERS OF DEATH (1977), a waterfall one day changed all that, sealing his fate to be a martial arts superstar.

As Gordon reflects, "One day, as we were filming CHALLENGE OF THE MASTER (1976), Liu Chia-liang Sifu was passing by a reservoir and saw the falling water hitting on a big piece of boulder. The splashing created by the falling water created an enigmatic halo. This inspired Liu Sifu to envision an image of a bald-headed monk fighting in the rain. As you know, Liu Sifu is my 'brother.' For some reasons, this stayed in his mind, and then he created this project with me in mind because I think he thought of me as being a good martial arts student - I am obedient and, on top of that, have a good attitude. I also would often volunteer to assist him teach at the martial arts school. Thus was the birth of Monk San Te in Liu Sifu's film THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN, and due to the sort of individual I am - and maybe a reflection in his eye in regards to Monk San Te - I think this is why he asked me to play the part."

Released in the West as THE MASTER KILLER, it was the first film to go behind the secret closed doors of the Shaolin Temple, to bring to life the legendary 35 training methods (i.e., chambers) a Shaolin disciple must endure to become a Shaolin Priest. Gordon reflects on several of the "chambers" and what he as an actor was put through in order for him to move on to the film's next chamber.

"As I recall, the first training scenes shot was the one of jumping over the water pit using the bamboo 'skis' on the water. It was important that it had to be interesting but also convincing, and I took a lot of dips getting across the water; but eventually I did actually do it, like in the film. It took a long time to design and we practiced it a lot. We were concerned about the filming time and cost, so we could only spend two weeks to do that sequence.

"One of the tougher sequences was the head butting all those hanging and swinging bags scenes. I actually got really dizzy hitting my head on those bags because half of them were real and the other half fake, and in the heat of acting and filming, I often forgot which was which, so I just hit everything.

"I actually fainted once while I was doing the hitting-the-bell scene, the long pole with a real weight attached to it. It was probably too hot that day, and I was too tired doing non-stop training and shooting. The entire movie took 80-100 days to complete. I would say 70 percent of the times I had to fight. We woke up at 9 a.m., ate breakfast, and started training at 10 a.m., then shoot all day, every day."

When asked about the most memorable moments during the difficult shoot, Gordon says without hesitation, "The biggest challenge was the 3-sectioned-staff. I had never learnt it before, but now I was in a situation where I not only had to learn it instantly but also had to look like the master who invented this weapon. Most memorable was that I often lost my self-esteem, because I was constantly scolded severely by Li Sifu when I did not perform to his satisfaction. But it was worthwhile. When I attended the first midnight show and saw how the audience had reacted. In those days all film directors and key cast would sit in the first midnight show to see the audience's reaction. It was an indicator of how well the movie would do in terms of box office and word of mouth. Thankfully the audiences went crazy, and I was moved to see how the movie made audiences happy."

His beloved real-life long flowing hair was now a distant memory. After shaving his head and playing the redoubtable Shaolin hero, Monk San Te, Gordon skyrocketed to fame. However, he was quickly pigeon-holed playing similar bald-headed characters, roles that required him to keep his head shaved. To this day his head remains shaved.

He adds, "Funnily, the trend in the '70s was to have long hair, and it was very hip in those days. Usually only monks were bald. So as a result, I wore a wig to go out when I was not shooting. (He used the wig in his next film, CHALLENGE OF THE NINJA.) On the other hand, in today's films, a bald-headed man can be considered stylish. I understand that to audiences Monk San Te equals Gordon Liu, in the same way as Terminator equals Arnold Schwarzenegger. I only realized this after attending overseas screenings. As soon as I appeared, everyone started chanting, 'Center, Center,' and I was thinking that they wanted me to move over to the 'center". What I didn't realize was that they were actually calling me 'San Te, San Te.'"

Due to 36TH CHAMBER'S phenomenal box-office success, a sequel was quickly put together; but it took a different direction, one that Gordon was not too happy with. He points out, "Well, yes, I was disappointed with RETURN TO THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN in a way. But as you know, Liu Sifu had made the comedy SPIRITUAL BOXER (Liu Sifu's directorial debut, and a film that marked the birth of the kung-fu comedy - Chan's SNAKE IN THE EAGLE SHADOW and DRUNKEN MASTER coming the following year), and it did well, was popular, and then others started doing comedy. So I suppose after making 36 CHAMBER and EXECUTIONERS FROM SHAOLIN, which were 'hard' kung fu movies, it was time to do another kung fu comedy. So I guess that's the reason why it couldn't really be about Monk San Te. So it was about a young rebel that wanted to learn from him."

Similar to 36TH CHAMBER, Liu Sifu was just as demanding and hard on Gordon. As he reminisces, "I got a big deep cut from the cracks of the dried bamboo and was bleeding non-stop, so I had to be rushed to the hospital. Instead of comforting me, Liu Sifu scolded me. But I was happy when he visited me at the hospital. Scolding is just his way; I know his heart cares about me."

Although arguably the most recognized actor to portray a Shaolin priest in Asia, Gordon shows his nature as a man and martial artist by acknowledging Stateside's most famous Shaolin priest actor, David Carradine. And although he politely alludes to a difference between acting and knowing kung fu, he has a heartfelt joy for people like Carradine who have done so much for martial arts cinema.

"I was impressed to hear David was going to be in KILL BILL. I made it a point when we were on location to pull him aside and tell him how much I admired his TV show KUNG FU. That series was a very important part of people in the West's understanding of kung fu, and Carradine played the role of what I think a Shaolin Priest truly was, to a tee."

Through all my years writing and covering martial arts actors and films, when it comes to Gordon's CLAN OF THE WHITE LOTUS, fans have often asked about all those needles in Lo Lieh's body, and what's with Gordon acting female and doing the needlework stuff.

After a giggle and a smile, Gordon says, "Well, in the first film with Monk Bai Mei, Wang Yu (not to be confused with Jimmy Wang Yu) played Hong Xi-guan's son Hong Wen-ting; but I think because I was schooled in Hung fist and could deliver that hard kung fu, Liu Sifu wanted me to play Wen-ting in this film. The Hung style is a very 'hard' and 'tough' approach. However, I was often required to apply my kung fu in a soft manner in this movie, like doing ballet; so Liu Sifu came up with the idea of embroidery kung fu, and so being soft was actually very challenging for me. Hui Ying-hong (Liu Sifu's favorite kung fu fighting actress) had to teach me how to use needles to defeat Bai Mei.

"But for you fans out there, they were not real needles stuck all over Lo's body; they were all individually glued on. We had very good make-up artist who would constantly retouch the make up after each take of the scenes."

In his next film, FIGHT CLUB, Gordon revisits his role as Wong Fei-hung from CHALLENGE OF THE MASTERS (1976) with one of his most memorable sequences ever, the one-on-one battle against Shaw's all-time best fighting villain actor, Wang Lung-wei.

As Gordon recalls, "Ah, yes, I really enjoyed fighting with him because he uses real power whereas my Hung style also practices power too. So we were fighting hand on hand and leg on leg, real and full power, so you can see the hard contact, and it makes the fight very real. Of course though, we couldn't use real power on our heads. I remember when we were fighting in that very, very narrow and winding venue, it was almost impossible to move, not to mention that we really had to fight! So, the end result was my elbows were all scratched. But my fondest memory was seeing Liu Sifu doing the 3-tiered lion dance by himself. He was just magnificent!"

Heavily influenced by Liu Sifu and still reeling over RETURN OF THE 36TH CHAMBER being a comedy and not a true sequel, Gordon stepped outside of Shaw Brothers and directed his first and only film, SHAOLIN AND WU DUNG, a film he considered to be the true sequel to 36TH CHAMBER. However, reluctant to make waves with the "re-birth" of all those Shaws films, Gordon declined to speak about the film, out of respect for the company that made him a star. After his brief independent sojourn, Gordon returned to Shaws, and after minor parts in MY YOUNG AUNTIE and MASTERS OF DISASTER, he acted alongside Liu Chia-liang and his other "brother," Liu Chia-rong, in perhaps his best final role as the monk gone awry, in one of the best kung fu films of all time, LEGENDARY WEAPONS OF CHINA. It's also one of only three films in which Gordon fights Liu Sifu (the others are CHALLENGE OF THE MASTERS and 8 DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER). The film was Liu Sifu's last for Shaws, and it holds one of Hong Kong films' saddest moments - during the shoot the film's star, Alexander Fu Shen, died in a car accident. Gordon reflects on these two important moments.

"In my opinion, Liu Sifu is great, very creative, very instant and spontaneous. He is a perfectionist and often rejects many takes. I remember in one film I did, SHAOLIN MANTIS, one of the takes I had to do 40 times, until I broke up and cried, as it was physically very tough and mentally very frustrating. Actually, I cried and vomited secretly because I did not want to affect other people. I had made an excuse to get out of there and only the assistant director knew about it."

A moment of silence later, he makes the somber reflection: "I remember that I was having dinner at a restaurant in Causeway Bay when I heard that Fu Sheng was killed in a car crash. I really felt very helpless at that time. The sorrow was there for a long time. I did not cry in front of people, but actually in some of the emotional scenes in 8 DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER, some of my tears were real, as it gave me a good outlet to cry in those instances.

"Actually I still miss him very much and thought about him a lot when I visited the Wong Fei-hung museum in July, the month of his death. When he was already a big star, I was only a beginner; but I got the chance to co-lead the movie with him. Director Liu Chia-liang wanted to create a complimentary pair with me being the tough guy and Fu Sheng being the funny guy. I had really wanted to finish the movie with him. The original ending was for me to save him instead of saving Hui Ying-hung."

In keeping with his true persona, Gordon closes philosophically. "I believe it is most important to respect the sincerity that comes from your heart. If you agree with your heart, you will find peace from your heart."

Written by Craig Reid for KUNGFUMAGAZINE.COM

***Great interview with the "Master Killer" himself...check out kungfumagazine.com for more articles.

Magnificent Butcher

2004-12-05T15:16:00.000-08:00

OK ....im sure just about everybody has seen this movie before,and because of that i really wasn't sure if i should even take the time to write a review since there are already tons of them out there...so instead,here is a link to 30 reviews of this movie..not all reviews are of the same verison..some might be of the Fox/Fortune Star version, which is the one i have and watched..and some are of the Hong Kong Legends Dvd or maybe even a Vcd version..but almost all of them as you will see gave this movie a Perfect Score ..or very close to it.

So instead of a full on review i will just express my feelings about this movie..

ANOTHER SAMMO CLASSIC!

This movie had some insanely GOOD fight scenes..and alot of them..all of the highest quality..not even movies today can do better...This movie also featured some very funny moments..now i realize the first time i saw this movie..which was awhile ago...way before i ever had a appreciation for Sammo and his skills...the "comedy" scenes probably barely put a smile on my face..but i know now it was because i was watching it alone..Last night i watched this movie with my father..and both he and I laughed at ALL the scenes/moments that were meant to be laughed at..

I also enjoyed the "30 Years To Master" ..Cosmic Palm Technique...very cool..just wish they showed more of it..the one time it was used and made contact with someone was on Sammo's character and he was somewhat easily healed by the all to powerful "beggar" of the movie.

Honestly..there are too many things to talk about in this movie..that's why i gave the link to the more detailed reviews..just in case someone actually HASN'T seen this movie yet..

I think the 2 best versions out there of this movie are the Hong Kong Legends DVD and the Fox/Fortune Star DVD..here's a site that does a side by side comparison of the two.

Like i said before, i own the Fox/Fortune Star version and am very happy with it...especially since i bought it for under $10.

I will say if you like VERY SOLID kung fu action..and don't mind actually Funny comedy then this movie is a MUST OWN!

SCORE:5/5

Here are some random screencaps i took of this classic movie.

**click thumbnail pics to open in full size

Kung Fu - The Trivia(Quiz)

2004-12-05T04:40:00.000-08:00

Take this simple.. well maybe not so simple(depending on who you are) kung fu quiz...i took it and did...ok...here was my score.

I missed questions 6,7,8 and 9.

Take it and see what you get..if you want leave your Score in this post Comments!

Take Kung Fu Quiz Here!

Kung Fu Masters-Figurines

2004-12-05T03:59:00.000-08:00

Kung Fu Masters figurines celebrate the classic martial arts flicks of the 1970's! Micro Icons figurines have magnetic feet and stick on any metal surface, but they stand well on any flat surface, too. These highly detailed 2-inch scale figurines come in blister packs of four figures each. This set of 3 blister packs includes: Card 1: Chow Yun Skinny, Chu Man Fu, Slouching Tiger and Reynold. Card 2: Randy Joe, Sum Yung Guy, Ricky and William. Card 3: Wacky Chan, Wasa B., Y.C. and Kevin Lee

Price: $17.99

These highly detailed environments give you the perfect place to display your 2-inch scale Kung Fu Masters figurines. Each environment comes with a Kung Fu Masters figure. This set of 2 environments includes: 1x Sushi Diner and 1x The Bridge.

Price: $15.99

**** You can order these Here,from this site based out of Hollywood,California..alot of stuff on the site says "OUT OF STOCK - AVAILABLE FOR ORDER" ..so if you placed an order,i'm not sure how long it would take to receive it.

The figurines don't look bad at all it's just those "comical" names they gave em...not the best choices..and if you noticed the series of figurines is called Kung Fu Masters,but yet you can clearly see Ninjitsu,Sumo, and Karate all represented..which i think are not forms of kung fu.

Anyways, just spreading the info along to anyone that might want to collect these!

2 More Reasons Why I Prefer PEPSI Over Coke!

2004-12-05T03:14:00.000-08:00

Check out this Very cool commercial for Pepsi Max..the first time i watched this i didn't really get how it was being done..i was focusing on the guys in the commercial fighting over the Pepsi..lol

Pepsi Max-Can Fu ---watch Here!

This Pepsi ad features a "Shaolin Temple" type of place high in the mountains...with monks,kung fu,training and more.

Pepsi-Kung Fu ---watch Here!

I Added A Tag Board!

2004-12-04T03:10:00.000-08:00

As you can see on the left..i added a tag board..hopefully more people will leave a comment or two since the tag board makes it so much easier to do..but if you want to still leave a comment under a particular post..please feel free to do so.

The tag board is very easy to use..you dont even have to put a name if you dont want..it will show as "anonymous" .. if you have a site or a link to something you would like to share with me or others that visit this site ..you can add a URL in the second box and when it shows up in the TEXT BOX it will be "clickable".

Well i hope i see some messages in the tag board..as lately i really have been feeling like me and only a couple others are even visiting this site.

Dogs Like Kung Fu Too!

2004-12-03T16:01:00.000-08:00

Get your dog his or her very own Shaolin Dog T-Shirt for $19.99

Here is the logo that appears on the shirt..

Check here for more products with this same logo shown and other logos/pics ..everything from bumper stickers,lunchbox,mousepad,wall clock,boxer shorts,teddy bears,trucker hats and many many more!

Where Are The Reviews At?

2004-12-03T15:44:00.000-08:00

I know i haven't put up any new reviews in awhile..thats mainly because i haven't watched anything lately....my work hours are 4:30pm to about 2-3:00am ... so when i get home,after taking a shower and whatnot..i usually just get online for a few hours before going to bed...and lately i have been real tired so when i get up i don't have that much time to get online AND watch a movie..so i usually just get online..For a minute there i was waking up a little bit early just to make sure i have enough time to watch a movie..or at least part of one.

Even though i haven't watched a movie this week..i have been getting them in the mail and even buying more!! I plan on watching as many as i can this weekend..and i am looking forward to my Christmas Vacation where i will have a total of 10 DAYS OFF!! .. I Can't Wait! ..just think, 6 work days off,(+4 weekend days=10) PAID ..just to stay at home and watch Kung Fu Movies!

So this weekend..expect some reviews along with screencaps and quotes...i would like to also start showing video clips or audio clips but i don't have a place to host the files..anybody have any suggestions?

I Guess Even A Buddhist Monk Needs Love Too!

2004-12-03T04:54:00.000-08:00

Celibate Monk Caught Buying Sex
By Rhett Watson
December 3, 2004

HE had been celibate almost his entire life but when a Buddhist monk finally decided to break his vow by going with a prostitute he managed to pick an undercover police officer.

Hoa Trung Nguyen, 47, from the Phap Bao Temple in Sydney's Cabramatta, even haggled with the would-be prostitute for a better deal on "full sex".

But after being unceremoniously bundled into an unmarked police car, Nguyen claimed he was joking. Following a four-hour hearing at Liverpool Court yesterday, Magistrate Ronald Maiden was not laughing as he convicted the monk for soliciting a prostitute.

"The accused's version of events, in my view, borders on farcical," he said.

"It is quite fantastic."

Nguyen is now on a 12-month bond.

Cabramatta police were running an undercover operation on August 7 to stop prostitution in Fisher St, a residential area.

CCTV footage showed Nguyen, his robes under an overcoat, approaching the officer dressed as a prostitute.

Nguyen: "How much?"
Officer: "Do you want full sex?"
Nguyen: "Yes."
Officer: "$50"
Nguyen, after haggling the price down to $40: "Let's go."

Police then arrested him.

Nguyen admitted asking about price but blamed it on human curiosity.

"I only want to ask her as a joke because of who I am. I would never do anything like that."

Police prosecutor Sgt Phil Donato said Nguyen's version was "implausible".

Legal Aid solicitor George Breton said there was "certain scope of misinterpretation of what he was saying" because Nguyen did not speak English well and that he only had $20 to $23 on him anyway.

"I'm not saying they [police] lied ... they simply got it wrong," Mr Breton told the court.

Magistrate Maiden, however, disagreed.

Herald Sun

**Just to let you know..this happened in Australia..story found on News.com.au

Jackie As Chun-Li From Street Fighter

2004-12-02T15:01:00.000-08:00

Here is a clip of Jackie playing and fighting as Chun-Li a video game character from the Street Fighter games...clip is from the movie City Hunter which i have never seen...but judging from the clip,i might have to check it out....Looks Crazy!

Clip Here!

**clip courtesey of AsianJoke.com

Kung Pow.....want more?

2004-12-02T14:13:00.000-08:00

I have read very mixed feelings about this movie...some people think it's very funny and others thought it was just plain shit! ...to be honest..i saw part of this movie on cable awhile ago..BEFORE i started watching and collecting kung fu movies...so there was probably alot of kung fu movie cliches used that i didn't even know were cliches..lol...so maybe i didn't quite understand the humor involved,but there was still some stuff i thought was funny..NOW,hundreds of kung fu movies watched later..maybe i will find it funny,maybe not...but i think i will rent this and give it a try.

**watch this fight scene Here!

For those that have not seen this movie,watch Trailers,Clips and check out photos from the movie Here!

Well for those that have seen this movie and LOVED it...Good News, the sequel is coming...

Kung Pow 2: Tongue of Fury (2006)

Plot Outline: The Chosen One (Steve Oedekerk) returns to be dubbed once again in this announced sequel that will feature Steve Oedekerk in another kung-fu flick dubbed over with Steve Oedekerk's voice for all the characters.

The movie is still in production or actually maybe hasn't even started shooting..but it is scheduled to be out in 2006!

***Some kung fu "comedy" i did like...was Kung Faux that i really thought was funny..since i do listen to rap and always have..listening to the selected rappers and hip hop personalities that were chosen to do the "dub-overs" was really funny..especially when they give the character a spanish accent or street slang speak.Even if you don't listen to rap..you still might find this funny.

Unfortunately for me this series is shown on a cable channel that i don't get unless i pay EXTRA for,which i refuse to do..so i rented the Volume 1 DVD awhile ago...and am STILL waiting for more!

Well if you have never seen this go to the site and watch selected video clips.

Hello,Is Anybody Out There?

2004-12-02T03:08:00.000-08:00

Man..it really feels like im talking(blogging) to myself..is anybody even checking out this site?
If so,please leave a Comment and let me know that there IS somebody other then me that comes here....I would really appreciate it..

An Ultra Interactive Kung-Fu Remixer

2004-12-01T15:17:00.000-08:00

This is very cool...starring none other then the man himself,Bruce Lee ..it has a interactive keyboard with the numbers 0-9 and letters a-z with the touch of each key does a different thing,plays a different sound effect and or shows a different image..you can even record your own "creation" and play it back. Just check it out,it's cool!

"I Know Where Bruce Lee Lives"-An Ultra Interactive Kung-Fu Remixer

The Girl Who Played Wong Fei Hung In IRON MONKEY(1993)

2004-12-01T15:04:00.000-08:00

Angie Tsang Ze-Man is a member of the Hong Kong wushu team and here's a clip of her performing the compulsory Nan Quan (Southern Fist) at the 2003 World Games in Hong Kong.

And here she is again competing in the compulsory Nan Dao (Southern Saber) at the 2002 Asian Games.

**Thanks to iskandam over at kungfufandom for these GREAT clips and introductions to them!

Kung Fu Fights Golf For 2008 Olympic Spot

2004-12-01T14:57:00.000-08:00

Martial arts are sparring with golf for a place at the 2008 Beijing Olympics after both were nominated as potential demonstration events.

Golf's inclusion makes sense as the game is becoming increasingly popular in China with about 200 courses and 200 more under construction," the Xinhua news agency quoted Cui Zhiqiang, secretary general of the China Golf Association, as saying on Friday.

There were more than 500,000 regular golfers in China, Xinhua said.

"But the inclusion of golf at the 2008 Beijing Olympics has run into opposition in the form of a group of supporters lobbying for wushu, the famous Chinese martial art," Cui said.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has already turned down China's application to make wushu a medal sport in 2008.

Both sports are relative long shots, even in demonstration, as an existing event would have to be dropped to make way.

The IOC is expected to make a decision by June 2005.
--------------------------------------------------------

**Now i don't have to tell which one i'm rooting for to make it into the Olympics!

Get your own Bruce Lee "The Jumpsuit" T-Shirt..KAREEM'S FOOTPRINT INCLUDED!

2004-12-01T05:16:00.000-08:00

The got game? shirt is an official shirt for KungFuMagazine.com, complete with a distressed logo on the back. Sizes M, L, XL, and XXL

Web Price: $11.99

Ordering info Here!

Bruce Lee FLASH Animation!

2004-12-01T04:58:00.000-08:00

Watch this 3 minute Bruce Lee ShockWave Flash animation Here!

**the words are not in english,but thats ok ..just watch the kicks fly!

Sammo Hung's Official Website!(?)

2004-12-01T04:42:00.000-08:00

I'm not quite sure if this really is his Official website..but there is some useful information regarding his Filmography(just not sure if it's correct) and his Biography...still worth a look.

Sammo is DEFINITELY one of my All Time Favorites to watch in classic kung fu movies!

Sammo's Name Be Praised!

BROC LEE : Enter the Salad Dressing

2004-12-01T04:28:00.000-08:00

Check out this 11mb Quicktime video Here!

**Click "Enter Site" then scroll down on main page,click pic to start video.

The Wu-Dictionary

2004-11-30T03:46:00.000-08:00

If you are a fan of the rap group The Wu-Tang Clan ..then obviously you heard thier music before...maybe you were jamming to a song and you were like "what did he just say" ..i mean rap slang seems to change daily..but The Wu-Tang Clan seem to use many slang terms that i'm sure started with them..well here is a very detailed and extensive dictionary of Wu-Tang Speak!

**i know i dont need to explain how The Wu-Tang Clan is kung fu related,right!?

The Wu-Dictionary Here!

Get your R.I.P. ODB t-shirt Here!

Kung Fu!: Reggae Vs. The Martial Arts

2004-11-30T03:07:00.000-08:00

You like reggae music? i know i dont have to ask if you like kung fu...well if you do like reggae check out this new Compilation CD featuring kung fu related and influenced themed songs..

Release Date 11/23/2004

Hear a 30-second sample from each track listed below.

1. Kung Fu Fighting - Lloyd Parks
Listen: MP3 Audio
2. Enter The Dragon - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
3. Exit The Dragon - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
4. Black Belt Jones - Bagga & Keith Hudson
Listen: MP3 Audio
5. Black Belt Jones - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
6. Black Belt - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
7. Hap Ki Do - Big Youth
Listen: MP3 Audio
8. Bells Of Death - Augustus Pablo
Listen: MP3 Audio
9. Finger Mash - Lee Perry & The Silvertones
Listen: MP3 Audio
10. Iron Claw - Tommy McCook & The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
11. Iron Fist - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
12. Scorching Iron - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
13. Kung Fu - Linval Thompson
Listen: MP3 Audio
14. Kung Fu - Linval Thompson
Listen: MP3 Audio
15. Theme From Hong Kong - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
16. Karate - Dave & Ansel Collins
Listen: MP3 Audio
17. Shaolin Temple - Barrington Levy
Listen: MP3 Audio
18. Shaolin Temple - Prince Jammy
Listen: MP3 Audio
19. Throne Of Blood - Prince Jammy
Listen: MP3 Audio
20. Fist Of Fury - Prince Jammy
Listen: MP3 Audio
21. Swords Of Vengeance - Prince Jammy
Listen: MP3 Audio
22. Hold Them Kung Fu - The Upsetters
Listen: MP3 Audio
23. The Long Way All The Way - Junior Byles
Listen: MP3 Audio

Want to visit the Shaolin Temple?

2004-11-29T01:54:00.000-08:00

Well i should say ..want to visit "a" shaolin temple..for those of you that live in the western part of the United States..or if you are ever in the state of Texas...you can stop by and visit the Houston Shaolin Temple which is ran by Master Shi De Shan.

Master Shi De Shan is a 31st generation disciple and martial monk (wu seng)
from the Shao lin Temple, Songshan Mountain, Henan Province, China. He was born
in Jiang Su Province in 1966. His secular name is Qing Shan Wan.

Songshan Shaolin Temple of America
11698 Bellaire Blvd.
Houston, Texas 77072
telephone: (281) 568-8881
telefax: (281) 568-8881
email: madstclair@aol.com

********************

For those of you that live in the eastern states of america..and have always wanted to visit the shaolin temple but you don't have enough money for the airfare to China...you can simply go to the USA Shaolin Temple which is located in New York city.

USA Shaolin Temple
678 Broadway, New York, NY 10012
Tel: (212) 358-7876
Fax: (212) 358-7879

-------------------------

Now here is a related story for this post...a story relating to these "shaolin temple's" popping up outside of China.

Shaolin monks in hand-to-hand copyright battle

The monks of China's Shaolin temple are not just good at kung fu but also increasingly agile at using copyright rules to protect their name from rip-offs, state media reported.

The 1,500 year-old temple, known as the cradle of China's martial arts, recently set up the Henan Shaolin Temple Industrial Development Co., whose main purpose is to protect the temple's intellectual property rights, Xinhua news agency said.

"Everyone just wants to make some profits from the name, totally regardless of the integral image of Shaolin Temple," Shaolin abbot Shi Yongxin told the agency.
More than 1,000 brands containing "Shaolin" have been registered without the approval of the temple in the United States, Japan and Europe, Shi said.

Since its start, the new company has been engaged in feverish activity, registering nearly 100 Shaolin-related brands in China and has applied to register "Shaolin" brands in over 100 countries, Xinhua said.

A survey by the China Trademark and Patent Law Office found that many countries were competing to register their own trademarks of Shaolin or Shaolin temple, state media reported previously.

On the west coast of the United States alone, there are three Shaolin temples. In Europe, Shaolin temples can be found in Vienna and Budapest.

The Accidental Video Game Porn Archive

2004-11-28T18:49:00.000-08:00

If you are into video games,porn and of course kung fu.. here is a very cool site that shows a screencap from various games where it looks as if the characters in the game or "having sex" ...very funny..the way this post and link is kung fu related in case you are wondering is because there are in fact Kung Fu Fighting games also listed as well...

Check the site out and the gallery Here!

Here is a sample pic from the site..

Tekken 4

Oral- HEIHACHI VIAGRA!!!

"The Five Deadly Venoms" Halloween Costumes!

2004-11-28T01:08:00.000-08:00

I came accross this story and pics of some guys back in 2000 that dressed up as "The Five Deadly Venoms" for halloween,and even took 1st place at a halloween costume party.

Pretty Cool,check it out Here!

Koss KS4192 Digital Home Audio & Video Entertainment System

2004-11-26T20:36:00.000-08:00

I have been wanting a Surround Sound system for quite awhile..as well as big screen tv..but i could only afford the surround sound system right now..anyways..i have been doing much research lately,looking up various models at different prices..and i realized i dont want to spend more then $200 on a system..at first i didnt want one that came with a dvd player..i wanted the kind that was just the receiver along with the speakers.

After searching for many hours i found out it was cheaper to get a system that included the dvd player...i narrowed my search down to a KOSS system..mainly cause i know thier stand alone dvd players can be "hacked" to be REGION FREE players! I looked all over the place for a region code hack for the model i was interested in,but couldn't find one..so i figured i'll just buy the system i wanted and try the existing hack for the KOSS players and just cross my fingers and hope that it works...

Went to Best Buy at 7am this morning..not only did they not have one on display but when i tried to get help they acted like the didn't know what to do..PLUS the line was Soooooooooooo long..it must have been at LEAST a few hours wait.Soooo..i said "phuck it" ..let me go to Sears where they had a similar model on sale.

When i got to Sears i went straight to the Electronics department and they actually had a display model up ..i just wanted to verify that i could hook up at least 1 or 2 other devices to it..mainly my PS2..and YUP..it had 2 A/V inputs...i was like HELL YEAH!

Next...i asked if they had one in stock..and had to wait about 20 minutes to get my answer..and luckily they had 1 left... so i said "i'll take it" ...

Came home started to hook it up ..and of course the speaker wires they gave me was way too short for what i needed..so i went to Radio Shack and bought 100ft of speaker wire..and i wound up using just about all of it up..anyways..about a hour later it was all hooked up..popped in a DVD to try it out..and....That Shit Sounded GOOD!

The sub which has a 8 inch sub woofer in it..was kicking alot more than i though it would..and for a 600 watt system..it did get pretty loud..i was very impressed with the overall performance of the system as well as the quality..

Then i remembered..can i hack it to play ALL REGION dvd's?

Went online found the hack code for previous model KOSS dvd players..and just tried that one..

1.turn on dvd player with no disc in tray
2.press 1-6-7-1-9 on the remote
3.select ALL for Region Code Setting
4.hit Exit

so..i did all that..and IT WORKED!!! I immediately tried out my Celestial/IVL Shaw Bros movie Shaolin Prince ..which is Region 3..played perfect...then tried some PAL dvd's..played perfect..

Oh man..i was then VERY happy with my choice of system and purchase..as well as the quality of the system.

Price for system $144 -$20 mail-in-rebate =$124.

I highly recommend this system to anyone wanting to purchase a inexpensive Dvd Player 6.1 Surround Sound System!!

***KS4192 Product Features

-Also plays MP3, WMA, & Picture CD for your convenience
-Comes with a SD Media Port that let you view digital pictures or media in a snap
-600 W (KS4192) total output from front center, rear and subwoofer, all included as a complete set
-Plays DVD, CD, S/VCD, CD-R/W, DVD+RW, and DVD-R/W for ease of use
-Also plays, CD+G, MP3, WMA, & Picture CD for your convenience
-Complete with digital tuner and let you enjoy the favorite radio stations
-Progressive Scan (480P/576P) for outstanding pictures
-Dolby Digital Decoder for quality sound
-Multiple audio/video sound formats tailored your language preference
-Component & S-video output for easy connections
-Full function remote control allows complete control with one hand
-VF display and on-screen menu display and controls
-Hi resolution multi-screen format to maximize the enjoyment of the movie
-Multiple language formats
-Movie time, track, and title search
-DVD and audio CD loop repeat play feature
-Multiple audio and MP-3 CD play feature
-Angle control (on DVD disc with this feature)

Shaolin vs. THE WORLD!

2004-11-24T13:56:00.000-08:00

Shaolin vs. THE WORLD...there have been many movies where somebody or a group of people for one reason or another have tried to take out Shaolin...WHY?..i don't know..maybe because Shaolin represents everything they want to be.....a little bit of jealousy i guess.But if these opponents of Shaolin were smart they would go by that old motto "if you can't beat em,join em"

I know there are MANY movies where the storyline is a "Shaolin vs" plot..but here are a few listed where it is in the actual title.

Shaolin vs. Lama
Shaolin & Wu Tang(Shaolin vs. Wu Tang)
Shaolin Temple Against Lama
Shaolin Challenges Ninja
Shaolin vs. Ninja
Shaolin vs. Manchu
Shaolin vs. Tai Chi
South Shaolin vs. North Shaolin(Invincible Shaolin)
Shaolin vs. The Devils Omen

If hollywood started stealing the "Shaolin vs" movie ideas like the do all other aspects of asian cinema..i wonder what NEW "Shaolin vs." movies they would come up with..

Shaolin vs. Jason(Freddy vs Jason)
SVP:Shaolin vs. Predator(AVP:Alien vs Predator)
Shaolin Versus the Volcano(Joe Versus the Volcano)
Shaolin vs. Larry Flynt(The People vs. Larry Flynt)

Here is one "Shaolin vs" movie i would love to see!!
**check the director and who it's starring!

Click pic for full size

The Five Deadly Venoms Action Figures!

2004-11-22T02:27:00.000-08:00

Very Cool!

More Info Here!

The Shaw Bros Name Game

2004-11-22T01:56:00.000-08:00

ok,now this might sound gay to some of you..but honestly its not that bad..when im mindlessly welding those body parts at work..i often think of various things..how much money im gonna get on my next check,which movies i will buy when i get my check,what i will eat for lunch(lol),and when i have already thought about all those i then play The Shaw Bros Name Game..

All you do is combine movie titles to make 1 COOL ASS new title...the trick is the LAST word of 1 title has to be the FIRST word of the next title..

Here are some i have come up with..

Invincible Shaolin Mantis
Crazy Shaolin Disciples of the 36th Chamber
The Chinese Boxer from the Temple
The Savage 5 Shaolin Masters
Martial Arts of Shaolin Challenges Ninja
The Anonymous Heroes of the East

thats a few i came up with..there are more but i want to see if anybody else can come up with some..one thing i havent done was combine MORE than 2 names...like maybe linking 3 or 4!!

It dont matter if you use the original title name,aka names,whatever..as long as the movie has been released under that name somewhere..it can be used!

The Shaw Story

2004-11-21T05:11:00.000-08:00

The most indepth look at how the Shaws came about,the history of how they started and how they are today.

Click Here!

Kung Fu Porn!?

2004-11-21T04:42:00.000-08:00

Kung fu porn,well no not really...but it is a scene from the movie A Chinese Torture Chamber Story II which you can pretty much say is WIRE-FU SEX ..with some kung fu style names of the sexual acts!

Check it out Here!

The Green Jade Statuette

2004-11-20T14:11:00.000-08:00

man o man,i really wasnt expecting this..let me explain..for the 2nd night in a row,i get home from work,take a shower,grab something to eat(lol) and then popped in the movie(rental) of The Green Jade Statuette ..i wasnt really sure what to expect, i dont remember reading too many reviews on this one and if i did i dont remember if they were positive or negative(i have a bad memory).

Anyways..this movie starts off with mayhem..shows some men in all black with thier face covered slicing away with knives at a group of people,killing them all..and taking what appears to be the star of the movie "the green jade statuette",which is of a monk.

Then we see the charismatic star of the movie,Meng Fei ride into town on horseback /end scene.

Next, a group of thugs trying to extort money from some innocent people leads to the first scene of the next "badass" of the movie played by Chi Kuan-Chun who easliy takes out the group of guys only to warn them and others basically not to mess with anyone or anything in Stone Village cause he is "the protector"!

oh.i really cant go on like this...i can be writing forever of all the details of this movie,since there are alot.

BASICALLY ,Meng Fei's character is a hired assassin sent to Stone Village to recover the stolen "jade statuette" ..even though the name of the movie is The Green Jade Statuette,in the movie it is never referred to as such, just simply the "jade statuette".

So we get to see Meng Fei in action soon after as he battles a group of men in a hotel/brothel.He is always carrying along,twirling, and uses in his fights what looks like to me a steel pipe..lol..that we late find out has a hidden extracting blade...COOL!

Next another character is introduced which is played by Wang Kuan-Hsing,there were two scenes where Meng Fei's character kills a man(men) and he happens to come out of nowhere and place a rose on the dead body and says "even the dead loves roses" ..

He must be obsessed with roses cause he is always seen caring one,smelling it,placing them on dead bodies, and even when he fights he is holding it..in one fight he ..well let me just quote what was said..

"hey how the hell can a rose be a weapon"
"even roses have thorns,can you not grasp this fact"

So a little bit later in the movie we find out the 3 best fighters in all of Stone Village up to this point are the characters played by Meng Fei,Chi Kuan-Chun and Wang Kuan-Hsing.

One thing i really liked about Meng Fei's character is that no matter when he comes accross someone that is trying to kiil him or hes talking to a lady he is ALWAYS smiling,he just had this cocky attitude like he knew NOBODY could touch him...I LIKE THAT in a kung fu movie character!

I have to say there were many plot twist and turns in this movie..at some points it really seems like more of a mystery movie then a kung fu movie but dont take that the wrong way..a very GOOD mystery movie at that.This was a very good story which includes a lot of backstabbing,and twist that really catch you off guard..well it did me anyways.

I always thought the PERFECT kung fu movie was not only a movie that has some EXCELLENT fighting,but a very good,clear and understandable story as well.

Though there were not non stop back to back fights in this movie,the fights that there was, was very solid action..especially towards the end(of course)when you see "someone" with blades sticking out the side of his shoes,slicing and dicing as he kicks his opponent(s).

Now that i seen it, i looked up this movie and found out the director was Lee Tso Nam
who directed one of my favs The Hot The Cool and The Vicious,which also had a very good story as well as solid action.

There were many things i left out because i didnt want to give out any SPOILERS if you havent seen this movie yet..and if you havent..you REALLY should!

This movie did suffer from the fact that it is presented in FULL SCREEN,there were a few scenes where you hear people talking but dont see anybody on the screen..or many closeup shots where you only see half of thier face.

I almost forgot, the great Leung Kar Yan was in this movie as well,but he didnt show up until the end when there was only around 12 minutes left in the movie.. he only had 2 short lines and 1 fight..still entertaining performance from "beardie".

SOME COOL QUOTES:

"it's not a good thing,to be as famous as you think you are"
"why's that?"
"the more famous you are,the sooner you die"

"you know that i ,Chen Chang never fail in killing,anyone that i wish to kill"

SCORE:4.7/5

Duel of the Iron Fist DVD CONTEST GIVEAWAY!

2004-11-20T13:35:00.001-08:00

Title(s) AKA: Duel Of The Iron Fists; Iron Fist Pillage; The Duel; Duel Of The Shaolin Fist (?)
Film Director(s): Chang Cheh (Chang Che)
Film Producer(s): Runme Shaw
Action Director(s): Tong Gaai, Yuen Cheung Yan
Released: 1971 [Hong Kong]
Genre: Martial Arts

Overview: David Chiang is superb in this one. A kung fu expert with a bad cough who must batle the great Lueng at the end of the movie. Lueng, who was in John Woo's "A Better Tomorrow", plays a carefree streetfighter who must do batle with the establishment and of course David Chiang who was brought in to deal with Lueng. The final batle between Chiang and Lueng in the rain at the end is fantastic, very well staged. And the ladies will love the tattooed butterfly on Lueng's chest, a symbol of his love for his lovely lady. I strongly recommend this one. It's a must see.

Cast: David Chiang, Ti Lung, Guk Fung, Lo Wai, Yeung Chi Hing, Cheng Hong Yip, Wong Ching Ho, Wong Ping, Wong Chung, Chuen Yuen, Cheng Lui, Chan Sing, Cliff Lok, Yuen Wo Ping, Yuen Cheung Yan, Fung Hak On, Hsu Hsia, Yen Shi-Kwan, Chen Kuan Tai

**Info provided by hkflix

***Unlike the PanMedia release of this movie which is english dubbed with imbedded dutch(?) subtitles..this version im giving away IS in english but DOES NOT have subtitles!

You might ask yourself "why are you giving this dvd away?" and i ask you "why not?" ..
I recently bought this movie at a local computer store for $0.99,it was so cheap i bought 2..and so the fact that i have a extra lying around i figure why not give it away..consider it a Random Act of (a kung fu movie lovers) Kindness that just wants to spread the joy of watching these classic kung fu movies..and yes ..this is a Shaw Bros movie!

**The dvd im giving away is NOT the one shown here in the pics(thats my copy) i have another one that has not been open!

As you can tell from the pics the dvd is not in a normal dvd case..it is in a cardboard type of case that opens from the back and you can slip the dvd out..and yes it is a real dvd it is not made of paper(lol) and it will not self destruct.

So if you are interested in winning this dvd ...all you have to do is..

*************************************************************
CONTEST:
Identify what movie this scene(in this animated gif i made show below)shown with Ti Lung comes from? .......thats it..pretty simple..well for those that have seen the movie that is..if you haven't seen it,take a guess!

HINT:It may not be a Shaw Bros movie!

NOTE:This movie(the animated gif comes from) has been released by more than 1 name,i will except any of the names it has been released under as the correct answer.

*************************************************************

I only have 1 extra copy of this movie so the FIRST person to identify what movie this scene comes from and leaves a comment in this post with the CORRECT answer and your email adddress will WIN!

I will then email that person for thier mailing address and send it off to you First Class Shipping(yes i pay shipping charges).. U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY PLEASE! ..it's that simple!

GOOD LUCK!

Moonlight Sword and Jade Lion

2004-11-19T04:13:00.000-08:00

**Click any thumbnail pic below to see in full size

This movie stars Angela Mao whom i only really seen in Hapkido and was not really impressed..it also stars Don Wong Tao who i enjoyed in The Secret Rivals and The Hot, The Cool, And The Vicious and the rest of the cast includes..
Man Kong Lung, Doris Lung (Chun Erh), So Chan Ping, Kwong Ming, Tong Lik, Leung Kar Yan, Cheung Fong Ha, Show Lo Fai, Yuen Sum, Man Cheung San, Ho Kong, Jo Pu Lam, Mao Tak San, New Mei Mei, Ha Hau Chin (according to hkflix)

I got home from work at around 1:30am ..took a shower,grabbed something to eat,then popped in this rental of Moonlight Sword and Jade Lion...

When the movie first came on the screen i was pleasantly surprised...it was presented in widescreen,ok colors and was english dubbed,overall good print...NICE!

The movie started out ok..very understandable story at this point,Angela Mao's character was told by her elder master to go find his brother..and throughout the whole movie thats exactly what shes doing..and during the whole time im watching this movie thats really all i understand and have to fall back on when i get confused on whats going on or who the hell is that on the screen...lol

The fights in this movie were somewhat slow..but they did get better towards the end with the most entertaning fight taking place at the end.It did have some nice weapons..a few.Especially the guy at the end who had dual blades come out from underneath his sleeves above his wrist, reminded me of Wolverine from X-Men.

This movie was also very quiet..it did have build-up music that would play right before a fight would break out..but during quite a few scenes where there's nothing but dialogue.....nothing......no music at all, where during certain times seemed like there should be.So thats what i mean by a quiet movie.

About the hour mark of this movie there was a wierd and not so entertaining sequence that took place in the woods..all these people jump out with flower shaped "things" ..i have no idea what they were but they were used as weapons..one was shown with blades coming out of it..others were shown with what looked like sparklers in it(lol) and then when thrown and made contact they exploded.A few were shown exploding but one when it was clearly seen hit the ground the actual explosion happend about a foot away..hahah..

Another filming error i noticed is towards the end when Angela's character jumps up on the roof..you can see her shadow on what is SUPPOSED to be the sky but is obviously a movie set painted FAKE sky!

One good thing this movie had going for it was the very familiar voices that i've heard in tons of classic and not so classic kung fu movies..a voice which i associate to Ti Lung whenever hearing it was giving to the older man in ScreenCap below,the one with his palm open and his eyes close(1st pic 2nd row)..what am i saying..thats not the ONLY thing it had going for it..also the fact that the very adorable Doris Lung (Chun Erh)(she's the one in the 1st pic 3rd row) was in it helped me stay with this one to the very end ..which totaled 94 minutes!

Now,i must quote the best line in the whole movie(?)let me set up the scene first..
There is this mysterious man whom you never see his face,he is in the shadows at all times..but he is the leader and has many followers..well his girl, played by Doris Lung sees something he is wearing around his neck and ask him what it is he tells her its a Jade Lion..and then continues on to explain it.. and this is what he tells her...WORD FOR WORD!

"that jade lion is one of a pair,however,i only have one...but if..i could get hold of the other one..i would be master,master of the kung fu world!"

(LOL)

But as the viewer watching this we never find out how....they never explain how that would be possible....hmmmm

"

Overall this movie had its boring moments and some fun ones..but maybe not enough fun.

SCORE:2.9/5

HKFlix Says:1.5/5
Unfortunately, we have to recommend skipping this yawner unless you're a die-hard Angela Mao fan.

**see a clip of one of the "fun" moments in this movie(thanks to flashlegsrare)
Clip Here!
-right click on link and select OPEN IN NEW WINDOW for bigger playing screen.

Shaolin Master and the Kid

2004-11-16T14:31:00.001-08:00

Synopsis:

This Taiwanese martial arts film stars Yue Hua as a federal law enforcement agent who's sent off to make sure his brother's killers are brought to justice. With his young nephew in tow, he faces countless hit men who are out to make sure the real killers he seeks are never caught. Unaware of the federal agent's skills, the unwitting hit men are soon taken care of … one by one.

I just finished watching this movie..and i can say is..GOOD,VERY GOOD! I really loved the feel of this one,music,fighting,villians,hero,scenery, i guess just about everything..oh yeah story too!

This movie really had some cool(crazy) villians..one with long red hair,one with his face painted white,one with face painted black,,one with a move called "Thunder Palms" where basically he had these little balls that he would throw and caused an explosion.The main villian was dressed in all black where when he got close enough to the main character of the movie he would remove his left hand and underneath was like a "pirate stump" with a blade sticking out..this guy also had some very cool lines in the movie..

"my kung fu is quite invincible,and no one has escaped from me yet"

The end villian is the one with the overall best lines in the movie.

"i shall kill you...but slowly...and piece by piece"
"huh,how i hate you ..i'll kill you and drink your blood and eat your flesh every drop,every morcel"
"now then i shall cut you to pieces,but slowly so you have plenty of time to appreciate the pain"

The fighting in this movie was pretty good...very entertaining..it did have some of that "only seen in a kung fu movie action" like where magically they can walk on water,jump around like a grasshopper,throw stuff very far with exact accuracy,etc. you know what i mean..i love movies like that...makes it more entertaining..

Rarely seen in an old school kung fu movies(well at least by me) was a couple music montages,you know where they play a song and show various scenes but nobody is speaking just something to look at while listening to the song.

At one point of the movie in a dramatic scene the theme song from the soap opera The Young and the Restless started playing..lol..but it actually fit and sounded good..haha...it was played quite a few times after that point.

Anyways..i really liked this movie and since this was only a rental i would definitely pick this one up, one day!

SCORE:4/5

Tony Jaa(Ong Bak) Demo Video!

2004-11-16T14:24:00.000-08:00

Man this guy is amazing..i do own and have seen Ong Bak and what he does in the movie is beyond crazy..this guy deserves to BLOW UP! ..i just hope he doesn't come to America and start making "Romeo Must Die" type movies!

Video Here!

The One-Armed Swordsman Trilogy Selling Well in Hong Kong

2004-11-15T01:36:00.000-08:00

Here is part of a story from the ChinaDaily website..

Evidently the passing years have not dimmed Hong Kong's appetite for the films. One recently repackaged Shaw Brothers trilogy, released by Celestial Pictures, was legendary filmmaker Chang Cheh's 1967 epic The One-Armed Swordsman. The feature spawned two sequels (The Return of the One-Armed Swordsman in 1968 and The New One-Armed Swordsman in 1971). The repackaged movie reached number 5 at HMV stores in Hong Kong - a significant achievement, says William Pfeiffer, CEO of Celestial Pictures from his offices based at the famous studio.

"You might expect that a film like that would be number one in a specialist outlet, but at a shop like HMV with a more international flavour, it just shows how popular the Shaw Brothers' films are.

"To get to number five against competition from Hollywood just shows how strong the market is for these movies."

I really did not know that the Shaw Bros movies were selling so well in Honk Kong or basically in Asia..i thought maybe people over there had enough of those movies..lol..Very good to know that Celestial is getting their money back..just wish they would get a little more on the ball and start "fixing" or maybe better yet,"stop fixing" the audio problems with some of the releases.

REAL Shaolin Monks Demonstration Videos!

2004-11-15T01:15:00.000-08:00

Man..these guys are extremely impressive..they are so fast they need to make a movie..lol..

The videos can be downloaded for free. The files are recorded in the MPG format and can be played with each usual Player. To download these files simply click on the screenshot Have a lot of fun!

Be astonished of the fantastic performances of Shaolin monks.

Check out various videos Here!

**make sure you check out that Shaolin Drunken Stick one..its the last one!!

Hero

2004-11-15T01:08:00.000-08:00

I first seen this movie last year..at that time i had rented it and watched this version which really was very good,both the dvd quality as well as the movie..

Then sometime later the movie gets a "uncut" release on dvd which was released by Edko and i pre-ordered that one on yesasia.com ..when i finally got it found out it had a logo that popped up during the movie at various times 8(

Then shortly after that the movie FINALLY gets released here in the U.S. in the theaters...and i for sure went to go see it.. i wanted to show my support for bringing over quality asian movies shown in its original language...suprisingly the movie was #1 for the first two weeks of its release!! 8)

Now Disney/Buena Vista will be releasing this on DVD

DVD Release Date: November 30, 2004
DVD Features:
Available subtitles: English, Spanish
Available Audio Tracks: Chinese (Unspecified) (Dolby Digital 5.1), English, French
"Hero Defined" - a look at the epic masterpiece
Storyboards
Inside the Action: A Conversation with Quentin Tarantino

so while this version will feature an English Dub track.. i wouldnt buy this movie for that(oh man i hated the english dub track for Crouching Tiger,Hidden Dragon) i do want to buy it to again,show my support for releasing asian movies here in the U.S. (now i just wish MiramAXE would get off thier ass and start releasing those Shaws)

I hope this is my last purchase of this GREAT movie.
So basically,if you dont already own this movie,GETIT!

Bruce Lee vs The Karate Kid

2004-11-14T23:26:00.000-08:00

Classic Brisk Ice Tea Commercial!

Watch Here!

Master Of The Flying Guillotine – Anniversary Deluxe Edition

2004-11-14T22:55:00.000-08:00

info from Ventura Distribution website:
------------------------
Genre: Martial Arts
Rating: R
TRT: 90 min.
Label: Pathfinder Home Entertainment
Format: DVD

Synopsis: Limited Deluxe Edition of the classic kung fu movie, staring martial arts legend Jimmy Wang Yu as the One-Armed Boxer, a warrior who has remained true to the recently overthrown Ming Dynasty. A league of kung fu masters are tracking down rebels with a new, deadly weapon--the flying guillotine; an unbeatable, almost supernatural blind man is the king of these killers.

Cast: Director: Jimmy Wang Yu
Cast: Jimmy Wang Yu, Kam Kang
Street Date: December 7, 2004
SRP: $24.98
------------------------
Ok now...i have to say that i reeeeeaally love this movie..i currently own the now available Pathfinder release in which i bought brand new for $9.99
As you can see on the cover it says Ultimate Edition and the run time on this dvd is 93 minutes and Ventura Distribution website has the new one listed as 90 minutes..(?)

NOW

The newly released one says Anniversary Deluxe Edition so the main question to ask is Whats The Difference? ....does anybody know?

I was very pleased with the release i already own..but if they somehow remastered this movie to the quality that Celestial is doing to the Shaw Bros movies...well then..i would buy this new one..but until i find out what exactly this new release will have to offer that the existing release doesnt have...i dont know if i will get it..i do kinda like the new cover..but did you read whats on the cover.. "It's a mean machine-Cuts your head off clean!" lol..kinda 70's cheesy sounding..reminds me of the Shaft character Samuel L. Jackson played in the movie Shaft..where his line was "It's my duty to please that booty" ..hahaha...!!!!

Oh yeah..i also noticed how the cover says Anniversay Deluxe Editon ..BUT..the synopsis states
Limited Deluxe Edition...i really doubt this version will truely be a Limited release..im sure they want to make as much money off this movie as they can..as you can probably tell by this second release.

more than likely,i will buy it anyways...

Chang Cheh:The Godfather of The Kung Fu Film

2004-11-14T22:39:00.000-08:00

Excellent site for everything that is everything regarding the man himself,Chang Cheh...definitely worth a look.

link Here!

**i wonder what Shaw Bros would have been like if Chang Cheh never got into film making....hmmmmmm.....

Buddha vs Shaolin(lol)

2004-11-14T22:04:00.000-08:00

This is a very impressive video that is more technically advanced then physically.
Here is the only information available on the site where you download the video.

Buddha vs Shaolin:
A short kung-fu-action-film without a story.

Videoclip (.wmv) 2.667 kB
Requires Windows Media Player

1:st prize - Svenska minutcupen -1998
Best photo - Novemberfstivalen - 1999
1:st prize - 8th Croation Minute Movie cup - 2000
Nominated to Stockholms filmfestivals "One kilometer
of film"-scholarship -2000
3:rd prize Nordiska smalfilm og videofestivalen.
Participating shortfilm on a DVD distributed by Paradiso.
Broadcasted as commercial for ZTV.

It is exactly 1 minute long.
Watch Here!

Is there anybody that has Yet to see this?

2004-11-14T21:36:00.000-08:00

Well this has been out for quite some time now..but just incase somebody missed this it is amazing how they did this..the music group The Chemical Brothers used scenes/video from the Shaw Bros. movie Two Champions of Shaolin for thier video Get Yourself High..but with the help of computers made it look as if the actors in the movie were actually singing and or rapping the song,and even added elements to the scenes that were no wayin the orginal scenes such as microphones,headphones,turntables,records,boombox..well you just have to see it to believe it.

I must have watched it dozens of times since it originally came out.

Go Here for your choice to watch this music video in Windows Media Player format or Real Player 56k/100k/300k ..Enjoy!

Great Review Site!

2004-11-14T21:17:00.000-08:00

I have searched hours upon hours for a decent kung fu movie review site..well not all in one sitting but ..well..you know what i mean,and here is one of my favs..mainly cause they include ALOT of screencaps as well as video clips from certain movies..not all movies have clips but there are enough that helps to make this site stand out from most.

The Stunt People
**i probably dont need to explain this but just incase..the movies with video clips are the ones with a pic of a video camera in the score column next to the pic of the camera.

Shaolin Prince

2004-11-14T20:03:00.000-08:00

ok ok ..the date is now November 14th 2004. .and i have to admit..i just barely ordered,received and watched my first ever Celestial/IVL/Shaw Bros dvds...this month!I have been holding off on starting to collect them in hopes that someday these remastered prints would be released with the inclusion of the original english dubbed tracks or maybe even a new english dub track..so ive been going somewhat backwards and collecting all the shaw bros/english dub dvds i could find(ground zero,pan media,etc)..regardless of quality.And well ..my waiting paid off...somewhat..i have been buying all of the SVE/Celestial Shaw Bros DVDs as they have been released in Austalia..as you all know by now..they are ALL Region Pal DVD's with the Celestial Remastered video with the ORIGINAL english dub tracks included!!!

BUT..

they are limited to what they can release..since i was told they can NOT release any of the 50 or so titles that MirmAXE has picked up ...Anyways..so my strategy in starting to buy Celestial/IVL DVD's was simply..just to buy movies that there is no existing english dub track available...and well i know there is one available for SHAOLIN PRINCE..which i already own and have seen..the video was simply TERRIBLE!!! ..this movie deserved to be seen the best way possible..and i really couldn't wait any longer for either SVE/MiramAXE/or any other company to release this with the dub track.

I just finished watching Shaolin Prince..and even though i already had seen the english dub version...man oh man..watching this movie this way(remastered) is like watching it for the 1st time. Excellent Quality,easy to read subtitles..my only complaint was the fact that the word "reckon" was used in this movie..i really hate to see that word used in any kung fu movie dubbed or subbed...it just dont fit!This movie is so god damn "FUN" "ENTERTAINING" "ENJOYABLE" "EXCITING" "etc" ..lol..if you dont already own this one..GETIT.

As far as the 3 Holy Fools..i really did enjoy them ..i liked the fact that they lived in the "disciplinary hall" and were told to live there for 3 years..YET they were the baddest of all Shaolin.As far as the fighting goes..no one could touch them..not even the Abbott.The 18 Lohan Arrays were very entertaining..those formations they used..and then when they busted out with those "rings" at the end..and then hooked em together "David Copperfield" style..i was like ..HELL YEAH!..not to mention the 3 Holy Fools showing up on what looked like wooden pogo sticks...HAHA..i loved it!This movie had so many Bad Ass things to it..way too many to name..

If you havent seen this movie yet,watch the trailer Here!

SCORE:5/5!