Martial Arts
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‘The Raid 2’ a breathless, if overlong, action-packed follow-up
The Raid 2 Written and directed by Gareth Evans Indonesia, 2014 The first reaction to Gareth Evans’ highly anticipated sequel to his blistering 2012 action movie is to complain to the Advertising Standards Authority. Despite the title’s implication, there is no specific raid here, at least not upon a single, individual location, a design mandated by the […] More
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The Grandmaster is More Art Film than Action, and a Beautiful One at That
In the last several years, Hong Kong cinema has had a fascination with legendary Wing Chun martial artist Ip Man that borders on manic obsession, to the point where it wouldn’t be surprising to find out that Hong Kong cinema spent a week secretly living in Ip Man’s pool house and going through his garbage. More
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Fantasia 2012: ‘The Kick’ Makes Martial Arts a Family Affair
The Kick Written by Jong-suk Lee, based on a story by Prachya Pinkaew Directed by Prachya Pinkaew Thailand/South Korea 2011 Fantasia imdb Traditionally, films that pit one country’s martial arts against the martial arts from other countries are blood-soaked chauvinistic affairs like One Armed Boxer and its sequel Master of the Flying Guillotine. Both great films, they up the ante on the Kung […] More
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Fantasia 2012: ‘Dragon’ an unusually human martial-arts showcase
Dragon aka Wu Xia aka The Swordsmen Written by Oi Wah Lam Directed by Peter Chan 2011 Hong Kong/China Fantasia imdb In a strange way, Dragon is a perfect companion film for the Shaw Brothers classic The Fists of the White Lotus that Fantasia presented this year. (Expect Edgar Chaput to review that film as part of his Shaw Brothers Saturday series soon.) Both films are about the never-ending cycle […] More
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Sound On Sight Radio Rewind: Episode #114 – The Cult of Jean Claude Van Damme
The late eighties and early nineties were the golden age of American martial arts action films. Which, of course, means that it was a cinematic dark age for anyone who doesn’t drunk-drive pick-up trucks while listening to Toby Keith CDs. Cheap and easy to produce, 80s movies like Above the Law and China O’Brien didn’t […] More
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Trailer: Ong Bak 3
With the box office success of Ong Bak 2, Sahamongkol Film was quick to announce their intention to film this sequel. Filming of new footage for the follow-up will begin before the end of the year and will also incorporate unused footage from Ong Bak 2. Sia Jieang, an Executive of Sahamongkol, stated the film […] More
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Trailer: Yuen Woo-Ping’s True Legend
In 1978 he achieved his first directing credit on the seminal Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow, starring Jackie Chan, then quickly followed with the similar Drunken Master. The films were smash-hits, launching Jackie Chan as a major film-star. He went on to work with such figures as Sammo Hung in Magnificent Butcher (1979), Yuen Biao […] More
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Toronto After Dark 2009: The Warlords
The Warlords 2007, Hong Kong/China Directed by Peter Chan Written by Xu Lan, Chun Tin-Nam, Aubery Lam, Huang Jian Xin, Jojo Hui, He Jiping, Guo Jun Li, James Yuen Starring Jet Li, Andy Lau, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Xu Jinglei 127 minutes, English 35 mm Generally speaking, when an action star attempts a role that requires delivering […] More
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Top 5 Jean Claude Van Damme films
Hard Target For 20 years Hong Kong director John Woo was the driving force in film on the Pacific Rim. Following the success of The Killer, Woo’s 1989 masterpiece of operatic violence, he made out to Hollywood with his chop-socky. Hard Target. Woo’s American debut took the Belgium-born Jean-Claude Van Damme to new lows of […] More
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The Cult of Jean Claude Van Damme: Sound On Sight Podcast #114
The late eighties and early nineties were the golden age of American martial arts action films. Which, of course, means that it was a cinematic dark age for anyone who doesn’t drunk-drive pick-up trucks while listening to Toby Keith CDs. Cheap and easy to produce, 80s movies like Above the Law and China O’Brien didn’t […] More
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Feudal Anime
Cult Cinema: Volume 2 In terms of cult cinema, anime, which encompasses a wide variety of genres within the blanket term of Japanese animation, can be difficult to categorize. Thankfully, its fans are not, because they all adopt the same high-pitched tone of indignation whenever you point out that jerking off to 14-year olds covered […] More