Tuesday, January 12, 2016

The Chinese Boxer (1970)

It's the same old story-  a karate man challenges some kung fu students, loses and then gets some Japanese experts to get his revenge.  This happens, but the villains accidentally leave one student alive, who then trains harder than ever before to exact his revenge.  You'd think those darn Japanese would realize their karate, judo and samurai skills are no match for the Chinese boxing!

And yet it happens in movie after movie, especially those starring Jimmy Wang Yu and the ones he directs as well.  This is a good movie, full of action and blood (but never any gore) and one can easily see why he was such a star back then.  The villains aren't the fanged style of Japanese, so that's a plus, but they sure aren't shown in any sort of positive light.  It would take a few more years before that would happen, and it won't be Wang Yu that does it.

Still, it's a fun movie, and apparently the first 'open hand' kung fu movie.  There aren't any real martial arts on display here- that's also a few years away, but the energy the actors put into it more than make up for it.


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