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The Worst Film Ever

Thanks for the memories!

How sad is this?

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Excellent Lau Kar Leung direct martial arts film featuring Gordon Liu with an uncharacteristically huge head of hair. Liu marries a Japanese woman and manages insult all of her family, resulting in himself having to prove that Chinese marital arts are just as good as Japanese martial arts. This leads to a series of terrific fights that take up the last 40 minutes or so of the film. One of the fights involving Liu with a three-sectional staff and an opponent with nunchucks is a real standout. Sadly, that wasn't the final fight of the film., which is something I always felt director Cheh Chang did very well in most all of his films, building to the best fight at the end of the film. As with most Shaw Brothers films, the story here isn't all that good, but the fight scenes are excellent and make this film well worth watching for martial arts film fans.

A classic kung fu film from the Shaw Brothers studio in that it depicts the similarities and differences between Chinese and Japanese styles of fighting - as well as weaponry - in a thoughtful and intelligent way. As well as this, the film offers up plenty of humour amid the chop-socky fighting bits, and the fights themselves are superbly choreographed and a delight to watch. As well as being accomplished fighters in themselves, the actors are actually good in their various roles too; whether it be Chia Hui Liu (or "Gordon" as he is called in the West) as the provoked hero, or Yuko Mizuno as his beautiful Japanese wife (she's particularly good), or the various Japanese challengers up against him.The martial arts bouts are genuinely exciting, each different from the last as various areas - karate, judo, ninjitsu, even a "drunken god" tale - are explored. My only complaint is that the sets are a little boring, with only the finale - set in a field of straw men! - offering any interest in the backdrop. For a martial arts movie, the film is refreshingly free of blood and violence for a change (not that I'm against that, but often it's just unnecessary) making it a wholesome tale for the whole family to enjoy. Little more is left to be said about SHAOLIN CHALLENGES NINJA, other than it's a fine example of the martial arts genre at its most professionally made and intelligent, and a lot different - and thus better - than most low-budget repetitive kickfests.

East meets Far East when "Gordon Liu" (sporting what looks like an unintentionally funny wig) finds himself agreeing to an arranged marriage with a Japanese woman. He's Chinese, so there are bound to be some rough spots along the way- but the real sticking point for this couple turns out to be- surprise!- martial arts. She takes the next ship back to Japan, to meet with her karate instructor (Kurata) and discuss what might be done to save her marriage. Liu sends her a formal, written challenge in the hopes of luring her back. The ploy backfires and Kurata and half a dozen other Japanese martial artists, taking Liu's insult at face value, arrive to teach him a thing or two about Japanese martial arts. Before you can say "marital misunderstanding," Liu's facing off against one Japanese master after another in a great, unending sequence of fight scenes that make HEROES OF THE EAST well worth sitting through. Kurata himself, using what he calls "crab karate," has what must be the widest horse stance in the history of martial arts movies (horseshoe crab stance?) and moves from side to side like a real crab. In another bout, against a judoka, Liu greases his body so that the man can't get a grip on him.

This is classic martial arts with everything that comes with it, including, to start with the downside first: A terrible English dub. The videotape I saw was also cropped. But if you can past that and get on to the movie you're in for a positive surprise. Drunk Shaolin.. is as good as it gets and offers a great sense of humor without getting silly. In brief the story is about a Chinese man who happens to be a kung fu expert marries a Japanese girl who is a an avid karate fighter. Trouble is certainly ahead as she chucks out her husband's Chinese kung fu weapons to make room for her own Japanese weapons, even worse: He insults her karate she takes it personally as so does her teacher in Japan and a group of his crack students, so they are off to China to challenge her husband to a duel. What follows is a fantastic display of Japanese contra Chinese weapons and techniques presented with considerable style as well as humor. I watched this film many times, it is joy forever. 8/10