Martial Arts > 1981 Martial Arts

Lone Wolf and Cub kick some serious butt

Advantages: a decent samurai movie
Disadvantages: dubbing, sound quality in parts as well as picture quality

This is a classic old school samurai film. This film was previously banned in this country for it's violent graphic nature, but nowadays I guess we are made of sterner stuff. If you are easily distressed then this moive is not for you. There are very explicit scenes of swords being buried into heads, heads splitting in half, and more blood gushing than you can shake a stick at. The film centres around Ogami Itto, who is played by Tomisaburo Wakayama ...
...to be referred to has Lone wolf and Cub. Itto is the shoguns chief executioner and a powerful man. So much so that lord Retsudo soon wants him dead out of sheer fear. In the initial attack Itto's wife is slain, and Itto decides to dedicate his life to taking the life of lord Retsudo and all those close to him, {one way of getting rid of the existential angst i guess} In a scene at this point he places a ball on the floor and a sword and he makes ...

tayloa22 29.08.2007 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Shogun Assassin (Strong Uncut Version) (DVD)

Ninja films made as they should be

Advantages: A mature serious approach to the genre
Disadvantages: compared to some martial arts films now, looksa little dated

...serious element of realism. Whilst Enter the Ninja concentrates largely on Franco Nero's character, Sho Kosugi has a great part in the film as a disillusioned bad guy. The film is a more serious look into the world of ninjas and actually attempts to put a decent plot into the movie Who's in it? ☺☺☺☺☺☺ Franco Nero~ Cole Susan George~ Mary Ann Flanders Sho Kosugi~ Hasegawa Alex Courtney~ Frank Landers Christopher ...
...Susan George: Eastenders, Tales of the Unexpected, Venom, The Jigsaw Man Franco Nero: Force 10 from Navarone, Die Hard 2, Django, Camelot Sho Kosugi: Iron Eagle, Pray for Death, Revenge of the Ninja, Rage of Honour Christopher George: El Dorado, Chisum Mission Impossible, Wonder Woman, Love Boat So what the heck is it all about? ☺☺☺☺☺☺☺☺☺a 86;☺☺☺☺ The film starts ...

tayloa22 15.11.2007 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Enter The Ninja (DVD)

Sharp pointy thing for hire

Advantages: father son relationship, action, plot
Disadvantages: dated, some won't like the graphic violence

Shogun Assassin- A Review By Addy Steeped in History Shogun Assassin is a chambara film which means sword fight, and that's what this film offers up in abundance. The film was originally released in 1980 but due to the sheer graphic nature of the film it was banned for many years in this country, {1983-2001} and now has achieved a cult status and huge fan base. This jidaigeki {Period film} is set in Japan during the Edo period and is a film ...
...Beauty and the Beast Shogun Assassin really does combine elements of both beauty and beast. Allow me to elaborate. The beast ☺You may remember that at the beginning of the review I mentioned that this film was formerly banned. This is due to the graphic nature of the battle scenes. Not only is there regular geysers of blood shooting out from gaping wounds but there are images such as swords being buried into heads and heads being split ...

tayloa22 04.06.2008 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Shogun Assassin (Uncut Version) (Wide Screen) (DVD)

Tung Lung, Honours Bruce's death

Advantages: Excellent martial arts, from Tung Lung
Disadvantages: none

Game of Death 2 Staring Tung Lung, Huong Cheng-Li, Roy Horan, Lee Hoi-San and previously unseen footage of Bruce Lee. The film in many ways is similar to Fist of Fury 2 they are both about avenging the death of a brother. In this case Bobby Lo played by Tung Lung set out to get revenge for the death of Billy Lo (Bruce Lee) at the hands of Jim Koo (Huong Cheng-Li). This film has a lot less American influence than Game of Death , which ...
...and fighting scenes than a well thought out story Probably the best Bruce Lee film ever made, even though Bruce Lee is not actually in it. Made with previously unseen footage of his films, a stand in and completed with the classic poorly dubbed English lame dialogue and amazing Kung Fu. When Billy Lo (Bruce Lee) is killed at friend Jim Koo's funeral, brother Bobby Lo (Tong Lung) sets out to avenge his death. Bobby Lo sets off to Japan to meet ...

Bandit_Haze 03.07.2000 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful
Review of Game Of Death 2 (DVD)

Shaolin And Wu Tang

Advantages: Good movie, great kung-fu
Disadvantages: English dubbed only, unremovable English/Chinese subtitles

Shaolin & Wu Tang is a good movie with an excellent end fight scene between three Shaw Brothers legends: Gordon Liu, Adam Cheng and Wang Lung Wei Unfortunately this dvd is pretty terrible. Previously available on VHS in both original Cantonese/English subtitled and English dubbed (with burnt in English subtitles versions, they opted to include only the English dubbed version on this dvd. So you get English audio and English subtitles (+ Chinese ...
...subs don't match. Not including the original Cantonese audio when it was previously available is just pure laziness even if this is a budget 5.99 RRP title. As with a lot of old kung fu titles, picture quality is equivalent to VHS but at least you can avoid those annoying tape gets chewed up in your VCR occurences. To summarise - Good movie, bad dvd. Skip it ...

eatingfish 20.10.2008 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful
Review of Shaolin And Wu Tang (DVD)