100 essential action/martial arts b movies, as chosen by you

[JaseSF]

86?: THE SHAOLIN INVINCIBLES (1977)

Stars Chia Ling, Huang Chia Ta, Tao-liang Tan, Chung-erh Lung and Carter Wong. Directed by Hou Cheng.

Plot: When the King orders the execution of two entire families because of a perceived insult, a Shaolin monk comes to the rescue of two of the girls. Trained in the art of Shaolin, the girls (played by Chia Ling and Chung-erh Lung, two very pretty ladies who happen to be very skilled in the fighting arts as well) grow up and finally reach an age where they wish to seek out vengeance against the king who murdered their families. Sent to help them in their quest are two men who've also trained in the art of Shaolin, played by Tao Liang Tan and Carter Wong. However it won't be easy for our heroes because the king has a formidable guard of kung-fu experts, a castle filled with booby traps designed to snare intruders and two seemingly unstoppable kung-fu fighting "gorillas", along with their two trainers who weirdly enough seem to possess tongues long enough they use them in combat, to serve and defend him.

Comments: While truly weird, especially the stuff involving the kung fu fighting gorillas (actually guys in the most ridiculous-looking ape costumes you're ever likely to see) and their long-tongued trainers (the tongues often look ludricrously fake too), this offers up a lot of exciting Kung-Fu fighting featuring our two lovely female leads and their male helpers. The story, aside from what's mentioned above, is fairly straightforward and easy to follow and the adventure as an whole proves quite enjoyable. That said, personally I couldn't help but get a kick out of the kung-fu "gorillas" and their trainers, as the scenes featuring them are so bizarre and unusual it's hard to take one's eyes away from them despite the utter disbelief one feels while viewing them. These two elements seem to nudge this one slightly into the realm of outright fantasy although thankfully the fighting for the most part seemed grounded in reality.

[Sister Grace]

89. Two Crippled Heros... need i say more?

Only if it's "The Crippled Masters" Sis. 

same movie, my copy was released under two crippled heros

There are indeed two different movies Grace, both done with the same actors. Crippled Masters was a 1979 production and Two Crippled Heroes was a 1980 follow-up. For some reason the latter is only listed on IMDB as "Crippled Heroes", but the VHS copy I have adds the "Two". The pair even made their act into a trilogy with a third movie called Fighting Life in 1981.

wierd; this just goes to show that martial art films aren't an area of expertise of mine. But hey, you learn something everyday! damn, now i have to find the other movie... 

[Andrew]

There are indeed two different movies Grace, both done with the same actors. Crippled Masters was a 1979 production and Two Crippled Heroes was a 1980 follow-up. For some reason the latter is only listed on IMDB as "Crippled Heroes", but the VHS copy I have adds the "Two". The pair even made their act into a trilogy with a third movie called Fighting Life in 1981.

wierd; this just goes to show that martial art films aren't an area of expertise of mine. But hey, you learn something everyday! damn, now i have to find the other movie... 

"The Crippled Masters" is their best effort.  I have yet to see "Fighting Life," but a few years ago Amazon.com mixed the films up in their system, which resulted in me getting some hate mail from people who wanted to buy "The Crippled Masters" and got "Fighting Life" instead.

Those two gents also turn up in Raiders of Wu Tang

[Jack]

Ninja 3 - The Domination

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKZ_svjtX_4&feature=related#

[Mr. DS]

The Story Of Ricky:  One of the most brutal and over the top films ever.  The best part is most of the violence is unecessary to the scene but its one of those cases where it makes the movie. 

[AnubisVonMojo]

wierd; this just goes to show that martial art films aren't an area of expertise of mine. But hey, you learn something everyday! damn, now i have to find the other movie... 

Yeah, you're telling me. I actually didn't know about Fighting Life until I looked into the actors on IMDB, and even then their filmographies didn't include the movie Andrew pointed out, Raiders of Wu-Tang! But, as the Buddha (or Tony Robbins) said, "the only real knowledge in life is experience". As such, I've got tapes of Fighting Life and Raiders coming to me from Amazon so someday (probably not until next year) I can sit down and do a one week marathon.

Back to the list: to clarify, I didn't actually nominate Crippled Masters b/c Grace already nominated Crippled Heroes so recently, so technically we're at...

No.84 - Chinese Super Ninjas - A typical tale of revenge as a Chinese martial artist must avenge his defeated brothers' deaths at the hands of evil Japanese ninjas. The non-typical part comes from the ninjas' various abilities as each of the 5 groups reflects a different element: fire, earth, wood, water, and gold. The best of which are the gold ninjas whose special ability are shiny gold parasols used to blind their opponents... with elegance! The wood ninjas are funny too, as they disguise themselves in tree costumes... which doesn't give them a lot of evasion power against opponents wielding axes. Unable to combat these ninjas and their fantastic abilities on his own, our hero joins a group of Chinese ninjas specially trained to combat the elementals' skills, forming the Chinese Super Ninjas! 

[Rev. Powell]

83.  The Last Dragon. 

[JaseSF]

82. Incredible Kung Fu Mission/Kung Fu Commandos (1982): Basically a bunch of oddballs are recruited by a Kung Fu master named Master Sher(John Liu) to be trained for a truly deadly, dangerous and somewhat suicidal rescue mission. "Don't push them so hard Master..they'll come to hate you."

"I don't want them to die..that's all." At first these guys are laughably inept and downright embarrassing to their master but after one particular embarrassing defeat at the local brothel they come to realize the value of the knowledge the master possesses and finally become serious about becoming trained fighters and show considerable improvement in attitude as well as skill as the time approaches to undertake the mission. The dubbed version of this is hilarious with one character talking with a cockney accent and another dubbed only via sound effects?!! 

[Cthulhu]

Chinese ghost story 3 (Sien lui yau wan III: Do do do)
Ghosts, kung-fu magic, hot Asian chicks, and an evil MOUNTAIN. Yes, if I remember correctly, they fight with a small mountain.
IMHO, this is the best one in the series.

[Andrew]

80.  "Drunken Wu Tang." 

http://www.badmovies.org/movies/dwutang/

The original language version still has all the crazy action, but the dubbed version is insane. 

"Give me the book, or I'll kill you all!"  "Don't threaten us, and get off our roof!"

[RCMerchant]

No list can be complete without the Master....BRUCE LEE!

Not much that can be said about his films that hasn't already been said. Here's a clip from one of my favorites....

79.The CHINESE CONNECTION (in reality FISTS of FURY...but the titles somehow got mismatched in the trip to the Western dubbing rooms...)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5q9kYKtvYU0

...heh heh...I like how Bruce kicks the bespeckeled shmuck in the a$$ towards the end of the clip!

[Kester Pelagius]

What?  No love for the dumb teen action flick Iron Eagle?   

I nominate. .

78. Legend of the 8 Samurai

[JJ80]

How about "The Streetfighter" (1974)?

[Rev. Powell]

76?.  DRUNKEN MASTER II (THE LEGEND OF DRUNKEN MASTER).  Jackie Chan.  The climax is one of the best fight scenes ever filmed.

[JaseSF]

Speaking of Bruce Lee, we need some Bruce Lee phonies on this list:

75. Bruce Lee's Secret (1976):

(My IMDB comments)

Bruce Li vs. 70s Disco Thugs
   In this film we see Bruce Lee wanna-be Bruce Li tackle an army of thugs(who just happen to look like a bunch of bad rejects from a 70s Disco special) lead by Mr. Grace(who just happens to resemble John Travolta if he were fat and had a scar on his face). The fights are pretty good but seriously lack credibility. In any case, this movie is very humorous to watch but the humor isn't of the intentional type. Good fun if you like this sort of thing.