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Martial arts film

 
Wikipedia: Martial arts film
For other uses see Martial arts (disambiguation)

Martial arts film is a film genre. A sub-genre of the action film, martial arts films are characterized by extensive fighting scenes featuring specific martial arts, often following the training and progress of the protagonist in training a specific style or school of martial arts.

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Kung fu films

A notable sub-genre of martial arts films are kung fu films, i.e. martial arts films featuring Chinese martial arts. This genre has mainly been produced in China, peaking in the 1970s, and has been dominated by Hong Kong action cinema and its kung fu and wuxia films. Famous actors include Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Donnie Yen, and Collin Chou.

During the 1970s and 1980s, the most visible presence of martial arts films was the hundreds of English dubbed kung fu and ninja films produced by the Shaw Brothers, Godfrey Ho, Joseph Lai, and other Hong Kong producers. These films were widely broadcast on North American television on weekend timeslots that were often colloquially known as Kung Fu Theater, Black Belt Theater, or variations thereof.

Boxing films

Films surrounding the martial art of boxing begin as early as the 1930s with The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933) and Kid Galahad (1937). The Rocky series of five films (1976 to 2006) enjoyed mainstream success.

While the 1989 Kickboxer starring Jean-Claude Van Damme is nominally about Muay Thai but features a crossover of karate with other styles, movies surrounding the sport of kickboxing appear in the 1990s, with American Kickboxer (1991), Kickboxing Kid (1992), Kickboxing Academy (1997) followed in the 2000s by the films by Tony Jaa. Ferocious Female Kickboxing (1981) and Heavyweight Championship Kickboxing (1990) are not martial arts films in the usual sense but coverage of actual sports competitions.

Ninja films

The mid 1980s saw a proliferation of extremely low budget ninja action films, mostly produced by Joseph Lai and directed by Godfrey Ho. Godfrey Ho was known for his technique of taking footage from little known or unreleased Hong Kong Films (most of them crime or sex thrillers) and splicing them with newly shot ninja footage. This often resulted in films that appeared to have two parallel storylines or sets of characters. Additional footage would be shot so that characters from both movies could appear to interact, usually through phone conversations or editing scenes so that they appear to be in the same room despite not appearing onscreen together. According to Ho, many films were made with the budget of one normal film using this technique. These ninja films regularly employed caucasian actors, most notably Richard Harrison. These actors were overdubbed by different actors despite having spoken english during the filming. The reason for this is that all the ninja footage was filmed without sound. These ninja films were also noted for the colorful, flashy ninja outfits that were regularly worn. Harrison frequently appeared as a character named Gordon whose role and backstory varied from film to film.

Martial arts in films in general

Beginning in the 1980s, there are many action movies starring Western martial artists such as Chuck Norris, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Mark Dacascos, Steven Seagal, and Wesley Snipes.

Action films that do include one or several scenes of hand-to-hand combat without focussing on the nature and background of the martial art are not usually included in the genre. Examples of this include Catwoman (2004), where lead actress Halle Berry was trained for the fight scenes by capoeira mestre Beto Simas, or The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), which includes a realistic fight scene for which Matt Damon was trained by Damon Caro, the scene itself being choreographed by Jeff Imada, both with a Filipino martial arts background.

war films by their nature often feature armed hand-to-hand combat, in the case of historical settings also historical martial arts. A notable example is the duel between Achilles and Hector in Troy (2004), presented as a fight scene including hoplite armour, round shield, spear and Bronze Age sword, choreographed by Richard Ryan.

A special category are fantasy or science fiction movies featuring fictional martial arts, such as The Matrix (1999), Equilibrium (2002), Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005), although classical Chinese kung fu films often present fictional extensions of Chinese martial arts in wuxia or gun fu style.

List of notable martial arts films

Notable martial arts films:

year title genre / style starring / choreographer
1937 Kid Galahad boxing
1942 Gentleman Jim boxing Errol Flynn
1948 Fabiola aka The Fighting Gladiator gladiatorial combat
1949 The True Story of Wong Fei Hung kung fu
1963 The Ten Gladiators gladiatorial combat Dan Vadis
1966 Come Drink with Me kung fu
1970 The Twelve Gold Medallions wuxia Shaw Brothers
1972 Fist of Fury kung fu Bruce Lee
1973 Enter the Dragon kung fu Bruce Lee
1973 When Taekwondo Strikes taekwondo Jhoon Goo Rhee
1974 The Street Fighter karate Sonny Chiba
1975 Master of the Flying Guillotine kung fu Jimmy Wang Yu
1975 Hard Times no holds barred
1976 Hand of Death kung fu Jackie Chan
1976 Rocky boxing Sylvester Stallone
1976 Shaolin Temple kung fu Shaw Brothers
1977 The Duellists fencing
1982 Shaolin Temple kung fu Jet Li
1984 The Karate Kid karate
1985 American Ninja Neo-Ninja
1986 Kung Fu: The Movie kung fu
1987 Last Man Standing bare knuckles
1988 Bloodsport karate, other Jean-Claude Van Damme
1989 Kickboxer Muay Thai, other Jean-Claude Van Damme
1989 Best of the Best taekwondo
1991 By the Sword classical fencing
1992 American Kickboxer kickboxing
1993 Only the Strong capoeira Mark Dacascos
1993 The Bride With White Hair
1993 Iron Monkey kung fu Yuen Woo-Ping
1994 Fist of Legend kung fu Jet Li
1994 Drunken Master II drunken boxing Jackie Chan
1995 Mortal Kombat game adaptation / fantasy
1999 Fight Club bare knuckles
2000 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon wuxia
2000 Gladiator gladiatorial combat
2003 Kill Bill exploitation / kung fu
2003 Bulletproof Monk fantasy / kung fu Chow Yun-Fat
2003 Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior Muay Thai Tony Jaa
2004 Million Dollar Baby boxing
2004 Throw Down parody / judo Johnnie To
2005 Tom-Yum-Goong Muay Thai Tony Jaa
2006 Fatal Contact kung fu Wu Jing
2006 Fearless wushu Jet Li
2007 Flash Point Mixed Martial Arts Donnie Yen
2008 Never Back Down Mixed Martial Arts
2008 Beyond the Ring Mixed Martial Arts
2008 Ip Man biopic / Wing Chun Donnie Yen
2008 Ong Bak 2 Ancient Thai martial arts Tony Jaa
2009 Merantau Pencak Silat Iko Uwais

See also

References

External links


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