2nd Old School Kung Fu Fest
November 8 - December 15, 2001 at Cinema Village
A molten mass of bubbling talent, Hong Kong in the late 70's and early 80's has infected the world with its accumulated talents that are changing the face of world cinema today. Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Sammo Hung, Yuen Wo-ping: all of them got their start in that hotbed of creative ferment.
It all started with the Shaw Brothers, the last great film studio on earth, and its two colossal directors: Chang Cheh and Lau Kar-leung. After them came the independent stunt teams: Sammo Hung's Team, Jackie Chan's Team, the independents Stephen Tung Wai and Ching Siu-tung. Out on the fringes, working for hire, were Simon Yuen and his home-schooled stunt sons, the Yuen Clan.
The Old School Kung Fu Fest covers them all. From Chang Cheh we have CRIPPLED AVENGERS, from Lau Kar-leung we bring you Jet Li's third film, MARTIAL ARTS OF SHAOLIN. Sammo Hung gives us THE PRODIGAL SON, the Yuen Clan is responsible for both DREADNAUGHT and TAOISM DRUNKARD. Stephen Tung Wai is the choreographer for the undiscovered MAR'S VILLA. To round it off we're bringing the American version of Japan's famed Lone Wolf and Cub series, SHOGUN ASSASSIN, and the US edit of the great, misguided Shaw Brothers/Hammer Studios collaboration, 7 BROTHERS MEET DRACULA, starring Peter Cushing and David Chiang and choreographed by Lau Kar-leung.
A roundelay of roundhouse kicks, and flesh-ripping riffs these movies are the genetic code of modern pop culture, the kung fu movies that slunk through grindhouses and across television screens, eating their way into the DNA of millions of children who grew up to be us. They cut through our modern world of McDonald's, Microsoft and the McJob because they're real. What they give us is fantastic and dependable: the sound of little cloth shoes running over baddies' skulls, the smell of nimble hunks clad in wet silk, the high-pitched strike of the sword, the berserker screams of unarmed combatants shredding wooden tables and chairs with their earlobes. The walls of the citadel of High Culture tremble before this lunatic onslaught. The dead white males of the European Canon cower before the feet and fists of Kung fu Cinema.
Just when the movies were getting too respectable for their own good, a cult cure is found.
Relax, jack. The Old School Kung Fu Fest is back.
Films
THE PRODIGAL SON (1982)
DREADNAUGHT (1981)
SHOGUN ASSASSIN (1974/1980)
CRIPPLED AVENGERS, aka MORTAL COMBAT, aka RETURN OF THE FIVE DEADLY VENOMS (1978)
SEVEN BROTHERS (AND ONE SISTER) MEET DRACULA (1974)
MAR’S VILLA (1978)
THE LEG FIGHTERS, aka INVINCIBLE KUNG FU LEGS (1981)
MARTIAL ARTS OF SHAOLIN (1985)
TAOISM DRUNKARD (1983)
Who is Madame Fan Fok-fa or, What is this old chick doing in my kung fu movie?
The Park Slope Paper, November 13, 2000.
