As a citizen of one of the most powerful countries in the world, I’m allowed to make fun of it periodically, hence the video.  In all seriousness, though, the United States is a hell of a place to live.  We’ve certainly got our faults, but where else in the world can you have such diverse opinions on religion and politics and not get in trouble for it…..most of the time?  When it comes to film-making, we are pioneers in the field.  We have the largest film industry in the world and an entire city dedicated to that industry: Hollywood.  We have/had the biggest stars like John Wayne, Clark Gable, Carry Grant, Jamie Lee Curtis, Sylvester Stallone, the list goes on and on.  When it comes to martial arts, that genre was never really taken seriously in the US until Bruce Lee entered the picture.  When The Green Hornet came out in the 60’s, people noticed the Kato, and were like, “Who IS that guy?  He’s fantastic.”  I did a post about Bruce Lee a little while back, and I’m going to reiterate that he has done an incredibly thing bringing attention to the martial arts and Kung Fu, specifically.  He’s inspired so many actors and martial artists that he’s become a household name.  Even if you had never seen a Bruce Lee movie, you know who he is.  Because of Mr. Lee, we began to see a lot more in the way of martial arts movies.  Most of those movies during the late 70’s and early 80’s really weren’t that good.  We got stars like Chuck Norris who stepped in and became a star in his own right.  We also got guys like Jean-Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal.  When it comes to action movies, nobody does it quite like the United States, and I mean every word of that.  Because of that, I’m going to discuss the best fight films that we have released.  This is The Best Martial Arts Movies: USA.

Black Dynamite

I think it’s fitting that I start this list with a Blaxploitation Kung Fu Comedy.  This is absolutely one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen.  Michael Jai White, who holds NINE black belts in styles such as wushu, Tae Kwon Do, and Kyokushin Karate, is a legitimate bad-ass.  Not only that, he’s a fantastic actor as well.  He’s been in movies such as Spawn and The Dark Knight.  He’s got himself quite a filmography.   He’s also got some serious comedic chops, too.  Black Dynamite is a PERFECT example.  It not only pokes fun at the Blaxploitation genre, while respecting it at the same time, Black Dynamite also pays homage to the old Kung Fu movies of the 1970’s.  From beginning to end, it’s an absolute riot.  This scene where somebody’s interrupting his Kung Fu is one of the highlights.  You have to see this movie to believe it.

Showdown In Little Tokyo

This was one of Brandon Lee’s last movies he did before he died in 1993.  This is a very solid little action flick with Dolph Lundgren who has moves of his own.  What really makes this movie work is Brandon and Dolph.  The two are such a fantastic pair, it’s a shame that they didn’t get a chance to team up again in a later flick.  This little fight scene shows a pretty decent fight scene injected with some humor.  It’s a fun little movie that doesn’t even last a full 90 minutes, and it doesn’t need to.  It gets straight to the point.  If you’re a fan of Brandon Lee or Dolph Lundgren, you owe it to yourself to check this one out.

Bloodsport

Of all the films that came out of the Cannon Film Group, Bloodsport was one of the finest.  Not only did it some solid fight choreography courtesy of Frank Dux(who the movie was supposedly about), it was the starring vehicle for the up-and-coming Jean-Claude Van Damme.  This movie put him on the map and helped make him a legitimate action star.  He’s been in a number of solid action movies including John Woo’s Hard Target, which is one of my favorite action movies ever.  While the veracity of Frank Dux’s story is up in the air at this point, Bloodsport remains one of the most memorable martial arts films of the 80’s.

Drive(1997)

What we have here is one of the greatest American-made martial arts movies ever made.  Why?  Because it’s so damn fun.  That’s why.  Mark Dacascos stars as Toby Wong who is on the run from a ruthless Chinese organization.  He “enlists” the help of one Malik Brody(Kadeem Hardison) and they head to Los Angeles to collect on a bounty.  From beginning to end the action in the film is phenomenal.  Mark Dacascos, at the time, I considered to be the American Jackie Chan, because he’s an amazingly talented martial artist and a good actor, which was a rarity back then.  The fights in this movie make it feel like a Kung Fu movie out of Hong Kong.  One of the funniest moments is when Malik and Toby actually talk about that.  The humor and the writing is spot on.  This one is definitely recommended.

Mortal Kombat

Mortal Kombat is probably the best video game-to-movie adaptation ever.  While that’s not saying a lot, as it’s not a particularly great movie, it’s still has some really awesome moments.  Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, Mortal Kombat features a rockin’ soundtrack and some pretty stellar fight choreography.  The fight between Johnny Cage and Scorpion is one of my favorites.  Surprisingly, the writing is not terrible.  The movie is pretty faithful to the source material, despite being a PG-13 movie.  Also, Christopher Lambert plays Rayden, the god of thunder.  He pretty much steals the show in every scene he’s in.  He’s genuinely funny at times.  Some of the visual effects are extremely dated, but the creature effects for Goro are still impressive.  I’m amazed they got him working the way they did.  Apparently the head of Goro is in the main lobby of NetherRealm Studios, the guys that made the Mortal Kombat video game.  The less said about the sequel, the better, though.

Skin Trade

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ot56jRHu36A

Featuring Tony Jaa in his English-language debut, Skin Trade follows Nick Cassidy, played by Dolph Lundgren, as he tracks down a ruthless human trafficking organization that attacked his family.  Initially at odds with Tony Jaa’s….well, Tony, they team up to take down the organization.  After a disastrous come-back in Protector 2, Tony Jaa finally gets to let loose in this film.  While dealing with the vile human trafficking issue, Skin Trade also offers up a pretty solid action thriller with some very impressive fights.  Michael Jai White also makes an appearance and gets to take on Tony Jaa.  While the film has some questionable visual effects, it’s a pretty solid and gritty thriller that shines the light on an insidious industry.  Definitely recommended.

Ninja: Shadow of a Tear

During the 80’s, there was a slew of movies centered around ninjas including American Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja, and Enter The Ninja.  While only a small handful of those movies were decent, they made ninjas cool.  I dressed up as a ninja often for Halloween.  But after the 80’s, ninja movies were no longer being made, and I’m not counting the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies.  They’re not ninjas, they’re turtles.  In 2009, we saw the return of ninja movies with Ninja Assassin and Ninja.  While I wouldn’t necessarily say they were great, they were a ton of fun to watch.  Ninja was the worst of the two, featuring some unwanted bad visual effects and a story that was just ludicrous.  Thankfully, Ninja: Shadow of a Tear takes those bad moments and throws them out in favor of a 1980’s-style brutal fight film.  Starring Scott Adkins, Ninja: Shadow of a Tear is one of the best fight movies of the decade.  Featuring some stellar choreography from fellow martial artist and actor, Tim Man, this movie has some of the best action in a direct-to-video film.  Highly recommended.

Undisputed III: Redemption

The second film on this list featuring Scott Adkins(who is British, by the way), Undisputed III: Redemption follows the villain of the previous film, Boyka, as he heads to a tournament that may earn him his freedom.  Turning a villain in the protagonist was a very interesting choice, and a good one I think.  This allows the character to try and put his past behind him.  While the story is…meh, the action can’t be denied.  This is a phenomenal fight film.  Featuring a cast that includes The Latin Dragon: Marko Zaror, Undisputed III is a balls-to-the-wall action film.  The fight choreography is spectacularly brutal, especially when Zaror enters the picture.  This fight with the Capoeira fighter is definitely one to watch.

Enter The Dragon

This one’s a bit of a cheat, as the film was made by studios from Hong Kong AND the United States.  This was the first major collaboration between worlds, essentially.  This was Bruce Lee’s finest effort, and sadly, his last completed film.  He passed away before the film was released, so he never got to see the completed footage.  For many, and myself included, this is the definitive Kung Fu movie.  While the story is kind of…eh, there is no denying that this film bridged the gap between the East and the West.  We have Bruce Lee to thank for that.  This fight scene with O’Hara is one of many phenomenal fights in the film, but the film was also about Lee’s philosophy as a martial artist.  The extended cut of the film includes some philosophical moments that help flesh out Lee’s character.  I honestly think that Bruce would be extremely proud of the film and of the people that helped make it happen.

While there are many other martial arts films made in the United States that are pretty good, these ones stand out the most for me.  While not everybody is going to agree, I hope that I’ve shined some light on some fairly underrated flicks that any fan of the martial arts should check out.  For me:  These are The Best Martial Arts Movies: USA.  With The Best Martial Arts Movies winding down, my final posts will be about China’s martial arts films, of which there are MANY.  So, it may take a few posts to get through my favorite movies from that country.  Until then, this is Major Tom, signing off.

Continuing with the theme of Best Martial Arts Movies, The Best will now take you down to Thailand.  Formerly known as Siam, Thailand has a rich and varied history dating back nearly 40,000 years, and is the only southern Asian nation to not be colonized by outsiders.  While political strife has certainly been mentioned many times in the news, Thailand still remains one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world.  While Thailand’s movie industry has been around as long as film-making has been, it’s never really garnered much attention outside of the country.  There was one man who really started to bring attention to the action genre in Thailand: Panna Rittikrai.  You may not know who Panna is, but you probably have heard of his protege, Tony Jaa.  These two guys managed to make some of the most unique and spectacular martial arts films in the industry.  One of the reasons these movies are awesome is because of their use of Muay Thai, Thailand’s national and kickboxing style.  I had heard of the style before Ong-Bak came out, but I never really saw what it was about.  When Ong-Bak was released, it shook the martial arts genre of action films to the core.  We had a new star in Tony Jaa, who is a phenomenal martial artist and athlete.  Because of him, we now have to access to many of Thailand’s action films, now that we know what they can do with action.  Story-wise…they still need some work.  This is The Best Martial Arts Movies: Thailand.

Ong-Bak: The Thai Warrior

It’s almost hard to believe that Ong-Bak was released 13 years ago.  Ong-Bak and Tony Jaa took the world by storm and showed us that you can have high-flying stunt-work without wires.  Tony Jaa was a living special effect, like Jackie Chan.  Ong-Bak follows Tony Jaa’s character, Ting, as he pursues the evil-doers who still the head of their revered statue, Ong-Bak.  The story is nothing more than an excuse for Tony Jaa to kick some righteous ass, and he does that extremely well.  The choreography and stunt-work is as spectacular as it is thrilling.  Tony Jaa does all of his own stunts and acrobatics.  The moment this movie hit the international market, all eyes in the action film genre turned towards Thailand to see what they would come up with next.  Oh, Ong-Bak was just the beginning.

Tom Yum Goong(A.k.a The Protector)

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ymWo6GFJAs

They did it again.  They took what made Ong-Bak so awesome in the first place and dialed it up to 11 with Tom Yum Goong.  Not only are the stunts crazier, but the fights are even more brutal.  This fight scene that I posted takes place near the end of the film, but it is one my favorite fight scenes of all time.  I’ve never seen such a bone-breaking fight in a movie before.  All the fight scenes in the film are phenomenal.  The real standout is the restaurant fight scene which is done in one entire take without cutting.  In fact, I’ll show you:

Panna Rittikrai and Tony Jaa basically just upped the ante for what an action film could be.  According to Tony Jaa, there were no overly serious injuries during the making of the film.  That’s absolutely crazy considering the stuff that you see here.  Wow is the best word I can to describe a movie like this.  Again, the story is nothing spectacular, but you really don’t go to a movie like this for the story.  It’s definitely worth checking out.

Chocolate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAN1GTRPyto

It’s exceptionally rare to find a martial arts film that is truly unique in this day and age.  To find one from Thailand is even more so, but here we are: Chocolate.  Featuring Jeeja Yanin in her feature film debut, Chocolate follows a young autistic girl as she learns martial arts by watching movies and local martial artists.  When she grows up she’s a fully capable martial artist with a few quirks.  Honestly, this movie is better than it has any right to be.  It actually has a pretty decent story with some pretty decent acting.  The standout here is Jeeja Yanin, who is another of Panna Rittikrai’s  proteges.  While Chocolate has some wire-work in it, it still has some very impressive and hard-hitting fight scenes.

Born To Fight(2004)

If there’s one thing that you can take away from these movies, it’s that there is a lot of screaming.  Screaming=drama, apparently.  In all seriousness, Born To Fight has some of the most audacious stunts that I’ve ever seen.  It’s a different kind of movie from what Tony Jaa has made, but the stunts are absolutely stunning.  Panna Rittikrai enlists actual athletes to portray athletes that get caught in the middle of a terrorist attack.  Gymnasts, martial artists, and soccer players.  Panna uses them all.  The film itself is actually a re-make of a film that Rittikrai starred in back in 1986.  Featuring yet ANOTHER one of Panna Rittikrai’s disciples, Dan Chupong, this movie is absolutely bonkers.  It gets pretty brutal at times, but I’m glad it doesn’t pull any punches.

Vengeance of an Assassin

In 2014, Panna Rittikrai passed away from acute liver and kidney failure.  He was 53.  He was Tony Jaa’s mentor and teacher, as well as the fight choreographer for many of Thailand’s modern martial arts flicks.  The last film that he directed was called Vengeance of an Assassin.  This was Panna at his best when it comes to action films.  It has some seriously wild fight choreography, brutal stunts and great camerawork.  It’s wall-to-wall with action.  While he hit some rough spots in his career, there is no doubt in my mind that Panna will be missed by fans of martial arts movies world-wide.  It’s an unexpected loss, but we should appreciate that he had such an amazing career, both as an actor and as a director.  Vengeance of an Assassin is one of his best.

There are other really good Thai martial arts movies, but these are the ones that stood out the most for me.  That will conclude my list for The Best Martial Arts Movies: Thailand.  The next ones will include American and European martial arts films, and The Best Martial Arts Movies will conclude with China.

 

A while back, I made a post about sequels and re-makes.  I made that post because I felt there needed to be some clarification on what sequels and re-makes actually are.  My opinion was, and still is, that I generally don’t really have an issue with sequels or re-makes as long as they’re done well and at least try to add something new to the franchise or world or whatever.  One could say that no sequel or re-make is necessary.  To a certain extent that point of view is not entirely invalid.  While I personally feel that most of these sequels/re-makes are harmless, there are a bunch out there that really have no reason to exist.  For my post today, I’m going to go over what I feel are the most unnecessary sequels and remakes.  One thing to keep in mind, however, is that not all of these movies are actually bad movies, they just feel like they really don’t belong.  So, let’s get this party started.

Alien Resurrection

This one kind of hurts, because I rather enjoyed this one.  It was a totally off-the-wall, B-level sci-fi movie.  I generally love those kinds of movies.  But that’s also the reason why I feel that it’s completely out of place within the Alien franchise.  The tone of the film is so vastly different from the previous movies that it doesn’t feel like a real sequel.  You’ve got some top-notch talent here, with some pretty solid writing from Joss Whedon, but the campiness of the film really works against it.  Besides, clones?  Really?  Even in 1997, clones were already cliche.  This version of Ripley, played brilliantly by Sigourney Weaver, isn’t the real Ripley.  Instead, she’s a clone/alien hybrid.  Alien Resurrection is visually distinctive and has some pretty crazy ideas, but it takes the ending of Alien 3 and throws it out the window.  The first two Alien films are near and dear to my heart, and I hold as equals.  Alien 3 for all the narrative and script problems, felt like a solid conclusion to what is otherwise a bleak, brutal and ultimately fascinating series of movies.  As I said, I don’t hate Alien Resurrection, but it’s too different for it’s own good.

A Good Day To Die Hard

As much as I felt that Live Free or Die Hard was unnecessary, it still felt like a Die Hard movie.  Die Hard 5 is just….NOT Die Hard.  For one, they took John McClane out of New York City and put him in Russia.  That was their first big mistake.  Second:  Not having a memorable villain.  Part of what made the first THREE films so spectacular was their bad guys.  The first movie had the late Alan Rickman as Hans Gruber, and Jeremy Irons as the brother in the third film.  McClane was almost ALWAYS outnumbered and could be hurt or possibly die.  He was human.  In Die Hard 5, he’s superhuman.  Don’t get me wrong, the action is pretty damned good, but it feels more generic than anything else.  Sorry folks, A Good Day To Die Hard was not a good day for audiences.

Taken 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYoC5GLgZ4E

Now, THIS is what I call a shameless cash-grab.  The first Taken was a pretty solid action-thriller with some really intense moments and a solid performance by Liam Neeson.  It opened and closed just fine and didn’t call for a sequel.  But we ended up with Taken 2.  Okay, it’s not half-bad, with a kind of a logical follow-up story.  Taken 3, though, was absolutely uncalled for.  Basically, Liam Neeson’s character is framed for the death of his wife and is on the run from the authorities.  I stated in my review, that this was basically a watered-down version of The Fugitive.  I meant it.  Taken 3 is not the worst movie in the world, but it tries to take a concept that could only work for one movie and stretch it to three.  The result is an incoherent mess of a movie.  Neeson just looks like he’s here for the paycheck.

Terminators 3,4 and 5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHhZK-g7wHo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGSxss7gWak

The intention of a film’s ending should always be considered when making a sequel.  The original Terminator’s ending deliberately left it wide open, because of the whole Future War with the machines.  As a result, we ended up with Terminator 2, one of the best sequels and science fiction movies ever made.  The ending to T2 was left vague on purpose, because the future was not set, even with the destruction with the Terminator and Cyberdyne.  They wanted you to feel that maybe something could happen, but left it for the audience to determine that.  In 2003, we get Terminator 3 which throws that ending out the window and ended up being an unnecessary entry that just happened to have a ballsy ending.  I loved that ending.  Salvation ended up being a generic post-apocalyptic film that lacked Arnold Schwarzenegger.  Not terrible, just….meh.  Terminator Genisys, at least attempted to try something different, even if it didn’t particularly succeed.  Ultimately, though, I feel that Terminator 2 was where the movies should have ended.  The books that followed in the early 2000’s were phenomenal and set up the future war LOGICALLY.  In T3, it’s assumed that Judgment Day is inevitable.  In the T2 books, Judgment Day happens, because Cyberdyne had more than one building and multiple back-ups.  A company like that SHOULD have back-ups in case of a situation like Terminator 2.  The movie sequels past number 2, just don’t make any kind of sense.  They’re fun to watch and not terrible movies, but they didn’t really need to be made.

Ip Man 2

This one is painful, because I really loved the first and third movies.  The problem with this one is that we have an over-the-top, mustache-twirling western boxer who is bullying the Chinese.  I’ve seen this kind of kung fu movie before many times.  We have the West that thinks they can walk all over the Chinese and they have only person who can stop the foreigners.  It’s not a terrible set-up, but Ip Man comes across as a superhero here.  The fight choreography is also problematic, especially during the fight between Ip Man and Sammo Hung’s character.  The whole movie seemed like a step backwards from the first Ip Man.

Martyrs(2016)

I’m only assuming that this film was made because the film-makers felt that the original Martyrs was just too brutal for American audiences to sit through.  The original French film was brutal and unrelenting.  It was also a completely unforgettable experience.  It’s not exactly one that I would watch over and over again, but it was extremely intense.  The re-make lacks the complete visceral punch that the original film had.  The new movie, while following the original film for the first half, takes a different turn afterwards and feels like your typical “victim fights back” ordeal.  The original film was very bleak and mostly hopeless.  This one has an ending that seems hopeful.  It’s not even as violent as the original movie.  Most of the violence is heard and not seen, and while that has an artistic merit of sorts, it robs the film of its potential power.

Ben-Hur(2016)

This one pisses me off, and it’s not even out yet.  Why is it that you would take one of the greatest movies of all-time and remake it for a modern audience?  I would have thought that the original Charlton Heston film would have been enough.  Yeah, it was 3.5 hours long, but that’s part of what made it an epic.  It’s a huge sprawling story with themes of vengeance, forgiveness and redemption.  What we have here appears to be a CGI-infested action film.  The original film worked because it was all done for real with the exception of some miniatures, especially that chariot race.  Nobody had done anything like that before, and no one has attempted it since.  I could be wrong, and this could end up being a good movie, but from what I’ve seen, it looks cheap.  Ben-Hur deserves better than this.  This one hits theaters in August.

There are many more unnecessary sequels and re-makes out there, and they will continue to be made.  These are just some of the ones that I tend to take issue with.  As I have stated, most of these really aren’t terrible movies, they just don’t feel like they belong anywhere.  Anyways.  Those are my thoughts on the subject.