118 - Soul Of Bruce Lee (Soul Of Sonny Chiba)

Connection To SAMURAI REINCARNATION - Sonny Chiba (again).

A little bit about Bruceploitation before I start this -

When Bruce Lee died in 1973 leaving only a small filmography and a huge fanbase, opportunist Asian filmmakers started making films trading on the Bruce Lee name - the mean't we got an whole host of imitators including but not limited to Bruce Li, Bruce Le and Dragon Lee (notice the pattern when it comes to name), we also got a number of films that where mean't to be biographies (though in fairness Dragon - The Bruce Lee Story would be as about as accurate) , we also got a couple of films attempting to do Game Of Death (this is before Game Of Death) and the story Bruce Lee might have intended, there was "sequels" - so we got Big Boss 2, Fist Of Fury 2 etc. and there's also films that put "Bruce Lee" in sometimes odd adventures (but I won't spoil any of them in case I want to cover them)...

So to be honest why am I mentioning Bruceploitation in a film starring Sonny Chiba - because he was awesome in his own right and nothing to do with these cash-ins (that I love) it's because of the marketing of the film - it's often called Soul Of Bruce Lee but as nothing to do with him, so yeah I take the marketing of the Bruce Lee name to sell the film as Bruceploitation - this is Bruceploitation at it's loosest term - but it still counts.

This was an enjoyable entry into the Bruceploitation genre or Sonny Chiba oeuvre - whichever way you want to look at it - the dubbed version I watched was suited to the film at hand and even had a bit of an Abbott and Costello routine in it - not sure intentionally - the guy he is searching for to avenge is master's death sounds similar to Someone - so you'd get him asking "I'm looking for someone" - which to me just added to the charm of the film.

Overall, if you love old kung fu movies of the 70's you'll find enjoyment in this. For me the Bruceploitation element maybe to a minimum but the Sonny Chiba awesome-ness is here and in tact.

117 - Samurai Reincarnation

Connection To SUSHI GIRL - Sonny Chiba.

I own over 20 Sonny Chiba movies - to some people this might not sound impressive, but bearing in mind here, over the last year I've down-scaled my collection (turning it into an online business), so the part that makes it impressive is that Chiba was one of the few actors who got out unscathed (Bruce Lee also did but obviously he didn't do as much stuff - so it's not as impressive).

I think my love with Chiba started when I got a cheap transfer of the first Street Fighter movie - dubbed but a good quality print - I saw the potential, one birthday my brother get me the British box-office of the three films - all great prints in original language, while at the same time he got me another Chiba set (from the same company all in original language. I think after that I was a bonafide fan - I even now own 2 original posters - one French (for Street Fighter's Last Revenge) and one Yugoslavian (The Killing Machine - probably my favourite movie of his), and though most of my collection is subtitled, I still own some dubbed - mostly because it's the only way I can see them - Samurai Reincarnation is one of those dubbed ones.

The dubbing is bad... I mean you expect the dubbing to be bad on Asian films but this one stands out even among them - they couldn't have got the tone wrong for most voices even if they tried and that kind of takes away from what is a pretty awesome film - seriously I would love to own this in original language, maybe it's out there and somebody could guide me towards it.

I could just see what I would have liked or loved about it if I got to see a decent version of the film - the fight scenes, the set design - this for me showed all the potential in the world, this is the first time in a long time a dubbed version of the movie as honestly took something from the movie.

Overall, I'd say recommend for the movie itself but not recommended for this version if that makes sense, the film deserves a decent treatment that wasn't the version I saw, so yeah that's my word on it.

116 - Sushi Girl

Connection To KABOOM - James Duval.

It's fair to see this film features some of the cream of the crop of the b-movie genre - this is not mean't as a slight at them, but just it's a collection of cool actors - many often will appearing in awesome stuff but you could accuse them of signing on for any old shit (bills got to be paid!)

And I don't actually think most of the actors where here to get the bills paid I think at some point there was a modicum of potential to be pretty good at one point that is just lacking from the finished project. The film is a crime-movie come torture porn...

Which brings me to torture porn - and maybe reason why other people could like this more then I did - it's a sub-genre (whatever you want to call it) that just had zero appeal to me, me I'm not squirmish to gore, it's just your Hostels and Saws where not the sort of horror I was after - so take this into consideration from now on on here (and the blog).

It's not a film I particularly cared for, it wasn't really dragging me into the torture porn element started to come into the mix, Mark Hamill was fairly entertaining in his role, and you can't fault some of the other guys - awesome performers like Sonny Chiba and Danny Trejo are basically cameos honestly - one scene of torture involving teeth got me just because of my fear of dentists, which will get a lot of people though we do get the benefit of the camera not showing it.

Overall I could see some people like this film honestly because it will give them exactly what they want - it's 2 movie genre for the price of 1 and it might be two genres somebody loves, but for me it was not a film I liked very much.