Shaolin - Die Rache mit der Todeshand

Alexander Fu Sheng plays an invulnerable Fong Sai Yuk in this movie. The concept of an invulnerable martial artist has been around almost as long as martial arts. Martial arts training certainly improves many physical traits. The cardiopulmonary or aerobic aspect of training enables the fighter to fight long and hard without losing breath. The martial artist's bone density improves so the fighter is less fragile to fractures. The stretching and flexibility of the fighter can also make injuries less likely. No amount of martial arts training will ever make a person invulnerable to blades and bullets. Yet the audience sometimes forgets all this or maybe just likes to pretend.

Liu Chia-Liang started in the movie business in 1953. He was a true martial artist with ties to Wong Fei-Hung. I consider him the greatest person in the history of martial arts movies. As an action director his job was to make actors with no experience fighting look like fight experts. As the film rolled and the actors fought everything about the fight was fake. They seemed to connect with the hits yet they widely missed because it was faked by the camera angle. The sharp, shiny metal swords were fake plastic. The entire actor could be faked by a stunt double. One thing Liu Chia-Liang never faked was invulnerability.

In 1975 Liu Chia-Liang directed an entire movie for the first time, "The Spiritual Boxer". The main story was about people who faked martial arts abilities, specifically invulnerability. Liu Chia-Liang was in a strange position where he had real fighting abilities and had to fake those abilities for others. He did this best job ever but there was a line he never crossed.

This movie is a mess. The story keeps going back and forth in time and is hard to follow. There is no clear hero or villain. The characters are identical except for the single fighting ability that makes a difference. Despite the flaws the action sequences are superb. Because of that I must rate it above average for the year and genre but I only recommend it for fans.

THE SHAOLIN AVENGERS (aka THE INVINCIBLE KUNG FU BROTHERS, 1976) retells the stories of legendary Shaolin fighters Fong Si Yu and Hu Wei Chien, played by Fu Sheng and Chi Kuan-Chun, who played these parts in previous movies. Unlike the other films in Chang Cheh's Shaolin/Fong Si Yu series, this one tells the whole story of Fong, from the killing of his father, his early kung fu training by his mother, and his immersion in the wine baths which make him invulnerable (except for one crucial weak point) to his fight with Tiger Li on the standing log posts to his ultimate battle to the death with the Manchus who burned down Shaolin Temple. (Many of these incidents have turned up in other films, but not all in one sweeping arc as they are here.)

The film also relates the story of Hu Wei Chien, who sought revenge for the death of his father and was sent by Fong Si Yu to Shaolin Temple to improve his kung fu skills first. This entire section had already been staged, scene-for-scene, with the same stars two years earlier in MEN FROM THE MONASTERY (aka DISCIPLES OF DEATH), also directed by Chang Cheh. This version actually plays a bit better. The characters are a little more fleshed-out, the production values stronger and the all-important training scenes longer.

The film adopts a flashback structure in which the three heroes, Fong, Hu, and Fong's younger brother Sai Yi (played by Billy Tang), confront the Manchu troops and the notorious white-browed priest Pai Mei and engage in a pitched battle, with flashbacks to the characters' pasts intercut at regular intervals. This allows a more seamless interweaving of the two main characters' stories. It's a well-made film and features an abundance of good fights in which the stars take on such formidable villains as Wang Lung-Wei, Leung Kar Yan, Lung Fei and Tsai Hung. It's not in the same class as SHAOLIN MARTIAL ARTS, FIVE SHAOLIN MASTERS and SHAOLIN TEMPLE (aka DEATH CHAMBER), but it's marginally better than its three predecessors, HEROES TWO, MEN FROM THE MONASTERY and DISCIPLES OF SHAOLIN (aka THE INVINCIBLE ONE), neither of which had particularly strong villains. The entire series remains, of course, required viewing for all serious kung fu buffs.