Kung Fury (2015)

31 Sunday May 2015

Tags

Action, Adventure, David Sandberg, Drama, Jorma Taccone, Kickstarter, Kung fu, Laser raptors, Leopold Nilsson, Martial arts, Short film, Thor, Thriller, Triceracop

D: David Sandberg / 31m

Cast: David Sandberg, Jorma Taccone, Leopold Nilsson, Steven Chew, Andreas Cahling, Erik Hörnqvist, Eleni Young, Helene Ahlson, Per-Henrik Arvidius, Eos Karlsson, David Hasselhoff

1985, Miami. When an arcade machine turns killer robot, there’s only one man for the police call on: Kung Fury! Destroying the robot proves easy for the Chosen One who was once just an ordinary cop. While chasing down a ninja (Karlsson) with his partner, Dragon (Chew), he was struck by lightning… and bitten by a cobra. From then on, and in line with an ancient prophecy, he became Kung Fury, the master of all kung fu, and the greatest crime fighter in the world.

Chewed out by his chief (Arvidius) over the amount of destruction Fury caused in disposing of the robot, he’s alarmed to find he’s got to work with a new partner, Triceracop (Hörnqvist). Refusing the idea point blank, Fury quits. When he learns that Adolf Hitler has travelled from the past to challenge Kung Fury’s position as the Chosen One, he decides there’s only one thing he can do: travel back to Nazi Germany and kill Hitler. With the help of Hackerman (Nilsson), Fury travels back in time, but instead of arriving in the 1940’s he ends up facing a laser raptor in the time of the Vikings. He also meets two Viking women, Barbarianna (Young), and Katana (Ahlson); when he tells them of his dilemma, they introduce him to Thor, the God of Thunder. Thor uses his hammer, Mjolnir, to create a time portal that will take Fury forward to Nazi Germany.

When he arrives, he crashes a rally being given by Hitler and proceeds to take on the assembled Nazi soldiers. Using his kung fu powers he dispatches them with ease, but when Hitler unloads with a machine gun, not even Kung Fury can survive the hail of bullets… or can he?

Part-funded by Kickstarter contributions, Kung Fury is an absolute blast, a knowing homage/pastiche of Eighties action and cop movies that goes to extreme lengths to entertain its target audience – and succeeds with a great deal of low budget panache. In realising that its budget required a novel approach to the material (written and directed by Swedish filmmaker Sandberg), the movie has been fashioned to look like a degraded copy of an Eighties video release. This allows the movie to hide a variety of problems such as Ahlson’s having replaced Joanna Häggblom, who filmed the scene where Katana summons Thor for the movie’s trailer. With the same footage being used in the completed short, visual scratches and distortion effects are used to hide the change in actress. In addition, the whole visual look of Kung Fury, from its softened colour palette and grainy film stock effect, gives it a pleasing retro feel that adds to the overall result.

The actual storyline is peppered with some of the craziest visual gags you’re likely to see for some time to come, as Sandberg challenges his special effects team in ways that seem impossible to complete on such a small budget: just $630,019. With digital effects, composite effects, model work, and a shed load of green screen work, Sandberg has made a movie that packs more into thirty-one minutes than some movies pack into two hours. Rampaging killer arcade machines, explosions, fight scenes, exploding heads, a giant Norse god, a talking dinosaur, Viking warrior women (with high-tech weapons), time travel, cars being tossed around like toys, gratuitous violence, a giant metal eagle, and Hitler as the Kung Führer – all this and more Sandberg manages to include in his movie, and every insane minute of it is more fun than fans of this twisted kind of thing could ever hope for.

Kung Fury‘s bizarre world is the distillation of every Eighties action cliché imaginable, from Fury being given a tongue lashing over the damage to the city he’s caused, to the absurd computations of Hackerman regarding time travel, to every macho pose that Fury strikes, all the way to Sandberg growling his lines like he gargles with gravel. There are scowling close ups, a portrayal of Hitler that veers between megalomania and whimsy, and in a great cameo, David Hasselhoff as the computer in Fury’s car, the Hoff9000 (he also gets to sing the movie’s theme tune, True Survivor).

It’s a fast, furious, absurdly entertaining fun ride, complete with an animated sequence two thirds of the way through, as well as an epilogue that sets up either a sequel or a full-length feature (either would be welcome). It’s not a movie, though, that will impress the serious cinéaste and is definitely – and defiantly – aimed at the type of movie goer who loves Chuck Norris, movies like Cobra (1986), and recent outings such as Iron Sky (2012). It’s a potent mix, full of WtF? moments, and as crazy funny (or funny crazy) as you’re ever likely to see, the cinematic equivalent of wading naked through a sea of jellyfish. Sandberg is to be congratulated for getting his project off the ground, and for getting it as far the Cannes Film Festival and since its upload to YouTube, an astonishing eight million plus views.

Rating: 8/10 – a few unnecessarily cheesy moments aside, Kung Fury is nothing short of astounding; with its cast and crew judging everything else perfectly, this is one movie that defies all logic by being so (deliberately) bad it’s brilliant.

Battle Creek Brawl (1980)

11 Tuesday Nov 2014

Posted by dullwood68 in Movies

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Tags

Action, Chicago, Drama, Golden Harvest, Jackie Chan, José Ferrer, Kristine DeBell, Kung fu, Mako, Martial arts, Protection money, Review, Robert Clouse, Thirties

aka The Big Brawl

D: Robert Clouse / 95m

Cast: Jackie Chan, José Ferrer, Kristine DeBell, Mako, Ron Max, David Sheiner, Rosalind Chao, H.B. Haggerty, Chao Li Chi

In Chicago in the 1930’s, restaurant owner Kwan (Chi) is being pressured into paying protection money to gangster Dominici (Ferrer). When he receives a visit from Dominici’s henchman Leggetti (Max) and some of his goons, Kwan is physically intimidated but doesn’t pay. As Leggetti leaves, Kwan’s son Jerry (Chan) – who has considerable martial arts prowess but has promised his father he won’t fight – intervenes and leaves the goons thoroughly embarrassed and beaten by using their own moves against them.

When Dominici hears about Jerry’s prowess he believes he’s found the fighter he needs for the upcoming Battle Creek Brawl, a street fighting contest held in Texas. Dominici needs Jerry to combat the fighter backed by rival gangster Morgan (Sheiner), but Jerry refuses at first. This leads Dominici to have Jerry’s brother’s fiancee (Chao) kidnapped and held hostage. Jerry attempts to rescue her – aided by his martial arts mentor, Herbert (Mako) – but Dominici outsmarts him; they strike a bargain though, and Jerry agrees to take part in the brawl.

Morgan, meanwhile, has persuaded Leggetti to betray Dominici and ensure his fighter’s win by kidnapping Herbert. Having made it to the final round, and facing off against Morgan’s fighter, Kiss (Taggerty), Leggetti threatens Jerry with his mentor being hurt if he doesn’t lose the contest. The only thing Jerry can do is to stall until he can find a way of saving Herbert, and then defeating Kiss.

Chan’s first English language feature, Battle Creek Brawl is an enjoyable, free-wheeling martial arts movie that gives the diminutive star the chance to show off his athletic skills and flash the cheeky grin that’s stood him in such good stead for more than forty years. It’s a mainly lightweight distraction, unconcerned with providing any depth to the proceedings, and in many ways all the better for it. It’s a very likeable movie, made purely to entertain its target audience, and on that level it’s a complete success.

Chan’s acrobatics are given plenty of screen time, and as ever he’s a joy to watch, the sheer inventiveness and physical dexterity of his movements proving as entertaining as ever. His wonderfully expressive features and often amazing agility are placed to the fore as much as possible, and writer/director Clouse – with a few awkward exceptions – keeps the camera focused on Chan and leaves everyone else several places behind. The clever intricacy of the fight scenes, particularly the incredibly well choreographed bouts between Chan and Mako, raises the bar throughout, and if Chan’s adversaries are a little too eager to line up and take their punishment, well, that’s always going to be a drawback when working with US stuntmen – it’s a question of timing.

The movie takes place in a strange mix-world of Thirties Chicago and Seventies Texas, with only the costumes and the cars giving an indication that the brawl itself is taking place in the same time zone as the rest of the movie (keep an eye on the Texas backgrounds and you’ll see how jarring it can be). That said, the decision to make it a period piece in the first place makes no difference to the story or the action, but the apparent acceptance of Jerry’s inter-racial relationship with Nancy (DeBell) is a refreshing change (even if it does reinforce the lightweight nature of the script).

With the script’s refusal to add any real intensity to events, the performances are necessarily lacking in substance with even Ferrer struggling to add any appropriate menace to his role. He’s more like a cuddly uncle figure playing at being nasty but in as urbane a manner as possible. As his rival, Sheiner tries to add some threat to events but he’s not given enough screen time to succeed, while Max is given the chance to take on Chan, but with predictable results. DeBell is kept firmly in the background, and of the rest of the cast, only Haggerty as the dastardly Kiss, and Mako as Herbert make any real impression.

Clouse keeps the focus firmly on the fight scenes, and keeps the action moving in ever more exciting ways, and the camerawork by Robert C. Jessup – aided by editor George Grenville – is surprisingly precise and fluid in equal measure; there’s always something going on in the frame and some of it is as interesting to watch as what’s going on in the foreground, especially during the brawl itself, where there are plenty of “bits” that enrich the fights themselves. And to round things off there’s a rich, emphatic score courtesy of Lalo Schifrin that works so well with the material.

Rating: 8/10 – almost too flimsy in its construction and execution, Battle Creek Brawl is still simple yet effective, and a terrific introduction to Chan’s remarkable agility; with an innocence that borders on deliberate naïvete, the movie succeeds by having a great sense of humour and by not taking itself at all seriously – and by showcasing some tremendous fight scenes.