Fearless Fighters

Title: Fearless Fighters
Director: Mou Man-Hung
Released: 1971
Starring: Chan Hung-Lit, Yik Yuen, Cheung Ching-ching, Chiang Ming, Mo Man-Hung, Ma Kei, Mo Man-ha, Wong Fei-lung, Kwan Hung

Plot: When the Eagle Claw Fighting Clan lead by To Pa plot to steal a shipment of government gold they spark a plot for revenge by a group of fighters called the Fearless Warriors

Review: With Bruce Lee bringing martial arts to the attention of the mainstream, there was of course no end of distributors looking to cash in on this trend, picking up movies from Hong Kong (or Taiwan in the case of this film) to be dubbed and pushed out to the drive-in and Grindhouse theatres. Released for the US market only two years after it’s release somehow this film has managed to survive in pretty decent condition, especially for a more obscure title much less get a re-release with an insightful commentary track from Richard Ellman who handled the films north American distribution and editor Dick Brummer who rewrote the film into a more format more accessible for English language audiences. It’s really a history lesson on a by gone age of cinema were smaller independent companies could get in on the craze much less a crash course in DIY Distribution.

If your a fan of kung fu cinema from this period a lot of its random moments of Kung Fu Weird like the fantastic weapons and random plot elements will be as familiar as the teleport-fu were characters trampoline into the air often landing in a completely different location as memorably seen in Sister Street Fighter which featured a fight made up of these location jumps. Of course for the purest this will be an unwanted distraction while for the rest of us it only adds to the fun.

Plot wise the film doesn’t try anything new with a revenge plot revolving around stolen gold with the villianous To Pa rounding up his own Cobra Command team of outlandish mercenaries to ensure he can maintain his grasp on the gold. The colourful villians including the dual sword welding One Man Army, Soul Picker with his flying sword and Dragon Raiser with his tiger claws. This of course is the kind of randomness I love to see in Kung fu movies and certainly the film delivers the fantastical elements in spades as arrows are plucked from the air and launched by at their owner and this is without mentioning the bionic upgrades one of our heroes gets knocked off a cliff and somehow rescued by his master who up until this point has never once appeared in the film!

At a brief 82 mins runtime there is little time wasted here as the film might be low on character development leading to a couple of plot holes here and there but with the focus instead on the action and showcasing fantastical weaponry no time is wasted. Sure this is far from the best the genre has to offer but as throw away fun this certainly delivers in spades making it hard not to have a good time with this especially if your familiar with the genre quirks such as jerky editing to make certain effects work and questionable dubbing.