King Boxer

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King Boxer
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Directed byJeong Chang-hwa
Screenplay byChiang Yang
Jeong Chang-hwa
Produced byRun Run Shaw
StarringLo Lieh
Wang Ping
Wang Chin-feng
Fang Mian
Tien Feng
CinematographyWang Yung-lung
Edited byPage Template:Plainlist/styles.css has no content.
  • Chiang Hsing-lung
  • Fan Kung-yung
Music byChen Yung-yu
Frankie Chan
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Running time
97 minutes
Template:Pluralize from textHong Kong
Template:Pluralize from textMandarin
Box officeTemplate:US$ (rentals)

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King Boxer (Chinese: 天下第一拳; pinyin: Tiān xià dì yī quán; lit. 'Number One Fist in the World', released in the United States as Five Fingers of Death) is a 1972 Hong Kong martial arts film produced by Shaw Brothers Studio, directed by Jeong Chang-hwa, starring Lo Lieh, and featuring fight choreography by Lau Kar-wing.[1]

Released in the United States by Warner Bros. in March 1973, the film capitalized on the success of Warner's TV series Kung Fu[2] and was responsible for beginning the North American kung fu film craze of the 1970s, with over 30 similar films being released in the U.S. in 1973 alone. Warner followed it with the first U.S.-Hong Kong martial arts co-production Enter the Dragon released later that same year, which was the most successful of the chopsocky films of 1973.[3]

Plot

A promising young martial arts student named Chao Chi-hao has spent most of his life studying under his master Sung Wu-yang, and has fallen in love with the master's daughter Ying-ying. After Master Sung fails to properly fight off a group of thugs, he sends Chi-hao to study under a superior master, Shen Chin-pei. He instructs Chi-hao to learn from Chin-pei and defeat the local martial arts tyrant, Meng Tung-shan, in an upcoming tournament in order to earn Ying-ying's hand.

Chi-hao meets a young female singer, Ms. Yen, on the road to the city and rescues her from Meng's thugs. She falls in love with him, but he resists her advances with difficulty. He reaches town and begins studying under Suen Chin-pei. After an initial beating by Chin-pei's star pupil, Han Lung, Chi-hao improves rapidly. One day, another thug of Meng's, "Iron Head" Chen Lang, breaks into the school and beats all of Chin-pei's students. Chin-pei finally arrives and fights him, but is struck by a dishonorable blow and wounded. Chi-hao tracks Chen Lang down and defeats him. When Chin-pei hears of this, he selects Chi-hao to receive his most deadly secret, the Iron Fist.

Han Lung discovers that Chi-hao has been chosen as Chin-pei's successor and becomes intensely jealous. He conspires with Tung-shan to have Chi-hao crippled. He lures Chi-hao into the forest, where Tung-shan's three new Japanese thugs - Okada, Oshima, and Zaemon - ambush him. They overpower him and break his hands. Later, they visit his Master Sung's school and kill him as well. Yen helps Chi-hao recuperate and again tries to woo him, but he resists her. Finally, Chi-hao's fellow students locate him and encourage him to regain his fighting spirit. He begins training and soon overcomes his wounds. Ying-ying arrives, but withholds the news of her father's death. A rejuvenated Chi-hao successfully defeats all the other students to become Chin-pei's representative for the upcoming tournament. Han Lung returns to Tung-shan with the news, but Tung-shan's son blinds him and casts him out.

On the day of the tournament, a conscience-stricken Chen Lang warns Chi-hao of the three Japanese thugs lying in ambush on the road to the arena. Chi-hao fights the thugs killing two of them. Then Chen Lang arrives and holds off the head of the Japanese thugs so that Chi-hao can get to the tournament on time. He arrives just in time and defeats Tung-shan's son to win the tournament. Tung-shan stabs and kills Chin-pei in the midst of the celebration and departs. As Tung-shan arrives back home, he discovers that all the lights are out. Han Lung appears in the darkened room and, guided by Yen's direction, fights Tung-shan and his son. Han Lung blinds the son, who is then stabbed by his father in the confusion. Tung-shan bursts out of the dark room and summons his minions who kill Han Lung and he himself kills Ms. Yen.

Chi-hao arrives at Dung Shun's house, but Tung-shan flees and commits suicide by stabbing himself before Chi-hao can fight him. As he leaves, the chief Japanese thug arrives with Chen Lang's head. He and Chi-hao face off. Chi-hao uses his Iron Fist power, causing his hands to glow red, and delivers several powerful blows that send the thug smashing into a brick wall. With the thug defeated and killed, Chi-hao, Ying-ying, and Ta Ming departs.

Cast

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Music

The theme song from the American television series Ironside, composed by Quincy Jones, is used as a leitmotif. The original score was composed by Chen Yung-yu and Frankie Chan.

Release

King Boxer was released in Hong Kong on April 28, 1972.[4] When the film was released in director Jeong Chang-hwa's native South Korea, it was re-titled The Iron Man. The distributor Shin Sang-ok sold the film falsely as a South Korean co-production to avoid paying import taxes. Ten minutes of the film are cut in this version, removing all the gorier scenes.[5]

It was released in March 1973 in the United States as Five Fingers of Death.[citation needed] On re-release in the United States, it was titled The Invincible Boxer.[4]

In December 2021, the film was released on Blu-ray in the UK as part of Arrow Films' Shawscope: Volume 1 box set, including an audio commentary by David Desser.[6]

Reception

Box office

In the United States and Canada, the film repeated its success in Europe.[3] It earned Template:US$ in American and Canadian rentals, the second highest-grossing film of the genre in the U.S. in 1973 after Enter the Dragon with rentals of Template:US$.[7] Five Fingers of Death exceeded Template:US$ in worldwide rentals by October 1973,[8] and went on to earn Template:US$ in North American rentals.[9]

Critical reception

In a contemporary review for The New York Times, Roger Greenspun wrote, "I don't know much about karate, but I know what I like. And the karate in 'Five Fingers of Death,' for all its slow-motion high leaps, its grunts, its whooshing fists, has the look of the bottom of the barrel. It is all too extravagant, too gratuitously wild—as if composed for show, rather than for attack, defense or any real purpose."[10] Variety called it "a Chinese actioner glossed with all the explosive trappings that make for a hit in its intended market ... Exquisitely-filmed and packed with colorful production values, direction by Cheng Chang Ho is powerful and direct and he gets top performances from cast headed by Lo Lieh, as the student, and Wang Ping as his beloved."[11] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film 2 stars out of 4 and called it "a shoddy, poorly dubbed melodrama stuffed with insane dialog," though he acknowledged "the genuine excitement generated by the fight sequences, providing you can get excited at the sight of a karate chop that splits a forehead."[12] Fredric Milstein wrote in the Los Angeles Times, "Director Chen Chang Ho, who has a definite sense of style, keeps the pace fast and the action spectacular ... Dubbing is awful, but you don't come to this one to hear people talk."[13] In a review for the Monthly Film Bulletin, John Gillett found that the trick effect in which characters leap into the air to land either in a tree or on the opposite side of an opponent become "somewhat tedious as the film progresses." However, "...the sheer panache of the staging and apparent enjoyment of the participants keep the narrative moving swiftly".[14]

In a retrospective review, AllMovie gave the film three stars out of five, stating the film was "not the best Kung fu movie the Shaw Brothers put out, but as an early entry it holds up surprisingly well for a genre getting its legs." The review noted that "a more unfortunate stereotype perpetuated by this and future films is the Japanese as primitive ape-like villains" and that the film "drags a bit on what are now tired Kung fu clichés, but the punchy spirit that made it popular still survives".[15]

Quentin Tarantino ranked the movie among his 11 favorite films of all time.[16]

Quentin Tarantino includes several references to King Boxer in his martial arts duology Kill Bill: Volume 1 and Kill Bill: Volume 2.[17] Notably, the use of the "Ironside Theme" as a musical motif, and Tien-siung's eye-gouging move.[17]

Unofficial sequel

The 1977 film Bruce and the Shaolin Bronzemen was retitled in some territories as King Boxer 2.

See also

References

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  1. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Collection Items Online Catalogue [Note: Search for "King boxer"]". Hong Kong Film Archive. Archived from the original on 10 October 2018. Retrieved 2 May 2016.
  2. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Film Reviews - 5 Fingers of Death". Variety. 21 March 1973. p. 18.
  3. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."U.S. Rage of Chop-Socky Films; Karate Breaks Out of Chinatown". Variety. 9 January 1974. p. 72.
  4. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."King Boxer". Shawscope Volume One (booklet). Arrow Video. 2021. p. 16. FCD2076.
  5. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Trivia". Shawscope Volume One (booklet). Arrow Video. 2021. p. 17. FCD2076.
  6. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Salmons, Tim (19 April 2023). "Shawscope: Volume One (Blu-ray Review – Part 1)". The Digital Bits. Archived from the original on 22 April 2023. Retrieved 13 August 2024.
  7. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Big Rental Films of 1973". Variety. 9 January 1974. p. 19.
  8. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Hollywood's alive, well and living in Hong Kong". The Miami News. 10 October 1973. p. 22. Archived from the original on 8 June 2020. Retrieved 8 June 2020. Worldwide rentals on "Five Fingers of Death," distributed by Warners, have already passed Template:US$.
  9. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Cook, David A. (2002). Lost Illusions: American Cinema in the Shadow of Watergate and Vietnam, 1970-1979. University of California Press. p. 266. ISBN 978-0-520-23265-5.
  10. ^ Greenspun, Roger (March 22, 1973). "Film: '5 Fingers of Death'". The New York Times. 54.
  11. ^ "Film Reviews: 5 Fingers of Death". Variety. March 21, 1973. 18.
  12. ^ Siskel, Gene (April 20, 1973). "Mortal combat, East and West..." Chicago Tribune. Section 2, p. 3.
  13. ^ Milstein, Fredric (March 23, 1973). "A Karate Caper in 'Fingers'". Los Angeles Times. Part IV, p. 16.
  14. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Gillett, John (1972). "King Boxer". Monthly Film Bulletin. Vol. 39, no. 456. British Film Institute. p. 251.
  15. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Buening, Michael. "Five Fingers of Death". AllMovie. Retrieved 2 May 2016.
  16. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Quentin Tarantino names his 11 favourite films of all time". Far Out Magazine.
  17. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content.Entertainment, Martial Arts (26 April 2015). "Five Fingers of Death (1972) | Martial Arts & Action Entertainment". Retrieved 13 March 2025.
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