Search - Introduction to Krav Maga on DVD

A commercial for the system

Seppo Vesala | Helsinki, - Finland | 09/23/2004

(2 out of 5 stars)

"This film reminds me of TV infomercials. There is very little actual content in the film, instead they try to convince the viewer of the superiority of their system (as a practitioner of Krav maga myself, I too like the system - although I don't think it's the ultimate self defence system. But I just dislike this kind of advertising where you have to pay to see commercials). At the beginning, there is a short history lesson, and the main principles of the system are also presented. After that, there are some testimonials on the effectiveness of the system. There are also some dramatized scenes used throughout the film (the same scenes are used in the other films, as well).

The film is narrated by Darren Levine (U.S. chief instructor of International Krav Maga Federation). Except for the dramatizations, there is very little visual content in the film, therefore you could get this information from the Internet, and get it for free. Besides, that way you would get both sides of the story: There are (at least) two international Krav maga federations in the world, and the history presented in the film represents only one side of the story. On top of that, they try to give the impression that Krav maga is an original form of self defence, that Imi Lichtenfeld developed it from scratch. In reality, Krav maga is based on ju-jitsu, judo and an older Israeli system of hand to hand combat called KAPAP (Krav Panim l'Panim - face to face combat), and it was developed by Moni Isaac along with Lichtenfeld. There are also other Israeli systems they don't mention at all. But then, this is a commercial, therefore they don't advertise the competition...

The reason I gave this film two stars (instead of only one) was that if you buy the whole 5 DVD set, you get this film essentially free. It is not worth the money if bought separately, however.

Run time: 0:24"