Search - Executioners from Shaolin on DVD

There is a reason you pay a couple dollars more for the red

morgoth | omaha, NE | 04/25/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"actually reasons, and big ones at that. It's not panned and scanned, it is presented in 16:9 format. Which I actually prefer over letterbox, if I had a big screen, I would probably take the letterbox, but this is to peoples advantage if you have around a 25 inch tv like me. Also another big plus is that unlike groundzero, you will be getting beautiful remastering job with no scratches, and I guarantee that. Now the sound is really the inly thing that they could have improved on. It only has 2-channel english language but the sound quality is still very good and won't fluxuate throughout the movie. The sound does change slightly but only because during the action, they just use original language track, but whenever they shift to speech, they have the john wayne sound-a-like AND COMPANY WHO DO ALL THE OLD SCHOOL AND NEW SCHOOL FOR THAT MATTER. So get ready for the same old voices, but again the sound shifts but is barely noticeable, I'm just a nitpicker. So overall it's worth the 3-5 dollars more.

Now the movie itself is absolutely wonderful. It has the great Chen Kuan Tai playing one of the last disciples after their shaolin temple was burned down. The movie starts with an introduction of how Pai Mei became a traitor and decided to help the ching's. It show's the head abbot of shaolin in a duel with pai mei and show his special kung fu internal style. Externally is shown just as well. I honestly can't think of a greater actor to play the traitor of the ming's. So in the next fight we get the greatest cameo of gordon liu's career. I had actually forgotten that this guy is a great actor until watching this and shaolin challenges ninja again. Now the action is made up of about 5 scenes. One after the other they get better and better but none surpassed the first 2 of the movie, the rest were just better because of the character development and the finale could not have been much better. Sure it could be bette in terms of speeds and superamn jumps but this is a hell of a lot more complex than your average kung fu tale. Now if I was only rating the fu it would only get like a 3.5, compared to say hitman in the hand of buddha would get a 3.5 or 4 btu is still only a 3 star movie. So after chen Kuan Tai escapes(thanks to gordon) he goes in hidnign and travels with the peking opera on the junks. Now I will certainly not leave out li-li-li, the hottest woman in cinema history. She meets kuan tai and marries him and they have a son who is played by wong yue. I am not familiar and didn't like him al that much, but he more than fit the bill for his fighting. So when the junks are ordered to be burned, chen and lily go in hiding and he studies for YEARS in the tiger claw style to try and beat pai mei, and he constanty refuses to implement her crane style. Even after he gets defeated by Pai Mei and is sent home a miserable loser he won't try her kung fu. But I guarantee you will see an ending that is sweet and overall great execution throughout the entire movie that will leave you with a smile on your face(especially if yu are a fan of li-li-li).

Also I didn't think that it deserved 5 stars I was stuck on a 4-4.5, but then the end came around.

Also sidenote from up at the top, this is uncut just like all red sun releases, so don't expect to see a scene cut-off and then reappear with lines on the screen and distortion because somebody finally decided to press the play button in a non-action scene."

If only he'd learned his wife's Crane style

Mantis Lake | Detroit, MI USA | 12/09/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"What can you say about a classic? I've owned this movie for a long time and bought it again when I saw it was remastered. The only flaw in this movie is that there aren't enough fights. The story is interesting and easy to follow with Chen Kuan Tai as the legendary Hung Hsi Kuan who escapes the burning Shaolin temple, marries Lily Li, an expert at Crane style and tries to perfect his own Tiger style to take revenge on the white-eyebrow priest, Pai Mei (Lo Lieh).

This is also (one of) the legend(s) of how Hung-Gar kung fu came to be. The style practiced by the illustrious Wong Fei Hung and the film's director, Lau Kar Leung.

The presentation is nice and clean and makes a big difference. It's not quite as crisp as some of Shaw's other restorations but I can't possibly imagine anyone complaining about it. This movie is also proof that refinement and beauty still existed in the popular culture of the 70's. Recommended.

1977. aka: Executioners of Death"

Executioners need protection

Kung fu student | Illinois | 02/08/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Average movie with OK acting, and many questions that needed to be answered to make this a classic!

I bought this movie because some of the reviews said that it was very good, but they did not tell the true story. At first the son was made to look like a little girl, and immediately study his mother's technique. The movie never really answered why the father made that decision,which was a key to the movie. I did like the interaction between the father and son, because that showed how the son wanted to emulate and aspire to follow in his father's footsteps as a warrior. I thought some of the interaction between the father and wife was a little unnecessary, and had nothing to do with the movie. The romance portion was short-lived, because that was it!!

Many of these movies devalue women once they have kids. They may have been a good warrior, but once the kids come then she becomes nothing but a cook, laundry maiden, and house servant. To me that is sad, because the plot would have worked even more by showing the mother as a great fighter who helped her husband's kung fu by continually fighting him with a different technique to help him grow stronger. Instead she just stood by and kept telling the husband that "you are not ready to fight Pai-Ma, you must study more!" If your husband was going to fight somebody who killed your father or brother would you send him out unprepared? NO WAY !!!

Other than these problems, the movie developed very slowly, but was not a total waste, because the scenes with Pai-Ma were all pretty good. This is not a must have, but its definitely worth watching if you are a fan of Pai Ma."