cityonfire.com | Shaolin Disciple

	Shaolin Disciple "If a Chang Cheh or Lau Kar-Leung classic is a long, meaty, satisfying bowel movement, then Shaolin Disciple is a tiny, silent, odorless fart." - Numskull Shaolin Disciple (1980) AKA: The Shaolin Disciples Director: Min Ming Writer: Min Ming Producer: Lui Li Action Choreographer: Liu Chia Yung Cast: Liu Chia Yung, Kuan Chung, Kuan Hai San, Chang Kang, Ku Feng, Liang Hsiao Sung, Lu Ying, Tang Hoy Yun, Liang Chao Yun, Li Wen Tai Running Time: 83 min. Plot: Not even worth typing. Availability: This title is available at HKflix.com Reviews NUMSKULL'S REVIEW: All kung fu movies are NOT created equal. I'm no expert when it comes to old school martial arts films, but I know a shitty-ass genre abortion when I see one. If a Chang Cheh or Lau Kar-Leung classic is a long, meaty, satisfying bowel movement, then Shaolin Disciple is a tiny, silent, odorless fart. The fight scenes are pathetic in terms of both quantity and quality. Even the final battle...as much a tradition of chop socky flicks as horrendous English dubbing and mistimed sound effects...is very short and feeble. The plot is so thin that the movie has to branch off into a dozen pointless subplots just to bring the running time up to an "acceptable" feature film length. There's a gang of hired thugs, there's a gibbering sex pervert, there's a girl possessed by a ghost, there's a bisexual man with a 24 hour hard on, and there's a fake mugging set to Khachaturian's "Sabre Dance" (you may not recognize the name but if you heard it you'd say "Oh yeah, that"), and none of them contributes anything to the main storyline. It's like they took chunks out of two or three other films and spliced them together into one yawn-inducing mess. Hell, maybe they DID...facts on this movie are scarce on the surface and I can't be bothered to dig too deep. I wasted enough time just watching it in the first place. So...we've got Little Mouse, a lazy goof-off who doesn't practice his "gung fu." His dad is a real ass-kicker, but he gets killed by bad guys. So Little Mouse fights those bad guys, matches them blow for blow, and inexplicably wins. No deadly secret technique, no rigorous training sequences, no performance-enhancing drugs, no nothing. Just a wee bit of uninspired fighting and a whole lot of boredom. You know those Jackie Chan movies with Lo Wei from the 1970s? Well, they were a hell of a lot better than this. Scary, huh? NUMSKULL'S RATING: 2/10

Shaolin Disciple

"If a Chang Cheh or Lau Kar-Leung classic is a long, meaty, satisfying bowel movement, then Shaolin Disciple is a tiny, silent, odorless fart."

- Numskull

Shaolin Disciple (1980)

AKA: The Shaolin Disciples

Director: Min Ming

Writer: Min Ming

Producer: Lui Li

Action Choreographer: Liu Chia Yung

Cast: Liu Chia Yung, Kuan Chung, Kuan Hai San, Chang Kang, Ku Feng, Liang Hsiao Sung, Lu Ying, Tang Hoy Yun, Liang Chao Yun, Li Wen Tai

Running Time: 83 min.

Plot: Not even worth typing.

Availability: This title is available at HKflix.com

Reviews

NUMSKULL'S REVIEW: All kung fu movies are NOT created equal.

I'm no expert when it comes to old school martial arts films, but I know a shitty-ass genre abortion when I see one. If a Chang Cheh or Lau Kar-Leung classic is a long, meaty, satisfying bowel movement, then Shaolin Disciple is a tiny, silent, odorless fart. The fight scenes are pathetic in terms of both quantity and quality. Even the final battle...as much a tradition of chop socky flicks as horrendous English dubbing and mistimed sound effects...is very short and feeble. The plot is so thin that the movie has to branch off into a dozen pointless subplots just to bring the running time up to an "acceptable" feature film length. There's a gang of hired thugs, there's a gibbering sex pervert, there's a girl possessed by a ghost, there's a bisexual man with a 24 hour hard on, and there's a fake mugging set to Khachaturian's "Sabre Dance" (you may not recognize the name but if you heard it you'd say "Oh yeah, that"), and none of them contributes anything to the main storyline. It's like they took chunks out of two or three other films and spliced them together into one yawn-inducing mess. Hell, maybe they DID...facts on this movie are scarce on the surface and I can't be bothered to dig too deep. I wasted enough time just watching it in the first place.

So...we've got Little Mouse, a lazy goof-off who doesn't practice his "gung fu." His dad is a real ass-kicker, but he gets killed by bad guys. So Little Mouse fights those bad guys, matches them blow for blow, and inexplicably wins. No deadly secret technique, no rigorous training sequences, no performance-enhancing drugs, no nothing. Just a wee bit of uninspired fighting and a whole lot of boredom.

You know those Jackie Chan movies with Lo Wei from the 1970s? Well, they were a hell of a lot better than this. Scary, huh?

NUMSKULL'S RATING: 2/10