Movie Depictions of Fights

Martial Media, Culture and Other Arts Martial Media and Popular Culture
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From the Depression and after WWII, movie fights were largely lots of punching each other, kicks were often flat footed shoves, there was some basic throws, there were sudden knifings, saps KOing people, and people sneaking up behind other people and breaking their necks.( :wink: )

This was also the era when the most Americans were involved in poverty, riots, and after, the most Americans were trained by the military and saw wartime violence of any time since.

Now, fights are choreographed, people hardly ever get KOed by things that KO people, the goal is the most exotic break or throw or strike or kick, weapons hardly ever kill characters. And less people are confronted with real violence, though some still are.

A good example of the difference is Watchmen. The comic itself portrays fights exactly in keeping with the older movies above, the movie is totally in keeping with the newer movies below.

Just found it interesting.

Is your kung fu James Cagney, or Keanu Reeves?

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my kung fu is conan the barbarian. i routinely KO camels for spitting on me, and rip the unihorns out of demons faces with my manliness. and when i get mad at people, i just pick them up and throw them into walls or off cliffs, or i cut their heads off.

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[QUOTE=Taixuquan99;1142557]Is your kung fu James Cagney, or Keanu Reeves?[/QUOTE]

That depends. I know Cagney did some Judo throws, but did he ever bend a spoon with his mind or fight clones of a rogue computer virus with a club made from a steel post ripped from the ground?

Iā€™ve always thought this was a pretty realistic fight (starts around 1:20).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrlxwlCHFXY

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If Iā€™ll direct the fighting scene in movie. Iā€™ll include the following scene:

  • You use ā€œfiremanā€™s carryā€ to pick your opponent up over your head, and
  • smash his head on the hard ground.
  • His skull is cracked open.
  • His brain and his blood come out of his skull.
  • You pick up a chunk of his brain.
  • Put it into your mouth.
  • Blood and brain are dripping from your mouth.
  • You look around, and
  • see if anybody else want to mess with you.
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can i be in your movie?

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it must suck to live in a world where you hate gung fuā€¦:frowning:

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Iā€™m not known for being subtleā€¦

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvHqIwCWjdg&feature=related

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what makes you think we hate gong fu? I love gong fu bro

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what makes you think we hate gong fu? I love gong fu bro

not you. just the same old people who bring up the same old issues over and over and over overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand overand over

same old sh1t just redressedā€¦

10

haymakers and sucker shots.

in kung fu movies, you had the whole ritual combat aspect with the crazy attacks and defenses.

otherwise it was the former.

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TAKEN

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or if you like a little more ā€œkungā€ in your ā€œfuā€.

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and you all know that there was a time when we wanted to be as tough as this guy.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4W_QFCQYac8

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my kung fu is like this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EQWcB1vXXg

before every fight, i stab a map to show strong

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map stabbing is a legit tech.
Because it does rearrange the map.

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[QUOTE=hskwarrior;1142572]it must suck to live in a world where you hate gung fuā€¦:([/QUOTE]

My point wasnā€™t hate of kung fu at all, I donā€™t associate kung fu, the methods, with endless and often pointless choreography.

For example, in the movie The Emporer and the Assassin, thereā€™s a scene where the characters are trying to convince Jing Ke to kill again so that heā€™ll kill the Emperor. They give a guy a sword and give Jing Ke a sword, and the guy keeps attacking Jing Ke, but Jing Ke is just essentially defending himself and pushing the other guy over. Itā€™s kung fu, but it contributes more to the realism than the heavily choreographed stuff.

That said, I do occasionally like certain choreography, but it becomes not only excessive, but ultimately largely rip-offs of previous choreography, which is tiring.

I would also say that movies like Unleashed fall into that Watchmen area, where the choreography is not any more realistic than any other martial arts movieā€™s, but merely has more blood. I donā€™t dislike either movie, but I consider the choreography as unrealistic as, say, CTHD, where the choreography actually fits the theme and story better.

The Bourne movies are the same, but with Kali being the mode of dance.

The older movies were likewise limited, the effect, aside from death, was often avoided as well, so the newer is clearly a logical extension of the former, I suppose.

And I certainly understand that truly realistic violence makes for a disturbing impact, so that the movie, if the violence fits, might not be something that you watch more than once, along the lines of a Requiem For a Dream, but in movies with themes that are supposed to relate to the cost of what is happening, like Watchmen or the countless kung fu movies where violence is lectured against by the very person who is gonna carry out the blood bath, parts become unwatchable because of the difference.

Watchmen is especially a pet peeve, as one should feel a sick thrill from the fights in it, at best, and instead itā€™s amusement park choreography.

That said, the overall quality of the kung fu choreographers is unquestionable, itā€™s simply that subtlety is utterly missing, which makes every blow meaningless. Only the last of three hundred blows matters in that style of choreography, and only because the story has to tell us it matters. When a guy gets stomped in the head, you see it, and you have to be told this is bad, someone is not using the medium well.

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I think that the shift to the type of fighting we see in the Bourne series, in Taken and most recently in Hanna, is because it is easier to learn, looks more ā€œbrutal and rawā€ and because you can make almost any actor pull it off.
The more ā€œbrutal and rawā€ is why I like it.
That said, the beauty of the choreogrpahy of a Donnie Yen movie like ā€œSMPā€ or ā€œFlashpointā€ or even the IP man movies, is simply brilliant.

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[QUOTE=sanjuro_ronin;1142694]I think that the shift to the type of fighting we see in the Bourne series, in Taken and most recently in Hanna, is because it is easier to learn, looks more ā€œbrutal and rawā€ and because you can make almost any actor pull it off.
The more ā€œbrutal and rawā€ is why I like it.
That said, the beauty of the choreogrpahy of a Donnie Yen movie like ā€œSMPā€ or ā€œFlashpointā€ or even the IP man movies, is simply brilliant.[/QUOTE]

Iā€™m with you on the Donnie Yen stuff.

As for the Bourne stuff, I think of it as every bit as choreographed and unrealistic, merely shorter and with more blood/broken bones, etc. You always see exactly what happens, thereā€™s never a moment where you think it was just an exchange, and then you realize ā€œthat dudeā€™s ****ed upā€. I think they lose out on a lot of impact for the fight scene that way. They give everything away, thinking the goal is filming the technique, when they should make the fight central. Two guys going at it for ten minutes without injury or one guy killing people one after another cleanly and crisply for ten minutes is the same level of unrealistic. I donā€™t dislike it, but tire of it being the only option, two versions of the same thing. Especially when the movie itself screams for something else.

For example, Ip Man screamed for more realism. Fantastic choreography, decent story, but thematically, totally at odds with the entire filmā€™s message.

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I donā€™t go to movies to learn martial arts. You should see a theater full of soldiers watching a war movie. Biggest group of loud and obnoxious critics youā€™ll ever see.

Hurt Locker was like a comedic commentary by all watching. :smiley: