I haven’t seen like half of those movies, but I have heard some GREAT things about Sword of Swords, the Basterd swordsman, Soul of the Sword and LAdy Hermit. This is so awesome!!!
I know I’ve seen the following:
Shaolin Hand Lock
Opium and the Kung Fu Master
Shaolin Prince
Invincible Shaolin
The B@st@rd Swordsman
Return of the B@st@rd Swordsman
The Duel
Shaolin Rescuers (I think the real title is Avenging Warriors of Shaolin).
I think I might have seen Life Gamble.
I wonder if Soul of the Sword is the Andy Lau/Anita Mui swordplay fantasy from the '90s?
Soul of the Sword is a Shaws Ti Lung movie. Like most shaw movies from the time is has about 100 other recognizable faces ( I’m going by info I found on hkcinemagic.com).
Life Gamble stars Fu Sheng (in a non fighting role). Interesting movie, but kind of boring. Not a lot of fighting. Lo meng and Fu Sheng use flying daggers, Chiang Sheng uses a whip, and Lu Feng has an iron claw (this may have been the inspiration for his iron claws he uses in Crippled Avengers). Wang Lung Wei and Ku Feng have small roles. There are some pretty ladies who have big roles, including Kara Hui. Lee I Min and Kuo Choi have a really cool fight at the end. Kuo choi uses a few different weapons including double nunchukas.
The other movies I have seen on that list are-
Hong Kong Godfather
Invincible Shaolin
Shaolin Prince
the Duel
Shaolin Rescuers (my favorite venoms movie)
So if BCI has signed with Celestial, then the quality of the transfers should be up to Celestial/DD level of clarity. (isn’t BCI the same company that puts out the Rarescope releases?).
I might have seen that Sould of the Sword, then. There was a super-abundance of Ti Lung swordplay movies (most directed by Chu Yuan, aka, Chor Yuen) that the Asian theaters used to show, such that the titles are mostly forgotten. Most were good quality, though. Not to mention that some movies are mentioned or released with different titles, creating ultimate confusion for a kung fu movie buff.
Yeah they put out the Rarescope releases.
The quality should be really good on the Shaw releases. They have the HD masters which is what Dragon Dynasty uses, so it is even better quality than the region 3 Deltamac and IVL releases.
What’s the big deal why not just buy all the Celestials?
[QUOTE=CLFNole;833641]What’s the big deal why not just buy all the Celestials?[/QUOTE]
Because Celestial isn’t a DVD company. Celestial remasters the movies, and Deltamac, IVL, Image, Dragon Dynasty, and now Media Blasters and BCI release them.
Well then why not just buy the ones that are already out. I have a number of them already. A few on the last I don’t care for. What I am asking is if they are already available remastered what is the big deal that another company will release them as well?
[QUOTE=CLFNole;833734]Well then why not just buy the ones that are already out. I have a number of them already. A few on the last I don’t care for. What I am asking is if they are already available remastered what is the big deal that another company will release them as well?[/QUOTE]
I am assuming you are talking about the region 3 deltamac and IVL discs. the reason I would buy the new region 1 BCi and Media Blasters releases is because they are taken from high definition masters, and the deltamac and IVL releases aren’t. Have you seen a dragon Dynasty release of a Shaw film? It looks even better than the IVL and Deltamac versions. Also, BCI and Media Blasters will be including English dubs for every movie they can, and IVL and Deltamac don’t feature English dubs. The English dubs are very important for me because I usually prefer them over the Cantonese and Mandarin dubs. Also, no DVD company has ever released a remastered version of Hong Kong Godfather, the movie I most want to see on that BCI list. Black Magic 2 is another movie that has never been released (Media Blasters is releasing this one).
I prefer the cantonese to the english dubs myself. Being a kung fu person when you hear certain things they make more sense rather than some of the english translations. Names of styles and somethings, which for most might not mean much but I can understand the Region 1 aspect.
Some of the IVLs are also from HD masters but you are right not all. In any event their quality is quite good.
Have any of you checked out www.jaman.com ?
There’s a number of the very flicks mentioned. All available for download rental or purchase. Rentals are a $1.99 for a 7 day liscense… purchase is 4.99 ! I just need to purchase the liscense for most of those, I’ve already downloaded them as rentals.
Give me an email address and I can send you invites. Either that or let 'em know you heard about it from “DaveMoral”
Yeah CFLnole it is just preference. English dubs are VERY important to me, especially when the voice acting is good. I got the remastered IVL version of my favorite shaw movie Killer Constable and the English subtitles suck compared to the English dub.
[QUOTE=CLFNole;833746]I prefer the cantonese to the english dubs myself. Being a kung fu person when you hear certain things they make more sense rather than some of the english translations. Names of styles and somethings, which for most might not mean much but I can understand the Region 1 aspect.
Some of the IVLs are also from HD masters but you are right not all. In any event their quality is quite good.[/QUOTE]
Of course. I dont know the difference between cantonese and mandarin, but either way, the chinese language adds alot of drama to kung fu flicks. If you have the english dubs, it just gets too goofy.
9 times out of 10 I will take the english dub over the Chinese dub. Its not like you are hearing the original actor’s voice, though every once in a great while you will. The key is the voice acting. Compare the oldschool British dubs to those “Jet Li Collection” Fortune Star dubs. Big difference.
My personal preference is to have the options for Mandarin or Cantonese, and the (original) English dubs. I positively cannot stand the new English dubs that Dimension puts on the films they release here. And as mentioned, the ones by Fortune Star. Especially the latter, because they just redo the original English dubs that were done better the first time around. Not to mention, on multiple options, often the original Mandarin (or Cantonese) version has all the original music/soundtrack while the other options do not.
Those Dimension releases not only have the horrible dubbing, but they change the music. It is really irritating. Oh well, at least Dimension is gone.
One movie that comes to mind where the music is better in the English dub is Young Master.
Jethro:
One thing about the Fortune Star/20th Century-Fox releases is they make some of the music almost inaudible. For example, during the final fights in The Young Master, Warriors Two, etc. And sometimes when there is a particularly heavy punch or kick landing in slow-motion, there is an odd click-type sound that prefaces the (usually) echoing sound effect. That isn’t from the original sound effects, it seems to have been added during the re-dub process, and it’s annoying. I have the old VHS versions of Young Master and Warriors Two, and IMO the music is better-done than in the DVD releases.
Yeah I remember the Warriors Two sound effects were horrible. Have you seen the cut version of Young Master? I think it is like 89 minutes long. The dubbing is some of the best i have ever heard, and the music is just as funny as the dubbing. The cut English version is one of my favorite comedies of all time right up there with Dumb and Dumber. And in the English version Jackie sings a song at the end. I don’t know why they didn’t include that in the Chinese version.
Yeah, the original English dub on Young Master was one of the best. The voices actually fit the characters. Why they replaced that with geeky surfer-boy voices I’ll never know. And I think from Young Master through most of Jackie’s '80s films, he sang the end songs. But IMO, it’s probably good he didn’t quit his day job.
Of course, the songs seem to be edited out of virtually all U.S. releases.
Shaw Brothers Remastered classics
I know the shaw brothers library is being remastered does anyone know where you can by these online? And are they available in dubbed or just subs? Thanks, appreciate it