As promised on this week’s radio show, here’s my track list of kung-fu & karate songs. Please feel free to submit more track names (I need more dub & reggae):

1. Tokyo Nights by Puffy AmiYumi

Crazy Sims bubble dance and sushi roll party:

2. Living in Japan by Fun Fun

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaCF7NmPBMY

3. Whisky & Green Tea by Supergrass

FYI: Chinese Dragons practice kung fu, not karate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oohvMU9H0uY

4. Karate by The Emperors

Featuring footage from ‘Black Belt Jones’:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxNX468ehhw

5. Karate Colombiano by Bondo de Role & DJ Chernobyl

6. Karate Boo-ga-loo by Jerry O

I love this crazy string dance from “Maiden’s Spring”:

7. Mein Synthesizer Kann Karate by Quenzo Flax

Synthesizers in space!!!

8. the new karate workout (kanye west + kennedy) by wait what

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvpU-M37rq8

9. The Karate Rap by David Seeger and Holly Whitstock Seeger

Thanks to Dan for this track. I don’t know if thanks properly covers it…

10. Hong Kong Nights by Soft Lightning

11. Hong Kong Garden by Siouxsie and the Banshees

12. Dance the Kung Fu by Carl Douglas

‘Kung Fu Fighting’ is better known Stateside, but this dance is indeed ‘Pure Dynamite.’

It even caught on in Bollywood!

13. My Chinese Girl Like Kung Fu Fighting by The Chinese Fighters

Side project of Belgian funk band El Chicles, the super-rare album includes tracks entitled ‘Kung Fu’N’Ky’ and ‘Karatekaze’.

14. Combate a Kung Fu by Wganda Kenya

15. Kung Fu Boy by Kumisolo

16. Kung Fu Master by Dana’s Master

Yes, a Ninja Synth genre exists and has a black belt in awesomeness.

17. Kung Fu by Prince Rhangani

18. Kung Fu Battle ina Brixton by Prince Fatty (Feat. Horseman)

19. Return of the Kung Fu Skinhead by King Hammond

One of the earlier Trojan skinhead reggae revivalists from the UK. His first album was issued in 1987. I don’t think he’s pictured below, but those fellows either have deep pockets or they’re smuggling badgers.

20. Kung Fu by Ash

These guys are from Northern Hi-yareland, part of the UK-ung Fu.

21. Kung Fu by The Dragoneers

22. Kung Fu by The Dirtbombs

From ‘Ultraglide in Black’ (as seen in ‘Only Lovers Left Alive.’)

23. Kung Fu Fighting (A Capella) by Robyn Hitchcock

With spring approaching, why stay inside unless you’re watching something hellaciously entertaining?  Check out the goodies in this edition of Going Deep!

R100: A mild-mannered Japanese businessman caring for a comatose wife while raising their young son finds a secret outlet for his desires: ‘a boutique dominatrix agency that specializes in guerilla acts of public degradation.’

Starring Nao Ohmori (aka ‘Ichi the Killer’ from another masterful masochism-themed movie) R100 begins unassumingly and then goes off the sprockets.

First, it becomes a meta-take on the Japanese ratings board system.  (R100 = No one under 100 admitted.)

Then a deadly mishap with one of the mistresses turns the finale into a madcap actioner, akin to a 60’s-era espionage film, that finds the businessman (and his son) fending off a leather-clad bevy of furious femme fatales.

From R100 to R the rock star.  The Fan (Blu-ray + DVD Combo) is a highly-prized German cult film from the 80’s that’s filled with New Wave music (Neue Deutsche Welle) from Rheingold, eye-popping colors and lots of nudity.  Like R100, this film is a slow-build shocker that proved anathema to stateside distributors.  Mondo Macabre is the first to bring a pristine, uncut Blu-Ray presentation to the US market.

Simone is a high school student obsessed with a rock singer named R.  Though overcome by nerves when she gets the opportunity to meet him in person, she soon gets the opportunity to show the extent of her devotion. Presented in German with subtitles, the combo pack includes a new 20-minute video interview with director Eckhart Schmidt, who reveals surprising layers of subtext and amazing behind-the-scenes drama.

For more S&M kink in luscious B&W, try Kino Lorber’s restoration of Vice and Virtue [Blu-ray].  Set in Nazi-occupied France, this adaptation of Marquis de Sade’s novel, Justine, was directed by Roger Vadim of Barbarella fame and introduced Catherine Deneuve, as a housewife abducted by the Nazis and sadistically trained to serve as a concubine.

And for yet more women in chains, don’t miss the Blu-Ray debut of Filipino trashsploitation pirate and prisoner flick, The Muthers, starring former Playboy Playmates Jeanne Bell (October 1969) and Rosanne Katon (September 1978).

From R100 to ‘Rated V for Violence’: Mark Of The Devil comes to Blu-Ray & DVD in a gorgeous transfer from Arrow Video.

Udo Kier plays Count Christian von Meruh, an 18th Century Austrian witch-hunter apprenticed to Lord Cumberland (Herbert Lom), a vain despot who uses religion as a means to steal wealth and abuse women.  Settings include historic buildings that actually held witchcraft trials.

Legendary for its gruesome imagery, Arrow’s uncut presentation reportedly preserves the colors and film grain and contains a terrific assortment of extras.  Sadly, it does not contain the ‘gag’ item originally given to theater-goers: a barf bag!

From the Mark of the Devil to the Mark of the Beast!  Meet Wolfcop [Blu-ray].  Half-man.  Half-wolf.  All cop.  “Here comes the fuzz.”

For a well-dressed wolf vs. a wolfman in shredded uniform, check out Wolfy, The Incredible Secret, winner of Best Animated Film at the 2014 Cesar Awards and nominated for Best Film at the 2014 Berlinale.  Orphaned Wolfy and his childhood friend (and rabbit), Tom, set out to find Wolfy’s mother at the Carne Festival — a gathering of the world’s most dangerous meat-eaters — and discover the secret of his mother’s disappearance and his true ancestry.

For a wolf with the suave vocal growlings of Benedict Cumberbatch, and an international spy farce that features black-and-white feathered penguins instead of black-leather suited dominatrixes, check out Penguins of Madagascar [Blu-ray].  Look for Short Fuse, a Belgian harp seal/demolitions expert voiced by Ken Jeong (The Hangover)!

For an Academy Award nominated film that contains ancestral secrets, disappearing mothers and selkies (half-man/half-seal: all selkie), check out the highly designed Irish animated feature, Song of the Sea (Blu-ray + DVD + DIGITAL HD), featuring the voice of Brendan Gleeson.

https://vimeo.com/104739617

For more Irish sea tales and femme fatales, Orson Welles plays an Irish sailor and Rita Hayworth plays a sultry blonde in Welles’ film noir classic, The Lady From Shanghai – Blu-ray.  The final shoot-out inside a hall of mirrors is cinematic history and it looks great in this worthy Blu-Ray transfer. (1080p High-Definition Video from a 4k Digital Restoration.  Presented in the Original Aspect Ratio of 1.37:1.)

For an under-acknowledged genre classic, check out Prowler [Blu-ray], newly restored by the UCLA Film and Television Archives and the Film Noir Foundation.  It’s the sordid tale of a cop (played by the manly-monikered Van Helfin) stalking an attractive housewife; he plans to win her heart by offing her husband.  Directed by Jopseph Losey, who also made the Peter Lorre serial killer classic, M (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray].  Written by then-blacklisted and uncredited screenwriter, Dalton Trumbo with Hugo Butler.

Criterion presents another lost noir classic with a new 2K digital restoration: Ride the Pink Horse [Blu-ray].  Directed by and starring Robert Montgomery, it’s a classic revenge the tale.  Here, a former GI comes to a little farmer town in New Mexico to settle with the gangster who killed his best friend.

Co-star Thomas Gomez became the first Hispanic actor to receive an Academy Award nomination for his role as Pancho(!)  Along with gorgeous cover art, the disc includes an essay by indie director, Michael Almereyda.

Here’s a trailer:

No, wait, pink horses don’t have horns.  Here’s the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tTlqfx_dWQ

Criterion also released François Truffaut’s follow-up to his seminal work, Jules and Jim:

The Soft Skin [Blu-ray] is the former film critic’s Hitchcock homage, dealing with marital infidelity.

 

For a giggle, I would consider hiding a different type of movie collection in the afore-mentioned Criterion packages.

Don’t Go In The Woods (Blu-ray + DVD Combo): If you’ve ever watched a horror film or read a fairy tale, the title of this low budget 1981 cult classic provides some sound advice.

For more madmen in the wilderness, here’s an opportunity to buy Aguirre, The Wrath of God [Blu-ray] unbundled from the monumental Herzog Collection.  This legendary film stars Klaus Kinski as Don Lope del Aguirre, a conquistador questing for El Dorado, the City of Gold.  Filmed in the Amazon jungle, Herzog and Kinski’s masterwork is a clear inspiration for Apocalypse Now.

Still wilding out: The Wild One is the original outlaw biker movie starring Marlon Brando as Johnny Strabler, an American icon of rebellion.

FOREIGN

Land Of Storms (aka Viharsarok):  A German co-production with more brooding men mounted on vintage motorbikes and lots of slapping on the Hungarian prairie.  (Seriously, so much slapping this week.)  Shot on 35 mm, the lush landscapes and strong performances garnered many festival and critical plaudits.  It looks stunning and should appeal beyond its niche market.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3f7wIoYISo

The Physician:  Set in the 11th Century, Tom Payne plays a young Christian who must disguise himself as a Jew in order to attend medical school in Persia.  This English-language epic about the search for knowledge contains sumptuous visuals and a stellar international cast (Ben Kingsley, Olivier Martinez and Stellan Starsgård).

This German co-production was directed by Phillip Stölzl (Young Goethe in Love) and written by Jan Berger, who penned “We Are the Night“, a hugely successful female vampire film from Germany that bested many Stateside genre offerings in production values and sheer entertainment.  Variety favorably compares “The Physician” to “Braveheart” and “Gladiator.”  Check out the trailer:

The Way He Looks  Daniel Ribiero’s coming-of-age film deals with Leo, a blind teenager with plans to study abroad; things change when he gets assigned a school project with Gabriel, the new kid in town.  His blossoming feelings for Gabriel create tension with his best friend, Giovana, and his overbearing mother.

Leo’s blindness makes for a surprisingly fresh take on first romance, underscored by the music of Belle & Sebastian.  This was Brazil’s official entry for Best Foreign Film at the 87th Academy Awards.

DOCUMENTARIES

This Ain’t No Mouse Music:  A musical trip through the byways of the American South and the history of Arhoolie Records.

TV

Maude: The Complete Series: Shout Factory presents the complete collection of Norman Lear’s Emmy Award winning sitcom, starring Bea Arthur.  Introduced in All in the Family as Edith Bunker’s opinionated liberal cousin, Maude was a two-hander sitcom that tackled hot-button issues such as abortion from a more liberal and feminist perspective.

Mondovino: The Complete Series: An international saga of wine making, featuring “…übercritic Robert Parker, legendary wine mogul Robert Mondavi, zany art collector Jan Schrem, and the noble proprietor of the mythical Romanée Conti vineyard.  From Florence to Burgundy, New York to Argentina, each hour-long episode stands alone as a passionate and hilarious piece of documentary filmmaking.”

AND MORE…

Low Down: An L.A.-set period piece about fatherhood, heroin and jazz starring an incredibly diverse cast (John Hawkes, Elle Fanning, Glenn Close, Flea, Peter Dinklage & Lena Headley)!

Son of a Gun An Australian remake of the terrific French film, A Prophet.  (Ewan McGregor, Brenton Thwaites)

Also check out two Tucson cargo-themed classics:

Arizona – 75th Anniversary Series: A drifter and the cavalry help the first woman in Tucson protect her freight line from Indians. (William Holden, Jean Arthur)

White Line Fever – 40th Anniversary Series A Tucson-based produce trucker protects his pregnant wife from a vicious band of cargo crooks.  (Jan Michael Vincent; Jonathan Kaplan)

It’s been a slow trickle for deep finds but there are some real treasures worth getting!

MAJOR RELEASES

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 [Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD]  TGIF!  You can now own THG:M-P1!

 

Beyond the Lights [Blu-ray] Hollywood romance with a breakout performance from Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Noni Jean, a pop starlet looking to escape her music career by leaping off a balcony.  Kazam Nicol is the hunky police officer who saves her life.   Minnie Driver plays Noni’s domineering stage mother/manager.  Directed by ‘Love and Basketball’ helmer, Gina Prince-Bythewood.

Big Hero 6 won Best Animated Feature along with ‘Feast’ — an Oscar sweep for Disney.  San Fransokyo is a wonderful mash-up of anime and Bay culture, and the first half of the film is a wonderful and empowering depiction of science education, robotics and higher learning.  Just beware tenured professors.

Foxcatcher [Blu-ray]  Dan named this movie the worst of 2014.  Another film-buff friend declared it director Bennett Miller’s masterwork.  Love or hate it?  You should own your opinion:

Whiplash [Blu-ray]  J.K. Simmons won best supporting actor and Whiplash also took home deserved wins for Best Sound Mixing and Best Editing.  The finale is edge-of-the-seat viewing — a showdown that perfectly realizes the film’s themes with a virtuoso fusion of passion, performance and technique.

 

DOCUMENTARY

Algorithms: A look into the life experiences and game strategies of juvenile Blind Chess players in India.  Smartly shot in black-and-white.

Slaughter Nick for President  This self-produced documentary depicts actor Rob Stewart’s 2009 trip to Serbia.  Stewart was the star of “Tropical Heat: Sweating Bullets” — a Canadian “Baywatch Nights” knock-off.  His character, Nick Slaughter, galvanized the country’s anti-Milosovic movement in the 1990s(!)  Slaughter’s tropical shirts, hairy chest and ponytail embodied an ideal of Western freedom that altered the country’s political course.

 

CRITERION
Watership Down [Blu-ray]  Criterion presents a new high-definition digital restoration of Martin Rosen’s animated adaptation of Richard Adams’ classic novel about rabbits seeking shelter after being fleeing from their warren after a terrible vision of military threat.  It’s beautiful and devastating.  The Blu-Ray includes a new interview with the director, and an appreciation given by Guillermo del Toro!

Fellini Satyricon [Blu-ray]  A new 4K Digital Restoration from Criterion: “Federico Fellini’s career achieved new levels of eccentricity and brilliance with this remarkable, controversial, extremely loose adaptation of Petronius’s classical Roman satire, written during the reign of Nero. An episodic barrage of sexual licentiousness, godless violence, and eye-catching grotesquerie, Fellini Satyricon follows the exploits of two pansexual young men—the handsome scholar Encolpius and his vulgar, insatiably lusty friend Ascyltus—as they move through a landscape of free-form pagan excess. Creating apparent chaos with exquisite control, Fellini constructs a weird old world that feels like science fiction.”

NEW TO BLU-RAY

52 Pick-Up [Blu-ray] is a Cannon film about Harry Mitchell (Roy Scheider), a successful Los Angeles entrepreneur and aspiring councilman who finds himself a blackmail target for a gang of pornographers, led by the louche Alan Raimy (John Glover.)  Harry turns the tables and starts pitting the blackmailers against one another.  This pulpy Elmore Leonard adaptation was directed by John Frankenheimer.

The Connection [Blu-ray] Shirley Clarke’s adaptation of Jack Gelber’s Obie-winning play is a film history standard that flips the theatrical ‘Playhouse 90’-style drama to the Flophouse, where a bunch of druggies and jazz musicians hang around in a New York tenement, waiting for their next fix to arrive.  Banned from exhibition, this Blu-Ray exists thanks to the UCLA Film & Television Foundation.

 

In The Land Of The Head Hunters [Blu-ray] is another classic film restoration handled by the UCLA Film and Television Archive.  Filmed in 1914 by photographer Edward S. Curtis, it depicts a warrior’s spiritual quest to rescue his kidnapped bride from a rival tribe.  This dramatic document of the Kwakwaka’wakw Native culture of British Columbia includes scenes of tribal traditions based on oral histories, including the potlatch — a ritual prohibited by Canadian law until 1951.

Eat Drink Man Woman [Blu-ray] is an early Taiwanese feature by Ang Lee (The Life of Pi, Brokeback Mountain) about a widowed father who tries to guide his three grown daughters through life with delicious food and sage advice.

Exterminators Of The Year 3000 [Blu-ray]  Post-apocalyptic Italo-trash riff on ‘The Road Warrior‘ — but this band of survivors is searching for water, not gas.  They still have to face a mad bunch of bikers, car chases, explosions and gore galore.  Presented by Shout Factory in its first wide-screen (1:85:1) Blu-Ray edition.

 

Oratorio for Prague Czech New Wave director Jan Nemec began shooting a documentary of the Prague Spring liberation celebrations — and ended up capturing the arrival of Soviet tanks in the streets of Prague.  It is the only filmed document of the 1969 Soviet invasion.  After exposing this brutal truth, Nemec was blacklisted and the film banned  — but the footage found its way around the world and became an important part of history, later sourced for films such as Philip Kaufman’s classic, ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being‘ and Sophie Fiennes’ ‘The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology.’

GENRE

God Told Me to [Blu-ray]  B-movie auteur Larry Cohen (Q, the Winged Serpent) directed this legendary sci-fi/police procedural that examines murder in the name of religious extremism — and alien insemination.  Blue Underground releases ‘a new 4K High Definition transfer from the original uncensored negative.’ Look for Andy Kaufman in his film debut.

New Year’s Evil [Blu-ray]

Shout! Factory won’t stop ringing in the New Year.  This Blu-Ray release is one of the lesser known holiday slasher flicks.  Rock’n’roll radio hostess Blaze is throwing a Day-Glo, mock-punk New Year’s Eve party in 1980s Los Angeles.  During her broadcast she hears from Evil — a long-time listener, first-time killer.  Evil’s resolution is to kill one person at midnight in every time zone in America — and he promises a Blaze of gory when the bell tolls in Los Angeles.

TV

Space Dandy: Season 1 (Limited Edition Blu-ray/DVD Combo) From the creator of ‘Cowboy Be-bop’, this hallucinatory anime deals with space travel, talking cats, alternate universes and interstellar zombies.

Sons of Anarchy: The Final Season

Sons of Anarchy The Complete Series Giftset [Blu-ray]  Yes, the final season is out on Blu-Ray, as well — but why not go whole hog on the greatest Shakespearean-influenced biker drama ever made?

Chips: Season 3 For those who prefer their biker justice armed with more legal authority, Francis Poncherello and Jon Baker are back on the beat in this long-awaited Warner Home Video release.

Longmire: Season 3 [Blu-ray]  Another long-awaited law enforcement-themed home video release.  Made in New Mexico, the third season of Craig Johnson’s popular crime thriller ended with a can’t-miss cliffhanger — and was then canceled by A&E.  Thankfully, Netflix promises a 10-episode fourth season soon.

Outlander: Season One – Volume One  Lush Scottish settings and thick Scottish brogues enhance this adaptation of Diana Gabaldon’s popular time-travel/romance series.

The Game Created by Toby Whithouse (“Being Human”), this 1970s-set BBC Cold War drama stars Tom Hughes and Brian Cox in an engaging tale of love and loyalty tested among spies.

Shakespeare Uncovered: Series 2 Stories behind the Bard’s greatest plays, explored by Morgan Freeman, Joseph Fiennes, Hugh Bonneville, Kim Cattrall and more…  A series that educates in an entertaining and insightful fashion.

Return to the Wild: The Chris Mccandless Story reveals more information about the strange disappearance and death of Chris McCandless, the subject of both Jon Krakauer’s famed book, ‘Into the Wild’ and Sean Penn’s film adaptation.