"Kung Fu Fridays" blog profile

A blog I just took notice recently is "Kung fu Fridays," (http://kungfufridays.blogspot.com/) a funny and informative chronicle of Chinese cinema – with an emphasis on Kung Fu films – plus a healthy dose of general wackiness thrown in for good measure. It has a technorati authority of 28 and a rank of 213,791. The writer is Colin, hailing from Canada, who is a fan of obscure movies – including but not limited to Kung Fu flicks – who runs an independent film distribution company specializing in offbeat titles. In many ways it is the type of position that gives great authority in a field such as Kung Fu movies: professional enough to know certain facets of the business, but independent enough to still be a diehard fan. Posts are made at a frequency of about several per week, another aspect that shows dedication and a love of the genre.


The posts cover a wide range of topics, from new Kung Fu movies, to older ones and rare or obscure finds. There are also many posts which aren’t even about Kung Fu films – rather strange posters or memorabilia the blogger has picked up recently – but it serves to add to the quirky and alternative feel of the blog. One of the more interesting posts was of an old ad for Kodak film prominently featuring Kung Fu. The post can be found at http://kungfufridays.blogspot.com/2009/01/slash-kick-chop-violence-galore.html and the tagline is “Slash! Kick! Chop! Violence galore!” – which is, according to the ad the type of action contained in the series Kung Fu with David Carradine. It is interesting to see this old representation of Chinese martial arts, prominently displayed even so long ago. It helps reiterate that in the film world, Kung Fu is seen as one of the most cinematic of the martial arts.


On the more modern side, there is another post compiling several semi-recent commercials called “Brand Name Punching” (http://kungfufridays.blogspot.com/2008/11/brand-name-punching.html). One commercial from Thailand features Muay Thai superstar Tony Jaa in a Mitsubishi ad, while two other ads show Donnie Yen – a martial artist who is nearing the latter portion of his film career, but is nonetheless reinvigorating Hong Kong choreography right now.


These kind of posts give us a sense of the past and present development of kung fu/ martial arts in the media. I myself can relate to this blog in that it provides new news about events in martial arts film world (an example being a post detailing new Criterion Collection DVDs of Hong Kong films), yet at the same time it also provides a background to what Kung Fu films were like in the 70s and 80s: zany and exploitative, and loads of fun. The blog has a personal touch (some of the posts relate to the author’s own life and business), and the somewhat esoteric subject matter makes the readership likely to be comprised mostly of obscure or cult movie fans. Posts are not always long on writing, but usually graphic intensive – with many Youtube videos to boot.


The blog is not really a scholarly or academic one. It is more of a fan blog, but written by someone who has experience in the industry and is a lover of Kung Fu and retro movies. My blog will not be concentrated quite so much on the old school, retro Kung Fu films, but rather on the newest developments in the Asian martial arts styles on film. Many of the movies detailed in "Kung Fu Fridays" are the history, the backdrop to every martial arts movie made today. Yet at the same time the exciting fusion of modern martial arts concepts like dynamic Wushu, hard hitting Muay Thai and a new level of acrobatics is changing the field. Still the spirit of my blog and "Kung Fu Fridays" is the same: a love for martial arts and cinema, a love which grows even more when combined. An excellent quote that is on the main page of the blog exemplifies this point of view. The quote is one I have never heard before, but is by renowned director Werner Herzog and really demonstrates the way I myself feel about martial arts movies as well. “Someone like Jean-Luc Godard is for me intellectual counterfeit money when compared to a good kung fu film”