Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Beloved Remakes & The Perils Of Full Screen

Just finished watching Karate Warriors, a remake of Yojimbo, featuring '70s martial arts film god Sonny Chiba. I've made it my mission as of late to watch as many Yojimbo remakes as I can get my hands on. As for Karate Warriors, overall it was a decent flick with some kick ass fight sequences and great slow-mo camera tricks. Though, the whole time I was watching the movie I was getting pissed off with my DVD. I've gotten used to the usual quality of the post-Kill Bill wave of cheapo Kung Fu DVDs floating around all the discount bins. Said quality is often poor at best, but I would kill for a better quality copy of this movie. The DVD I watched was a craptacular full screen transfer, which made some of the fighting difficult to follow. It also had some of the worst audio I've ever heard, the quiet parts were too quiet and the loud parts were too loud. Though, despite my obsessive nitpicking of the DVD I would definitely suggest that fans of Sonny Chiba check this flick out. Good story, good fighting, and classic seventies kung fu music.