The Greatest Martial Arts Movie From Every Year of the 1970s
Martial arts, a genre that is incredibly simple in scope as it is wide-ranging in influence. While martial arts films have long been a staple of the East, it wasn’t until the 1970s that movies featuring kung-fu fighting and intriguing storylines began to become popularized in the West. There’s one man that you can thank for this, and it’s Bruce Lee, the first martial arts actor who broke through to Western audiences with his sweet fighting moves and movies that kept audiences hooked to the plot.
While Lee helped popularize martial arts movies in the West, there are other movies from this decade that can be considered equally iconic, mixing Eastern flair with Western Hollywood dazzle. So, let’s take a trip back to the groovy ’70s and look at the best martial arts film of every year from the decade.
1
‘Brothers Five’ (1970)
1970 was a dynamic year, a time that was seeing abrupt changes in the pop culture landscape. While Eastern movies had yet to make a big splash in North American theaters, there were numerous martial arts movies that came to define the year. In other words, it was hard to pick just one. But, we had to, and the one we went with was Brothers Five, released in the early half of 1970.
Directed by Lo Wei, Brothers Five follows five brothers who, after the death of their father at the hands of the leader of the Flying Dragon Villa, were separated at birth. The brothers reunited years later, and teamed up to rid their manor of the gang that killed their father. Brothers Five was nothing short of action-packed, filled with great kung-fu fights that would make any martial arts fan scream in delight. Once obscure to the West, Brothers Five is a movie that slowly gained cult classic status after kung-fu movies gained wider acceptance in the West.
2
‘A Touch of Zen’ (1971)
Moving into 1971, martial arts movies were just starting to get noticed in North America, and A Touch of Zen was the movie that helped do it. Separated into two parts, this elastic kung-fu film (its total runtime is 180 minutes) takes a more traditional route to martial arts glory. Directed by King Hu, A Touch of Zen is based on the “Xianu” story from the Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, written by Pu Songling.
Any movie that’s set in the Ming dynasty is sure to be a good one, and A Touch of Zen was no different. Not only was the fighting top-notch, but the film also waded into themes such as Zen Buddhism and feminism. Oh, and to top it all off, this film was also a ghost story. Talk about a martial arts movie that had the total package.
3
‘Fist of Fury’ (1972)
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If we were to pinpoint the exact time martial arts movies became a mainstream hit in North America, 1972 would be that year, all thanks to one man: Bruce Lee. Lee was long part of Hong Kong’s film scene by the time he starred in 1972’s Fist of Fury, but it was here where his legend quickly began to take root among American audiences.
While Fist of Fury is widely known for the very awesome, very realistic kung-fu fights featuring Lee, the movie is actually much deeper than one would expect from a martial arts movie. Fist of Fury touched on a very thorny subject that wrapped around Japanese colonialism, which gave the movie a weight that few movies of its kind could match. While we’re going to talk about the movie that launched Lee into the superstar stratosphere next, Fist of Fury is, in my opinion, the legend at his absolute best.
4
‘Enter the Dragon’ (1973)
If 1972’s Fist of Fury was the movie that put kung-fu star Bruce Lee on the map with American audiences, Enter the Dragon was the one that catapulted him into superstar status. Sure, there were a number of great martial arts movies that came out this year, but Lee was quickly becoming one of Hollywood’s hottest commodities, and Enter the Dragon outclassed all of them, becoming not just the best martial arts movie of that year, but one of the best of all-time.
Enter the Dragon was one of the first martial arts films produced by Hollywood, and to say it was influential is an understatement. Enter the Dragon continued Fist of Fury‘s panache for showing realistic fighting, and it successfully blended martial arts with more mainstream genres such as action and spy films. In a sense, it’s hard to pinpoint what Enter the Dragon actually is, but that’s the beauty of it. The movie is everything, action-packed and story-focused, and you can’t call yourself a martial arts fan if you haven’t seen this gem of a film.
5
‘The Savage Five’ (1974)
With Bruce Lee tragically passing shortly after finishing Enter the Dragon, audiences who had just seen the beauty of martial arts films wondered how the genre could continue without its superstar. While Lee’s passing was a tremendous loss for the genre, martial arts movies continued to be made, with one of the best being 1974’s The Savage Five.
In a sense, The Savage Five is a traditional martial arts movie mixed in with the Western genre, and the end result was a great movie that should be considered a classic. Here, we follow a town that’s trying to get rid of bandits that are up to no good. Is the movie simple? Yes, it is, but that’s what makes it so great. Martial arts movies don’t have to be complicated epics in order to be epic. What makes it great is the action-packed scenes that will keep you hooked on the screen. Add in a touch of Western gravatas, and you have an underrated gem in The Savage Five.
6
‘The Man from Hong Kong’ (1975)
By the mid-’70s, a subgenre of martial arts movies was just beginning to take shape called “chopsocky.” Using overblown storylines and highly exaggerated special effects, chopsocky films were kind of looked down upon by more sophisticated fans of the genre. Nevertheless, this subgenre did produce some great martial arts films, with one coming out in 1975 called The Man from Hong Kong.
Released under the title The Dragon Flies in America, The Man from Hong Kong follows Fang Sing Leng (Jimmy Wang Yu), a police inspector who heads down under to Sydney, Australia, to pick up a criminal for extradition, except, he finds himself embroiled in a battle with Sydney’s most notorious crime boss, Jack Wilton (George Lazenby). The Man from Hong Kong is a perfect example of a chopsocky martial arts flick. The story is wacky, and the fighting was also highly dramatized. But, as I mentioned earlier, these types of martial arts movies weren’t really bad, and this film is one of the better ones from the subgenre.
7
‘Secret Rivals’ (1976)
The best aspect about martial arts movies is how you can be in-and-out of them while still being highly satisfied. 1976’s Secret Rivals, directed by James Nam and Ng See-yuen, is a great example of this. Clocking in at a hair above 90 minutes, Secret Rivals is a movie that packs a lot within its truncated runtime.
The movie follows Northern Leg (John Liu), who embarks across China to try to find the man who killed his parents. Secret Rivals was a return, somewhat, to the simplistic nature of martial arts movies, keeping the plot simple and condensed, and the fighting more realistic. All of this adds up to a movie that was great in action and had an intriguing enough storyline that keeps viewers locked in and engaged throughout.
8
‘Broken Oath’ (1977)
Before 1977, martial arts movies were primarily dominated by men showing off their sweet fighting skills, with women largely relegated to supporting roles. Angela Mao wasn’t going to be another woman in a supporting role, however. She set out to prove that women could kick butt in martial arts as well, with the spectacular Broken Oath serving as the way point for female fighters to take center stage.
Here, we follow Mao’s character, Liu Chieh Lien, a young woman who begins to excel in the art of martial arts after being sent to a Shaolin monastery for women. Using her superior kung-fu skills, she sets off on a revenge tour to get back at the men who assaulted her family. Broken Oath is a movie that is dripping with girl power, with Mao’s fantastic fighting skills on full display. She paved the way for women martial arts fighters to find their footing within this male-dominated genre, and did so with style, grace, and badassery.
9
‘Heroes of the East’ (1978)
By the tail-end of the 1970s, martial arts films were becoming very popular with Western audiences. One of the movies most moviegoers latched onto was Heroes of the East, directed by Lau Kar-Leung and showing off a different kind of martial art, one from Japan. You see, before Heroes of the East, martial arts movies were dominated by stars from Hong Kong and China. So, Heroes of the East served as a breakthrough for Japanese martial arts stars to show what they had.
Heroes of the East follows Ho Tao (Gordon Liu), a kung-fu fighter who wants to display that his brand of martial arts fighting is superior. One of the best aspects of this thrilling movie is that it showcases a variety of martial arts styles that you typically didn’t see in films before this one. From Japanese Judo to the Chinese Crane Fist, you’ll see fighting on a scale that will blow your mind, making this the best martial arts film of 1978, and the ’70s in general.
10
‘Odd Couple’ (1979)
We’ve reached the end of the decade, a time when the carefree ways of the ’70s were beginning to give way to the conservatism of the 1980s. I say this because martial arts films were beginning to move in this direction as well, shedding the chopsocky nature and diverse fighting style in exchange for tighter and more serious storylines with heavier, brutal fighting scenes. So, it’s no wonder that 1979’s Odd Couple feels like the end of a dynamic era, and it went out with a bang.
Directed by Lau Kar-wing, Odd Couple is a martial arts film that is also a comedy, leaning fully into the chopsocky subgenre with a crazy plot that works really, really well. The plot of Odd Couple is simple. It’s a movie that looks at two fighters to see which one is the best, to a hilarious extent. Not only will you hold your stomach in laughter, but you’ll also bare witness to some of the best fighting of the decade; and, in one that saw the rise of Bruce Lee, that’s a tall statement to make.
