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The Street Fighter (1974)

Dir: Shigehiro Ozawa

“The Street Fighter” is a rare thing…it’s a non-American film that actually manages to reach the same status as home-grown product when it comes to it’s place in U.S. Grindhouse history.

But does the film hold up today?

Sonny Chiba is ‘Terry’ Tsurugi a ruthless, no messing, kick ass guy for hire. As we join the movie he is rescuing a Japanese criminal named Junjou (Masashi Ishibashi) from prison.
Junjou is set to be hanged, but Terry (disguised as a Monk) tricks his way into the cell and quickly slams his knuckles into Junjou’s back!
We are informed though (in a wonderfully cheesy bit of dialogue) that this is all part of Terry’s plan;
Terry: “You’ll be unconscious soon through lack of oxygen…It’s an ancient technique”.
Junjou: “An oxygen coma?!”

Sure enough, just as he is about to dangle Junjou collapses and it’s promptly arranged for him to be carted off to Hospital (as it would not be right to hang an ill guy). And sure enough, he is sprung on route.

Terry returns back home to insult his annoying assistant ‘Ratnose’ (Waichi Yamada) and to collect the rest of his fee for the rescue job from Junjou’s Brother and Sister. Foolishly they declare that they are rather short of funds and can’t pay him!
Showing his business skills Terry promptly kicks the crap out of them both and the Brother ends up taking a fatal dive out of the top floor window. Then, to recoup his money, Terry promptly sells the Sister into prostitution! Never has an anti-hero been so damn anti.

Terry is then approached by the Yakuza (who in a mess up in the English dubbing are described as a “Hong Kong” assassin group!) to kidnap a young Woman named Sarai (Yutaka Nakajima) who, after her Father (who was head of a Martial Arts school) mysteriously dies, has become a rich oil heiress.
But they refuse to agree to Terry’s high fee and attack him as he tries to leave.
This annoys the hell out of Terry of course, and he decides to go against the Yakusa (who have been joined by the Mafia just to make things more complicated) and protect Sarai (though it seems to be implied he’s only doing it to get near her fortune!).

Meanwhile Junjou (after he bumps into his Sister plying her new trade, and learns what happened) has joined the Yakuza to get revenge on Terry...

 

Due to it’s astonishingly immoral (well at least as far as ‘heroes’ goes) lead character, and the tough as nails performance in said role by Sonny Chiba, the film touched the hearts of the 70’s, urban flea pit cinema dweller even more so than the films of Bruce Lee himself.
Chiba’s rough and tumble fighting style was the exact opposite of Lee’s devastatingly majestic and fluid moves.
It was a street brawling Karate hybrid that looked like it could be performed by anyone.
Whereas most of the audience looked on in awe and envy at Lee, they looked at Chiba as a tough bastard with a style that they had at least some chance of emulating without having to stand on one leg for a month up a Tibetan mountain.

Chiba became a grime caked street God, his name became slang, and for a brief moment in time Chiba probably could have run for President and almost all of denizens of 42nd Street would have actually voted for him. Sonny was THE MAN. Chiba, Chiba….

As with all Martial Arts films released in Europe and The States during the 70’s/80’s the dubbing leaves rather a lot to be desired. Especially when it comes to the squeaking ‘Ratnose’ and his heartfelt cries of “Teeeeeerry….Teeeeerrrrryyyyy”. Everywhere else it’s pretty much the gruff delivery, with added pointless words to fill in the lip synching gaps, we have all come to know and love/loathe.
Translation wise, as well as aforementioned Yakuza mix up, it also seems less than accurate (unless the original script by Koji Takada was dubious in the first place) with lots of enjoyably trashy and/or cheesy dialogue like:
“So I’m to die because I know who controls the Yakuza here…isn’t that mean and nasty”.
“The inscrutable oriental better not screw up”.
And the now classic statement, “Become a number one man”!

The main heiress plot and the Junjou sub plot mesh well, but there is still much that seems overly murky. Alliances are twisted, bent and broken every five minutes and in the end it all becomes a mind aching jumble of obscure motives and reasoning. Best to just sit back and enjoy the flying fists.
And like James Bond’s villains Terry’s enemies are sometimes reluctant to just kill the guy and deliver all manner of ‘honour’ speeches instead of just doing the deed.

But enough of this! What about the reason we’re all here…the action!
On it’s brief original release this was one of the first ever films to get an ‘X’ in America solely for violence alone. It was later cut down drastically to get an ‘R’.
Today, I can’t see the uncut ‘X’ print having a problem getting an ‘R’. There is still plenty of dribbling blood and bone crunching noises as Chiba kicks and punches his way through numerous lesser beings, but it’s impact 30 years on has certainly lessened.

But that is not to say this is not wickedly violent entertainment. Chiba’s arms and legs flail around in a most ungracious fashion and woe be to them that get in the way! Chiba delivers a mixture of sudden hard punches and deliberate torture. One second a power knuckle punch will crack ribs and spines the next it’s a slow ‘fingers of death’ vice grip on an unfortunates throat.
There is nothing at all graceful here in the way Terry despatches his foes, but this oriental rough housing certainly packs a satisfyingly punch.

Chiba himself not only brings a cold-blooded ruthlessness to Terry where his actions towards people are concerned, but also in the almost primal way he fights. Pulling some of the most over the top expressions of controlled rage ever seen on a Human being and making a noise like a cat heaving up a fur ball (as he primes up his ‘Chi’, always essential) Chiba is indeed a wild force of nature.

Highlights in the numerous fights include the famous ‘X Ray’ image (which actually looks like someone hitting a bouncy rubber skull) when Terry whacks a guy on the head, an eye gouging, an unintentionally funny scene of a guy spitting his teeth out, various blood spewing mouths (and some vomit spewing at one point, after a brutal stomach hit), lots of very painful sounding cries, cracking bones, knife slashed stomachs, a castration via Terry's 'fiingers of death' that results in a fistfull of bloodied trouser front, a blood gushing knife in the eye aftermath and a full on bit of head splatter after one guy is thrown over a railing.
And look out for an unexpected one on one with that Japanese staple…a blind swordsman.
The famous rain soaked finale ups the violence and delivers a high body count and although it all ends abruptly (the sequel “Return of the Street Fighter” ties up the few loose ends) it still manages to satisfy.

All of this mayhem is scored to the very catchy sounds of funk guitars (the “Street Fighter” theme itself being a toe tapping delight) and disco beats. It’s the 70’s folks!

So overall we certainly have a movie that has aged and lost some of it’s brutal power, but also a movie that retains it’s welcome, rough edged, entertainment value and street level violence that so endeared it, and the man Chiba himself, to those Grindhouse audiences.

This can now be found online on a fully uncut, wide screen DVD for as little as $2.20, (£3 including postage to the UK) from www.dvdpacific.com. Its 2 sequels are going for the same.
So at those prices how can you resist that Chiba high