Champion of Death
(Image Entertainment DVD)
(1975)
review by Annoyed Grunt

I’ve heard people say they got goose bumps at the end of Return of the King. It got to me too, but it paled in comparison to what I felt during Kill Bill. What tugged on my heart strings? The coma raping? The insane bloodbath? No, it was seeing Sonny Chiba’s name on the big screen. He may not be the most skilled martial artist around, but he’s by far my favourite for three reasons: He has a certain undefendable charisma, his movies are wonderfully violent and, most importantly, he acts the way I would in a kung fu flick. When confronted by an unsurmountable challenge, he cheats his ass off, fights dirty and goes for the kill quickly. Yes, Chiba is the man, but is he a champion? A champion of death?

Set shortly after World War II, Chiba portrays his real life master Masa Oyama. The film is loosely based on his real life exploits, but I have to think the film takes many, many liberties. At least I hope so. Anyway, in 1949 they hold the first post war karate tournament and Oyama walks in off the street, outclasses all the competitors and wins the trophy. Afterwards he decries the current karate scene, calling it nothing more than ballet. He smashes the trophy and goes in to hiding. He surfaces three years later when he sees an American GI on the streets with a prostitute and becomes enraged. It turns out he saved the girl years ago and he feels she’s wasted her life since then. So, he does the only logical thing; beats up the GI and rapes the girl. The military police arrest him and force him to fight for his life, but he comes out on top and starts a relationship with the girl. Note to self: rape isn’t that big of a deal after all.

With a girl by his side, he takes on a protegee and life is good. That is, until a bull escapes and runs wild downtown. In a wonderfully bloody scene, Oyama kills the beast with his bare hands (something the real Oyama has done dozens of times) and word of his skills begin to spread. But life isn’t all roses and ice-cream as his protegee runs foul off the law is gunned down. Oyama starts heavily drinking and ends up killing a man in a pub brawl. Consumed by guilt, Oyama tries to make things right by working for the man’s widow on the farm. But the karate tournament is coming up again and the officials in charge don’t want him to compete. But when they send some agents to take him out, Oyama sets out to show he’s a true champion... OF DEATH!

As you can tell, I absolutely love the title, so much that it created an almost insurmountable amount of hype in my own mind. Although it wasn’t the 83 minute death fest I hoped it would be, it is a perfectly serviceable flick. The Oyama character is surprisingly deep and the story is filled with pathos. The character goes from a real bastard to a mentor to a surrogate husband and father. Chiba’s acting is surprisingly good and so is the dubbing. Seriously, this is one of the best dubbed kung fu flicks I’ve ever seen. Like most Chiba flicks, many skulls are cracked and much blood is spilled. He doesn’t tear off any body parts this time out, but the scene with the bull makes up for it. I’m sure PeTA would have a heart attack if they ever decided to dig through the DVD bargain bin.

Directed by Kazuhiko Yamaguchi of Sister Streetfighter fame, Champion of death is a bit of visual mess. During fights he often go to painfully shaky point of view shots that only serve to distract and possibly nauseate. I don’t want to sound like an editing geek, but many shots don’t cut together well. He crosses the axis so often he should get frequent flyer miles. The flashback scenes have a wonderful colour to them and it’s a bit of a shame that the rest of the movie is rather bland looking.

The DVD is about what you’d expect for a budget DVD. The image quality is nothing to write home about and while it is a widescreen print, it’s the wrong ratio. Either that or Yamaguchi has no idea how to frame shots.

But how can you go wrong with a Sonny Chiba movie called Champion of Death?