Dragon Princess

Welcome back to the blog! So after the Giallo film, I felt a need for a change-up and decided I haven't had a martial arts film with a compelling story, a collection of characters and some serious fight scenes. So normally you think Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li on maybe some Donnie Yen. This time around however I am heading back to Sonny or Shin'ichi Chiba and his Sister Street Fighter co-star Su or Etsuko Shiomi. This is Sonny Chiba's Dragon Princess a.k.a. Assassin Woman's Fist a.k.a. Lady Karate a.k.a. Dragon Princess.

Yumi's first drag queen encounter.

Wouldn't be my blog without alternative titles. A quick side note before going into the film story. Dragon Princess part of a double feature billing via Grindhouse and Drive-in with another Sonny Chiba movie, Karate Warriors.

This film opens with the Karate master, Kazuma Higaki (Sonny Chiba of Street Fighter, Return of the Street Fighter, Sister Street Fighter, Karate Inferno, Karate Warriors, Golgo 13: Assignment Kowloon, The Bushido Blade, Kill Bill: Vol. 1 and Kill Bill: Vol. 2)arriving with his daughter finding his shrine and dojo completely thrashed. A rival member of the Karate school,Hironobu Nikaido (Bin Amatsu of the Ninja Hunt, The Magic Serpent, Samurai Wolf II, Gokudo, Blackmail Is My Life and Gangster Cop) decrees Kazuma is not worthy to be teacher, a fight ensues. Kazuma is clearly the superior fighter but Nikaido will win by any means necessary, including calling in three of his boys to assist. Most dishonorable. With four masters attacking Kazuma, expect these cameramen to earn their money! Not kidding, these guys were like a sadistic ballet, moving gracefully but full of rage and focus.

CHIBA!!!

They break out blades and start cutting him down by inches, damn near bleeding him out. Between adrenaline and the need to protect his daughter, Kazuma goes head on against them. These bastards go so far to threaten his daughter's life. With a commendable defense, the sheer numbers wear Kazuma down, they damage his hand so badly and cut out one of his eyes with a Kunai knife (a farming tool, throwing weapon/dagger). The guy was stabbed under the shoulder with a Katana, stabbed the hand with a Sai and had lost his eye to a Kunai knife and still standing. BADASS!

Leaving him a broken and bitter man, Higaki doesn't give back so much as a second glance.

Alive but crippled, our former Karate master takes and trains Yumi. Pity Yumi, for she will never know another life aside from her father's need for vengeance and she will be the instrument to carry it out. They have fled to Los Angeles to Rocky montage Yumi's training, building her skills, strength and stamina. Yumi (Su Shiomi of Sister Street Fighter, Return of the Street Fighter, Sister Street Fighter: Hanging by a Thread, The Great Chase, The Gorilla Seven, Return of the Sister Fighter, Karate Warriors, Hoero tekken and Fall Guy) is as trained and prepared as she can be.

Kazuma is on his death bed explaining that he asks Yumi to keep the corruption away from Karate and avenge them both. For her loss of a childhood and his crippling. This is spurred into action when Kazuma passes away. Yumi puts her plan into action and decides she will track these men down and show them the error of their ways.

Worry not my readers, for Master Nikaido is foremost master of being a complete cheat and utter dick wagon, as his thugs, "The Big Four" are sent out to dispatch the competition for impeding Karate tournament. Seriously this guy is lacking the armor but he is in full Shredder mode. This much dishonor, you would think his ancestors haunt him in the night and laugh at his tiny willy when he is in the shower or hitting the bathroom. Maybe he has an unlicensed, nuclear accelerator in his closet.

Yumi returns to Tokyo, a land she has not been in since a child to her grandfather. Grandpa while not creepy like say; the one from Silent Night, Deadly Night does cast a lot of shade on Yumi's dead father and how he left so soon after the death of her mother. Personally I think he just needed to vent his spleen a bit. Still bad form, Grandpa.

Yumi's job been made that much more easier as she follows these asshats to get not only revenge for her father but to deal a blow to Master Nikaido's plans. Twofer!

Pirate Chiba!!!

Yumi isn't the only one on a path for vengeance. She is joined by Masahiko Okizaki (Yasuaki Kurata of The Fists of Vegeance, Fists of Revenge, The Godfather Squad, The Golden Triangle, Young Hero of Shaolin, The Legend of the Owl and Blood, the Last Vampire), who was also a target for the competition, he and his bad ass mullet don't take prisoners nor BS lightly.

Another quick bit of trivia for the New Yorkers, this was double billed with Karate Warriors on 42^nd Street Marquee in 1976 before its massive makeover in the early 2000s

Now we can easily argue this is yet another Karate/Kung Fu/Taekwondo revenge story but there is some heart to go with the action, Su is damn impressive as a martial artist and okay that piggy portion of me is enjoying seeing her in pigtails (WHAT OF IT??!!) but unlike most of these films, it is usually a son or elder male student avenging the fallen master, not a young woman let alone the daughter of said Sensei. That you find more popular in Manga or Anime but not so much the live action films.

From this and a TV pilot, Su and Sonny went on to doing more films giving her international stardom. I look forward to finding some more of Sue Shihomi's later hits. I did enjoy this one.

Unfortunately, I found my version in Public Domain and it is clearly a straight VHS to DVD transfer with piss poor rendering. 

Master Raiden...you're female now. K.