Sister Street Fighter: Hanging by a Thread

Hey all. Back from my much requested "Outbreak" demands and I plan to review one tomorrow.

I am hoping it won't be insanely depressing. How about a karate film with a heroine up to her shapely hips in a gaggle of smugglers, gangsters and prostitutes? Now while that was setup sounds filthy as it was intended; it makes it no less accurate.  From the Dragon Princess and Sister Street Fighter, comes "Sue" Etsuko Shihomi back in action with the following sequel.  This is Sister Street Fighter: Hanging by a Thread a.k.a. Sister Street Fighter in Danger a.k.a. Female Killing Fist- Crisis Resolved a.k.a. Return of the Female Killing Fist a.k.a. Sister Streetfighter 2

Hey she took Elvis's shades!

Yes the multiple titles means several foreign re-releases from those 20 to 200 Karate movie packs so yes this could be a concern on the quality of the film. Let us not forget Dragon Princess and Sister Street Fighter are both in Public Domain so take your small comfort. Let's check this out, shall we?

We have our Toei Company logo of waves smacking the rocks below and right into a three minute fight choreography intro. This is not uncommon with the Karate and Kung Fu flicks of the 1970s. So we see Sue in full form, whipping nun-chucks and snap kicks looking fearless.

Etsuko Shihomi(The Street Fighter, Sister Street Fighter, Karate Inferno, The Great Chase, Bullet Train, Karate Bear Fighter, Return of the Sister Street Fighter, Dragon Princess and Sister Street Fighter: Fifth Level Fist) reprises her Koryu Li character in this sequel and this time around she searching for Birei (Hisako Tanaka of Sister Street Fighter: Hanging by a Thread and The Great Chase), a former schoolmate of Li's has gotten into trouble.

Her friend's uncle asks Koryu to look in on Birei because he is convinced she is mixed up with some shady cats and that's no good. It seems Birei was kidnapped by some gangsters. They specialize in smuggling and prostitution, so these guys are clearly easy going and fun loving. Oh wait; that's hippies and not gangsters. My apologies. They're hightailing it to Tokyo for their ill-gotten gains.

Not Sonny Chiba!

No sooner does Koryu get to Tokyo she has a turbulent taxi ride. Apparently the gang was ready for her. She defeats crooked Cabbie's Kung Fu in the train yard only to square off with a swarmy nun-chuck hitter and his ninja nerds four. Sorry but these guys don't exactly put the fear of God in you like the Hand via Daredevil, Iron Fist or The Defenders.

The fight choreography on the train tops was fun and clever and probably dangerous as Hell. While Koryu's Karate is true and solid, she needs to level up if she is to defeat the boss and his evil gang. The prostitute's hinders are being used to smuggle diamonds. Surgically implanted in their buttocks, not jammed up them.  Sheesh, you sickos.  One can only assume their man whores have to balloon black tar heroin or get it shoved into their collective wangs.

By the power of GRAYSKULL!!!

Koryu meets up with her sister, (Tamayo Mitsukawa of Hoshi no flamenco, Hibotan bakuto: Jingi tooshimasu, Sister Street Fighter: Hanging by a Thread and Kozure okami)Hakuran and tells her what is going on and sis won't have anything to do with it but offers her apartment for a place to crash while she is on vacation. Yet as Koryu sleeps, the bad guys send another assassin after her. Um they just follow her around Tokyo or is this gang that connected? Seriously, what kind of spotters and surveillance are they doing around town?

And she does team up but not with Sonny Chiba this time. I know, I thought it blasphemy as well.

Instead she has a questionable guy Tsubaki (Yasyaki Kurata of The Fists of Vengeance, The Godfather Squad, Fight! Dragon, Return of the Sister Street Fighter, Challenge Me Dragon and Secret of the Shaolin Poles) that has his own motives for assisting her.

This is standard martial arts exploitation 101, protagonist given a quest, fights a ton of bad guys, deals with the boss battle and saves the day.

As Koryu fends off each weapon bound nutter butter we get to find out each assailant's name and fighting style. That's handy when I need to pick them out in a line up for the cops. Yes officer, that man right there. He was using Korean Kung Fu. No doubt in my mind.

Biggest pet peeves is the storyline isn't anything really different or that clever and the fricking handheld camera work for most of the fight scenes gets a little nauseating. Not sure what veteran director Kazuhiko Yamaguchi (Sister Street Fighter, Wolf Guy, Karate Bullfighter, Karate Bear Fighter, Karate Warriors, Return of the Sister Street Fighter) was thinking with all the handheld. Surely a crane shot or a dolly cam would have been reasonable. I am amazed I haven't had a migraine from this handheld nonsense.

The original poster was very misleading as Etsuko Shihomi is posed in shorty shorts and go-go boots. How dare you, movie poster!  Is it a decent follow-up from Sister Street Fighter?  Not really.  The story is lack luster, Etsuko is amazing as always but the fights drag on or are very abrupt. Tempo, movie tempo. The evil boss cackles way too often and his whole underworld connections tend to stand out in a crowd a bit too easily.  The way Koryu is able to track these guys down so quickly without resorting to Batman level of interrogation of thugs?  C'mon!

Here's hoping the next sequel is better. 

Shhh, Sue beefed.

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.