At my martial arts class today, the teacher (Sifu) was teaching me a form called the “Small Wheel,” and in the course of doing so demonstrated a blocking technique which is called “Heaven and Earth.” One hand angled straight up, the other down, crossed at the wrist.
And I did the block and stared at it, and then said, “Wait a minute…isn’t this ‘King Kong Palm?’ Drew Barrymore used that…”
And he sighed and said, “Yeah. It’s King Kong Palm. When I was a student, we’d recognize things from ‘Enter the Dragon.’ ‘Hey, that’s from ‘Enter the Dragon!’ Bruce Lee!” So now what does everyone say? ‘Charlies Angels!'” He shook his head, looking a bit disappointed. Just not as cool somehow, I guess.
PAD
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“Enter the Dragon,” while not high art, was the pinnacle in the career of a martial arts legend. “Charlie’s Angels ” is fun fluff, but fluff nonetheless. It has less to do with what’s cool, I think, and more to do with the “supposed” loss of reverence for the source material of “Heaven and Earth, (“King Kong Palm?” Groan) and the contributions of an innovator in that art.
Another example. Think back to an 1993/1994 issue of Adventures of Superman guest starring Superboy.
Superboy: “Second star to the right, straight on til morning.”
Superman: “J.M. Barrie. Peter Pan. How appropriate.”
Superboy: “What’re you talking about? Captain Kirk said that.”
Similar, don’t you think?
That’s great and funny! Can totally relate. I take a ‘self defense’ class from a friend mainly for the cardio workout, and sometimes I get called on to help instruct new people. I was officially labelled ‘weird’ when trying to explain to someone how to ‘pop the hip’ to increase power of strikes by using the line “You ever do any belldance? Same motion, only with more gusto.”
And then, another student I was working with, after the instructor taught us a new ‘take down’ move was having problem with getting the backward spin motion right and in frustration I blurt out “C’mon! It’s just like that zombie dance move in Thriller!” and then had to demonstrate what I was talking about. The instructor, horrified and shaking his head, concluded that I was right, it was the same general move. (and hey, want to have real fun, right before you do it, you do the Tai Chi ‘snake creeps down’ with straight down arms, and the tai chi ‘shake’ then launch into that backward spin and you’ve got self defense straight from Michael Jackson!)
Okay, I’m going away now before PAD files for the TPO.
Funny you should say that PAD.
I just took my first class today,
not really that interesting but I thought it was cool you should post that on the same day I start. Love that Superman reference posted by Paul Anthony Llossas by the way.
Hehe, I wouldn’t have said Drew Barrymore, but Aoi Umenokouji. The “Heaven and Earth” stance is also a move in Sega’s Virtua Fighter 4 game. Aoi has it and can use it for quick dodges and parrying certain strikes. Just a funny little thing 🙂
Trivia: That line (and many of the moves) in Charlie’s Angels is taken from, and is paying homage to, the 1977 martial arts classic “Iron Monkey.” Cheung-Yan Yuen was choreographer on both films.
His brother, Woo-Ping Yuen is the choreographer on the Matrix films (and also worked on the Iron Moneky films).
What style of Kung-Fu do you study?
Self-Defence, huh?
I didn’t realise things with Quesada were that bad 🙁
Hey Mr. David, how long have you been studying Kung Fu and what style? I think it’s cool that you do regardless, because the martial arts have had such a strong positive influence on my life. I have studied Shotokan karate for almost 8 years now, but haven’t been able to get to a class for months because of a new early morning job (read: wake up at 2am, go to bed by 8pm). I’ve always wanted to study other styles, especially some of the Chinese arts. Yup, I’m babbling. One question I do have though, is now that you study a martial art, have you become more critical of fight scenes in movies, tv, and comics? I know I have. For my one of my senior projects in illustration, I redrew an entire fight scene from an Xmen comic because it irritated me so much.
Tacos for monkeys on the planet of fish.
The comment from gvalley sparked this thought:
The newest TV show: “Industry Celebrity Boxing”. You take two people who are celebrities in their own industry, but maybe not as well-known to the rest of the world and pit them against each other. First up: Peter David vs. Joe Quesada.
WHy all these things happen?
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