Assault of the Final Rival (1978)

ridiculous rating

Memorable, crazy movie

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

I,I I, I I, watched a movie, you can get it from any pound shop. Yes, you can get it from any pound shop.Oh, I, I I, I I, bored of story, It was written by Godfrey Ho, oh, It was written by Godfrey Ho, I told you so, becauseAll I ever want is Kung Fu, And anything that Kung Fu can offer you, because:I, I I, I I, was pured bored man. There was too much drama and acting yar, oh, there was too much drama and acting, yar,I, I I, I I, was astonished. The last fight was filmed in slow motion, yeah, the last fight was filmed in slow motion, I told you so because All I ever want is Kung Fu, And anything that Kung Fu can offer you, (crappy storyline solo)

I thought ASSAULT OF THE FINAL RIVAL came up well below par as a kung fu film and is notable only for featuring a storyline borrowed from the Biblical tale of Samson and Delilah. The hero, as played by Don Wong, is a man who uses his lengthy locks to battle his opponents, that is until a sneaky bad guy compels Wong's girlfriend to give him a haircut in his sleep.What follows is a near hour of non-action and instead plenty of melodrama. The tears flow freely, a pregnancy and birth follow, and Wong barely appears on the screen. It tests the patience quite considerably and martial arts fans will undoubtedly be twiddling their thumbs and waiting for something - anything - to happen.There are a few elements of interest including a fighter with one of those massive straw hats like in the Lone Wolf & Cub films but for the most part this is a real bore. Wong seems to have been doubled for some of his fights which is a further disappointment, but the battles are so poorly conceived that it doesn't really matter. ASSAULT OF THE FINAL RIVAL is a boring film from beginning to end.

I selected this movie to watch on the strength of Don Wong as the star and I also recognize Lung Fei as a substantial martial arts star of the golden age from 1967-1984. The copy I obtained was a digital file in almost widescreen format but it still had the edges cropped yet was wider than the usual Ocean Shores VHS copies The picture was above VHS quality and watchable on a modern high definition television without causing eyestrain or motion sickness. It was English dubbed and I did not recognize any of the voice actors. This was probably because they sounded like Saturday morning cartoons were their usual line of work. The opening scene was the overdone "Who are these two guys, why are they fighting, and why should I care?" The dialog did little to clarify which guy I should be cheering for, but – Don Wong you know? Despite the poor opening fight I continued to watch. After hearing the line "His hair can create great hurricanes" I kept watching only because the remote control was out of reach and my beer was full. The characters continued to explain Don Wong's character's entire life story and all their plans so I did not need to watch just listen to the exposition. This gave my eyes a rest. The girl cuts off a hank of Don's hair and he really did need a trim. Despite looking a lot better the haircut drained all his power yet having hair myself I know it grows back so just take a rest already and problem will be solved. Don immediately gets into a fight and defeats all the opponents with punches and kicks, no hurricane needed. Next he fights the Killer Twins and is forced to flee but one of the twins had white eyebrows and everyone knows the white eyebrows villain is only defeated in the final fight. Don is rescued by a girl. There is more dialog explaining his back story and that his hair takes seven years to grow back. After giving birth alone the girlfriend wants to be a nun but Don's hypercritical "friend" tortures her (and the viewer) with a long lecture. Overall I felt the dialog ruined this movie for me. It was total cornball unbelievable overly dramatic. I suspect this could be simply because it was dubbed and not subtitled. Years from now when I totally forget about the movie I will try to watch it again in a subtitled version to test that hypothesis. I can't rate it any higher than below average now.

ASSAULT OF FINAL RIVAL (1978) is a low-budget Taiwan-made kung fu film that offers a highly dramatic middle section that elevates it above most run-of-the-mill kung fu films of the era. The fact that the film goes for almost an hour without a fight scene would be fatal to most such films, but the relationships among the main characters here are so compelling that our attention never wavers.The plot is a rather formulaic affair in which a kung fu champ has made powerful enemies who seek to neutralize him, apparently purely out of jealousy. The main character, Chen Wai (Wong Tao), incurs the wrath of a powerful lord (Lung Fei) who uses Chen's girlfriend Ah Ming (Eva Lin) to get at him. Paralleling the Samson-and-Delilah story, the villain uses threats of murder to force the girl to cut Chen's long hair, including one long lethal braid that constitutes his most powerful weapon. Chen runs away, weakened, to hide out at a temple to renew his strength and regrow his hair. Ah Ming gives birth to Chen's baby and then leaves the boy with Chen's friend, Par Kin, to take to Chen. Deeply ashamed of having betrayed Chen, Ah Ming becomes a Buddhist nun and joins a monastery.Meanwhile, Chen raises his son and regains his strength, thanks in part to the efforts of Moon (Susan Tsang), a young widow who saved his life earlier in the film and to whom he returns for help in raising the boy. Eventually Chen has to defend himself from his former enemies after they track him down. There aren't that many fights, and only a few feature the star, Wong Tao. In one of these fights--in which he confronts Lung Fei--Wong is inexplicably doubled by another performer for the entire fight. Still, when Wong is seen in full fighting mode, he's always exciting to watch.Wong was a superb kung fu star and is seen to better effect in such films as SECRET RIVALS, DEATH DUEL OF KUNG FU, FATAL NEEDLES FATAL FISTS, and CHALLENGE OF DEATH. He is quite good here, but mainly because he gets to emote a lot. He plays an interesting and complex character who is forced to confront the meaning and value of his skills as a fighter. But the real draw of this film is actress Eva Lin in the role of Ah Ming. She is seen in the act of childbirth, surely a rare sight in a kung fu film, and is plunged into deep anguish over the fate of the baby before she decides to give the infant to his father and go off to become a nun. Her scenes are sad and poignant and shot with such an air of austere, melancholic beauty that they seem to have been designed for a completely different movie and then dropped in the middle of this otherwise routine kung fu movie. There is one scene where the hero's best friend goes to call on Ah Ming at the monastery (all shot on location) that has such an emotional impact that it sustains the rest of the film, even though the subsequent scenes are not quite as compelling.It helps that the film's moving middle section is scored with some very appropriate music cues and not the usual rip-offs of James Bond and Italian western themes that normally punctuate these films. In fact, the music is quite unlike the usual kung fu soundtrack. It doesn't sound like an original score (every scene boasts a completely different music cue) but it doesn't sound at all familiar, indicating that the cues probably came from a music library untouched by other producers of these films.ASSAULT OF FINAL RIVAL is not the best kung fu movie ever made and the English dubbing is wildly uneven, with the actresses doing superb jobs while the villains sound awfully cartoonish. But it's got some great scenes, a handful of worthy fights, and better than average photography and is well worth a look.