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Sonny Chiba and his influence in Tarantino films

Page history last edited by PBworks 16 years, 1 month ago

Sonny Chiba and his Influence in Tarantino Movies

 

                          Sonny Chiba is the man!

 

Sonny Chiba: The Man, The Myth, The Legend

 

Sonny Chiba has been called a man of few words and many fists. Born Sadao Meada in Fukuoka, Japan, Sonny Chiba has become one of the most well known martial arts actors in the genre. He took his place in the martial arts boom of the 1970s, popularized by the kung fu superstar Bruce Lee, with his background in gymnastics, karate, judo, and kenpo. Since starting his acting career in the early 1960s, he has appeared in over 150 movies and most recently appeared in Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill: Volume I.”

 

A typical Chiba movie can be characterized by explosive hand to hand combat, excessive violence and gore, with plentiful deaths. The movie that catapulted Chiba to stardom was the brutal martial arts movie “Gekitotsu! Satsujin ken”, which was translated in English to “Street Fighter,” and literally means sudden attack: the killing fist. Chiba’s character in “Street Fighter” was a street thug who would sell his brand of kick-ass, unrelenting violence to the highest bidder. Upon its release, many criticized “Street Fighter” for its extremely graphic scenes of violence, although flocks of fans crowded to see the now cult classic action movie.

 

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As can be seen in the above clip, Chiba’s character in Street Fighter, Takuma Tsurugi (Terry in the English version) has no qualms with fighting and killing his enemies, either man or woman. Later in the movie, he actually sells the same woman he is fighting (see above clip) into prostitution! However, he does protect an heiress who the mob is trying to kill to get her inheritance money. The conflict between Chiba and the mob continues for the rest of “Street Fighter.”

 

Fun fact: Did you know that “Street Fighter” was the first movie to receive an X rating based solely on violence? If you’ve never seen the movie before, check this clip out and you will probably understand why.

 

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“Street Fighter” was highly successful and spawned the sequels “Return of the Street Fighter,” “Sister Street Fighter,” and “Street Fighter’s Last Revenge.” Chiba also starred in the movies “The Bodyguard,” “Dragon Princess,” “Karate for Life,” “The Executioner,” and “Killing Machine.”

 

Chiba has said that his favorite role to play is that of the bad guy, and his style of applying brute force to his foes with no remorse has characterized his film career. In his movies, only a fool would want to fight Chiba because it is inevitable that it will mean a brutal and painful death. Here is a nice montage of a few of the most popular Chiba movie scenes:

 

 

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Connection to Tarantino

 

Quentin Tarantino, the writer and director of “Pulp Fiction”, “Kill Bill” volumes one and two, “Natural Born Killers,” “From Dusk Till Dawn,” and “Reservoir Dogs,” has been an outspoken Sonny Chiba fan and considers Chiba to be one of his favorite actors. Ironically, Chiba achieved his biggest fame in the western world when Tarantino included him in “Kill Bill: Volume One.”

 

Tarantino has incorporated Chiba into several of his movies:

 

-In “Kill Bill: Volume One,” Chiba played the role of Hattori Hanzo, a master sword maker who was of great importance to Uma Thurman’s character.

 

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-In “True Romance,” which was written by Tarantino, Christian Slater is a big Sonny Chiba fan. Slater is actually watching a Sonny Chiba triple feature when he meets his future wife in the movie.

 

-In “Pulp Fiction,” Samuel L. Jackson’s often quoted passage of Ezekiel 25:17 was taken from the opening of “The Bodyguard”, when the passage scrolls across the screen.

 

The fighting scenes in Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” volumes one and two are also similar to the styles presented in Chiba’s movies. Both feature one character often fighting against a slew of enemies, with the protagonist emerging victorious from an almost effortless battle. In this scene, the change from color to black and white as well as the Japanese style martial arts music really highlight the connection that Tarantino was making to this movie genre. The use of cheesy special effects, especially the blood squirting almost like a sprinkler system, also reminds me of the special effects from the era of Sonny Chiba movies. Although swords are used in "Kill Bill" while it is mostly hand to hand combat in "Street Fighter," they both contain about the same amount of bloodshed.

 

 

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A good clip to compare this to, from "Street Fighter"

 

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For more about Sonny Chiba, check out this interview:

 

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And these sites:

http://www.henshinonline.com/chiba.html

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002002/

http://www.sonnychiba.com/

http://www.vivachiba.com/

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