According to Charlie Ahearn, 43rd Street and 8th Avenue of the 80′s had been strangled by the government for at least 20 years. Times Square was shut down because of the potential of a real estate boom in the area. Ahearn says 8th Avenue was ‘The grime crime capitol of NYC’.  The night life was rife with ‘action’. The general public were intimidated by dealers openly selling drugs, young women were being harrased by men looking for prostitutes and the general lawlessness of the area gave rise to organisations such as the Guardian Angels. Street kids from Brooklyn and the Bronx came to 8th Avenue to buy drugs, watch kungfu films and play the amusement arcades in the area, it is said it was common for kids to be robbed while playing games in the arcades. Prostitution, transvestites, drug dealers, pornography. All this, literally under Ahearn’s window. 

He was already fascinated with street culture, making the film The Deadly Art of Survival and Wildstyle. Times Square was in the midst of the Street scene, and so was Ahearn’s apartment building. He moved there in 1980 with his artist wife, Jane Dickson, while in the process of setting up his Wildstyle production office.  Ahearn usually shot on 8mm film, but the birth of his son in 1986 prompted him to buy a video camera.

 8th Avenue night life would become active between midnight to 6 am, and Ahearn wasn’t getting much sleep, he woke up night after night to film whatever was going on in the street outside;  transvetite madness, drug deals gone wrong, fist fights… LOTS OF FIST FIGHTS! As Ahearn put it - TTragedy after tragedy”‘ unfolding.

Times Square Sleaze

Ahearn’s voyeurism became a replacement for the newspaper, if he needed to know what was happening he just looked out the window. Most of the footage in Doin’ Time In Times Square was captured when a commotion out in the street below woke him up. One night, woken by loud Biz Markie music playing, he went to the window with video camera to find a group of people doing crazy dance moves in the street below. When people visited his apartment, Ahearn would show them his video recordings, the video tapes were a mixture personal family activity and drug addict fights and prostitutes on the street. This was what gave Ahearn the idea of presenting Doin’ Time In Times Square as an extended home movie.

If you’re fascinated by the madness that is the underbelly of society then Ahearn made this film for you. This twisted dark comedy of night terrors is prime time viewing for the voyeur in most of us. Hollywood has made billions feeding our hunger for street dreams by repeatedly selling us a dramatised version of what occurs outside our own windows, so wasn’t it inevitable that sooner or later we would want THE REAL THING?

"Get down before the police come!"

Nowadays the viewing of reality tv in the form of street madness is common place, internet sites such as You Tube present us with all the makeshift reality madness TV we require. The cyber voyeur that is everyday Joe Public will unleash the iPhone camera at the slightest altercation, which then can and will be uploaded to our personal channels in an instant. Welcome to the world of bum fights, Nigerian vs Ghanaian bus arguments, MC battle gone wrong, the crackhead street madness, black vs white street fight… There seems to be no art to capturing human tragedy on an iPhone, and equally nothing mentally beneficial to gain from watching the madness on your computer. But in Ahearn’s own words what he captured was “a slice of life of a time gone by“, when society paraded its damaged goods openly hand in hand, up and down Times Square for the world to see. Charlie Ahearn’s film is a documentation of  Times Square’s ongoing nightly reality tv twisted drama… tragic, funny, freaky, fascinating. He played mini big brother with his aerial view of the madness below.

Bum Fights

Woman attacks man with broom stick!

While his family slept, Ahearn filmed junkies and lowlives from the safety of his apartment above, at least it was relatively safe once he had the iron front door fitted. Filming lowlives is one thing but allowing them into your apartment is another! Fitting the iron door came after his front door was kicked off the hinges by thieves. Jane, his wife, home during the breakin screamed out “C’MON MOTHER F%^*£RS I’M READY FOR YOU!!!, which prompted the thieves to flee empty handed.

The Times Square filmed by Charlie Ahearn no longer exsists, his apartment building was torn down and replaced by a “Miami style art deco 37 storey building”. 

“Times Square has been Disneyfied”, but he does not miss it, says Ahearn “why would anyone want to reminisce on the grime and crime of Times Square?”

"Don't be Side kickin my side kick"!!

The punch knocked the guy out cold! He was robbed by at least 3 other characters where he lay

Crack head goes through the unconscious guy's pockets.

1. The Deadly Art Of Survival

“Nathan who is unaware of a contract out on his head is jumped and beaten bloody by a local street gang.Using his martial arts skills he set out to get revenge and is pitted against a group of drug dealers from a rival karate school called the Disco Dojo “ 

Charlie Ahearn has been a man in the right place at the right time and has recieved numerous accolades for just that. As if you didn’t know already, Ahearn is the celebrated director of the seminal hiphop masterpiece, Wildstyle.

Wildstyle with its semi dramatised/documentary approach perfectly captured the ghetto hiphopera unfolding in front of America’s eyes. Ahearn was smart enough to let the story unfold without a thought of dilution nor any other less than divine intervention, which as we all now know was the inevitable. Of course, Wildstyle went on to be a ground breaking worldwide success. But Wildstyle may never have been made if it wasn’t for one of Ahearn’s earlier films… The Deadly Art of Survival. 

It was the making and showing of this low budget doc/fiction No Wave classic which thrust Charlie Ahearn into the world of hiphop. On seeing The Deadly Art Of Survival Fab Five Freddy approached Ahearn… And the rest, as they say, is history. 

The Deadly Art of Survival  was originally the idea of one Nathan Ingram, ghetto soulbrother martial artist. After seeing one of the short films that Ahearn showed in Ingram’s neigbourhood, he approached Ahearn with an idea for a ghetto martial arts film starring himself and his young students. Ingram was inspired by the idea of a martial arts ghetto epic to capture young blacks imaginations (they were already hooked on martial arts movies), in order to eventually steer them clear of the drug and crime wave rife in New York city throughout the 70′s.

On a side note: 21st century Nathan Ingram still works in the community in a similar way to how he did in the 70′s, but now running a prestigous martial arts school in China town, teaching martial arts to kids of all cultures.

As with many films of this genre, The Deadly Art of Survival contained all the typical traits of low budget film making… sketchy acting, adlibbed dialog, shooting in front of a street audience, boom microphone hanging too low. Super 8 film limitations meant that a whole scene was planned out and shot in a single take. But all those quirks make films of this nature so unique… they literally cannot be reproduced or re-enacted ! 

The Deadly Art Of Survival was shot between ’77 and ’78, and was filmed mainly on weekends because some of the actors were school kids from Ingram’s neigbourhood. Other cast members included  Charlie Ahearn’s artist friends such as downtown ‘No Wave’ 8 mm film producer Beth B, the choreographer and dancer Yashiko Chuma, and the artist Kiki Smith. Nathan Ingram’ s family and their real life church scenes also featured in the film. The church in question, situated on 14th St, was run byIngram’s father and mother, scenes feature Ingram’s father playing the church organ, and his mother praying in an intense fashion, while cousins and other family members appear in the congregation.

A prehiphop NYC street scenery can be seen through the lens of Ahearn’s Super 8 camera, at this point in time Bruce Lee and Martial arts were the attraction for young black men in the projects. Martial arts was practiced by many who were inspired by kung fu films. Early breakdance movements of the 70′s were also inspired by martial arts movies, it was literally a no brainer to make a martial arts inspired movie.

Ahearn estimated that the film, shot entirely on super 8 film, cost $2000, which covered the cost of buying pizzas over the two year period to feed the kids involved and give them incentive to take part.

Lee Quinones' freshly painted Howard the Duck mural 1977

 Graffitti artist Lee Quinones’ artwork was featured in film, and a few years later Quinones’ became Ahearn’s star in Wildstyle. His freshly painted Howard the Duck mural was featured in the  The Deadly Art Of Survival’s opening scene. He also painted a graffiti mural of a train on the wall of Handsome Harrys Disco Dojo. The Disco Dojo was a fictitious karate school run by the ruthless Handsome Harry, played by George Gonzalez, a fellow martial artist friend of Ingram. But the dojo was just a cover for Harry’s drug dealing operation. In one ridiculous scene, the unscrupulous Handsome Harry is seen blowing weed smoke in his young karate students faces in an attempt to hook them on Marijiuana and rob them of their pocket change. The character of Handsome Harry is a spoof comic view of ghetto karate dojo’s of the time, conning young kids into paying for a service they were meant to get for free. Nathan Ingram’s whole philosohy was to present these kind of services for no charge.

The Deadly Art Of Survival is named after the school that Ingram established in 74′, he never charged his students a fee because he saw martial arts as a way to build his ghetto students sense of self and promote a better way of life other than drugs and crime. All the martial artists in the film were students of Ingram, including the ‘ninja’ who were an integral part on the plot. The fight scenes were also choreographed by Ingram.

With hindsight, Ahearn feels he would have thought twice about some of the dangerous stunts he allowed to happen during the making of The Deadly Art Of Survival. During the last fight scene, when Handsome Harry meets his end at the hands of Ingram, George Gonzales fell backward into the river, nowadays this could never be done today without a stunt double. Charlie also talked his twin brother, John Ahearn, into a dangerous climb up to the top of a bridge to get an aerial shot “thats how things were done in those days” he explained. 

The following dialog is from a scene in The Deadly Art Of Survival. It is a conversation between Sly Abrahams and Steve Rikenbaker (some friends that Ingram had drafted into the movie). One of them had recently been to a  Parliament Funkadelic show, so they adlibbed a conversation about the show. They discuss their preference to Bootsy Collins performance over Funkadelic, they also spoke about the girls who were at the show…This piece of dialog is an insight into the current music trends of circa 77′, 78′  that young blacks were getting into. It also shows that hiphop attitude was a natural instinct of ghetto kids of  NYC.

This next piece of audio is from a scene where the ninja’s were playing with Nathan’s mind, it is an early example of hiphop NYC.

Howard Ingram in the opening scene

The Disco Dojo sign

black-belt-jones-madness sos v black belt jones
the black six million dollar man

70′s blaxploitation icon Jim Kelly teams up with Tan Tao Liang (flash legs) and Bolo from Enter The Dragon for this 1978 non blockbusting bargain bin vhs fodder.
If you’re prepared to dig you’ll find this at decent carboot sales from between £1.50 and £2.00.
and you won’t be dissapointed.but be warned…you will never get that hour and a half back…ever!
C.I.A agent Mr Lucas is sent to Hong Kong to recover the north pole star diamond from a ruthless gang led by the evil Mr Liu,and gets to beat up some thugs along the way.
This obscure movie enters the Holy Roller 2nd rate badass hall of fame automatically.
International karate champion Jim Kelly co star of Enter The Dragon,travels to Hong Kong to star in a movie that fails to capitalize on the Black Belt Jones character.
Black belt Jones II or The Tattoo connection as it was originally called is not in the same badass realm as the likes of Shaft and Superfly.
Kelly’s screen presence fails to have any significant impact in this movie.
This could be due to the ultra bad direction.In simple terms that this is NOT a Black Belt Jones movie.
The Black Belt Jones character lacks the humour,screen presence and all round badassness that badass cinema fans expect from Kelly.A combination poor overdubbing and even poorer direction removes any resembelance to the origial character.

In fact,the Black Belt Jones character is hardly part of the script ,and doesnt appear in the movie’s 1st quarter of an hour,which is a shame since this movie trys to sell off the back of Kellys Black Belt Jones success.

The director actually scripts the leading role around Tan Tao Liang.Flash legs Tan Tao Iiang upstages Kelly in every area… storyline,fight scenes,dialog,appearance,and acting in general.this is because in this edition of black belt jones/the tattoo connection, Kellys best fight scenes are edited out ,rendering him pedestrian compared to the dangerous Tai kwon do kicking skills of  Tan Tao Liang.

Black Belt Jones or ‘Mr Lucas’ only substantial onenliner is ‘Ive been known to be called the black six million dollar man‘ but the badly overdubbed voice is clearly not Kelly’s.
Black Belt Jones II could easily be mistaken for a film made 4 years previous to Black Belt I,and seems to be filmed on very old film stock making  it resemble Bruce Lee’s The Big Boss or Fist Of Fury in film quality,but that’s a plus in the Shottsman book.
This film is sub standard but badass gem non the less,essential for dialog sample diggers producers.and b rated flick fiends alike.
Tan Tao Liangs tai kwan do skills and Jim Kelly’s soul brother karate kickassness make this movie a decent allbeit lowgrade sequel to Black Belt Jones 1.
The soundtrack is poor and throwaway ,lacking in decent audiable quality and is also badly edited.

This is another example of career ending ‘b’rated 70′s history …WATCH AT YOUR OWN PERIL!!!

written by Shottsmann

anti-ching-rebel

Anti Ching Rebel the mp3 movie

kung-fu-films-1

Snake in late nights shadow

A brief journey back to spotlight the forgotten era of Late Night kung Fu Cinema.

The martial arts choreography in a typical modern day Hollywood action movie can seem generic in nature to the trained eye,American film directors have wasted no time in an attempt to repackage martial arts into instant kung fu noodles.

Chinese Blockbusters like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon,Moon Warriors, Barefoot Kid and Once upon a time in China,are upstaging Hollywood. Hollywood, not to be upstaged have bought in.

The rise in popularity of a new era in Asian cinema have made international Superstars out of Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh.

There  now are many pretenders to the martial arts throne.Ong Bak star Tony Jaa, is re-igniting hardcore fans love of original fast moving martial arts action for the 21st century. Transporter and Crank action man Jason Statham is Hollywoods latest psudeu kung fu king for hire.

Hollywood’s fascination with kung fu took it to center stage in the high octane action movie The Matrix.Keano Reeves and co star Lawrence Fishburne were crash coursed in Wu Shu (a popular Chinese performing art) by Woo Ping Yeun,world renowned actor.kung fu choreographer and director.His movies have gone down in the kung fu hall of fame…One Armed Swordsman, Drunken Tai Chi,Drunken Master, IronMonkey, Broken Oath, Tai Chi master, Wing Chun. Born Invincible, Snuff Bottle Connection,The Invinclible Armour, Once Upon A Time In China, and Jet Li’s Fearless,all involved Woo Ping Yuen.

Woo Ping applied His kung fu expertise to Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill.Tarantino took an unashamed massive bite out of kung fu classic Fist of the White Lotus,Tarantino appeased true Kung Fu movie fans by casting White Lotus Star and Kung Fu legend Gorden Liu (Santa),as the White Lotus Priest.

Gordon Liu ‘the priest Santay’

In the 80′s Hollywood Put the power of martial arts action in the hands of Steven Seagal and Jean Claude Vandamme.

Martial arts screen giants, Liu Chai Liang , Gordon Liu,Casanova Wong, Fu Sheng, Yuen Biao, Hwang Jang Lee,Frankie Chan, and Leung Kar Yan waited in the wings for their time of worldwide recognition to come.

Only a few gained Hollywood superstardom, Jackie Chan became a one man film industry, as actor, director, and stuntman Chan occupied martial arts number one spot in many fans eyes. Other fans lost interest as Chan became more diluted and mainstream orientated.

Samo Hung, star and director of over 130 movies had some Hollywood success in the 90′s with CBS tv series Martial Law, which ran for 44 episodes over two seasons.

We would have to do some research,to discover a time when names like Gordon Liu and Casanova Wong were achieving cult status to the first generation of kung fu movie fans in the U.K. It’s Impossible to start unless we go back to the very beginning. Back in the 70′s a young British kid’s 1st taste of ‘Kung fu’ would have come from 3 sources:
1.David Carradine
2.The Water Margin
3.Monkey
The generation we refer to were too young to have witnessed Bruce Lee ‘s first screen appearance in the American tv series The Green Hornet, for the time being fans settled for lesser hero’s.

David Carradine fueled youngster’s initial interest in Martial arts with his part in the epic tv western series Kung Fu. Kung Fu was based on the tale of half Chinese runaway monk Cain and his misadventures in America.

Chinese and American bounty killers spelled trouble for Cain and trouble spelled KUNG FU FIGHTS!

“Kung fu is the ancient oriental art of self defence, if practiced by the untrained it could be dangerous Was the warning, Obviously the warning fell on deaf ears.

The swordplay of Lin Chun and Hu san-niang in the Japanese TV series The Water Margin inspired kids once again.

The ABC in Brixton ,which later became the Ace home of Late Night.

Masaaki Sakai the star of another Japanese tv series Monkey had children fascinated with his monkey magic and his comical pole fighting. Equally as fascinating was the overdubbed voices of Monkey Pigsy  and Sandy. These historic TV moments are the prequel to the genre known only to inside fans as LATE NIGHT.

30 years ago there was a buzz in school playgrounds amongst young black kids, their older brothers were already going to late night kung fu cinemas. Hearing about films  like Kung Fu vs Yoga, seemed too incredible to be for real. Kung fu films were not yet  available on VHS format.

One of the very first films on VHS was Sun Dragon, this legendary movie starred Billy Chong, a star of many late night classic’s. Sun Dragon also featured black kung fu actor Carl Scott, a hero to black kids well before the arrival of Billy Blanks (China O’brien) and his Taebo workouts.

To a lot of late night regulars, Bruce Lee was not just a legend  of the movie screen.Even though Lee was somewhat of a mainstream phenomenon, he was the pioneer of the martial arts Genre. His international success with films like Fist Of Fury ,The Big Boss,Way Of The Dragon, and Enter The Dragon increasd fans hunger for martial arts movies, and fuelled the surge of kung fu films flooding out of Hong Kong and China.

Before Bruce Lee things were pretty luke warm in the form of Warner Brothers ‘b’ rated karate mishaps, after Bruce Lee an unstoppable movement exploded! It is also widely recognised that Lee deserves credit for originating idea of the tv series Kung Fu, which was eventually starred by the late David Carradine.

There was a new breed of kung fu movie on the horizon, based on raw incredible action, taken much further than even Bruce Lee could have imagined, this kind of action had never seen before on screen, anywhere in the world. Films like Warriors Two, 18 Fatal Strikes, Rebellious Reign, Magnificent Butcher,  and Odd Couple represented this new era.

The new Late night audience swapped Bruce Lee for Beardy, Jackie Chan,and Sammo Hung,now the talk was Flash Legs, Silver Fox, Santa and SAM SEED THE DRUNKEN MASTER!

Odean Shepards Bush 1983 Home of Late Night.

Friday nights at The Odean Cinema on Shepards Bush was usually packed by 11.15pm,the young fans(mainly West Indian)waiting in anticipation for a double helping of kung fu film action.These were brand new films that you could not see anywhere else apart from late night film clubs, the cream of these films would not appear on video cassettes until 10 years later.

The Odean Shepards Bush, Odean Cinema Streatham,Ace Cinema Brixton Coronet Cinema Elephant and Castle, STUDIO 6&7 Cinema Lewisham,were some of the places that showed these legendary films, Shaolin Plot,Mad Monkey KungFu, Dreadnaught, 8 diagram pole 36th Chamber, Iron Bridge Kung Fu,Knockabout, Born Invincible, 18 Bronze men, Snake In The Monkeys Shadow, Iron Monkey , Invincible Iron Armour…this incredible list  goes on and on

The coronet as it is today…once home of LateNight.

Those who couldn’t keep up with the pace and fell asleep during film two were always woken up to shouts and cheers to an epic last fight scene.

It was when Golden Harvest’s PRODIGAL SON graced the screen the full impact of what was being shown really hit home. This was the pinnacle of kung fu motion picture artistery, the like’s of which had never been seen before.The virtuoso acting and martial arts genius of the late Chin-Ying Lam, the ferociousness of Frankie Chan, the all round  brilliant acting and acrobatic kung fu skills of Yuen Biao as Leung Chang the street brawler. These amazing combination of actors, along with the direction acting and choreographical skills of the legendary Samo Hung make this film number one all time late night classic second to none.

Leung Yee Tai and Leung Chang the street brawler

Odean Stretham home of Late Night

3:30 AM and the cinema would quickly empty, young people buzzing and talking about  what they’ve just seen as they poured out into the streets of Sheperds Bush Roundabout, sure enough as regular as clockwork the same guys perform early morning reenactments of the shaking eagle, sleeping fist, drunken mantis,and snake fist as the nights final curtain call, then its kebabs then night busses or the long walk home.

Of course all good things must come to an end and by 1987 these nights had their time and were over.

A retrospective view of Late night cinema happened briefly during the 90′s bringing kung fu to the hiphop generation schooled on Wu Tang Clan, but the golden era was well and truly over.

The posters featured have been kindly donated by Sifu Jack Kontou master of the Wing Chun style of kung fu and student of 30 years.He is also an avid kung fu film collector,and was a regular member of late night film clubs at the Coronet Cinema Elephant and Castle and the Odeon Shepards Bush in the 80′s.Most of the posters here represent the showing the cult movies for the very first time in the UK.Real cult history worth sharing.These seminal nights remain in the minds of many as PRICELESS!

written by Shottsmann

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s.o.s vs cleopatra . the casino of gold edit

She’s 6 feet 2 inches of pure dynamite! When there’s trouble that the hood can’t handle,This mama will explode in a burst of blaxploitation B movie Badassness!

The late Tamara Dobson enjoyed a very brief movie career,starting in 1972 and ending in 1975 on a not so high note with the movie Cleopatra Jones And The Casino Of Gold.

This is an unconvincing attempt at a sequal to the the first Cleopatra Jones Movie,where our heroine, U.S agent jones enter deep Hong Kong waters for another hot kung fu mama adventure.
With Chinese female side kick Mi Ling Fong. they come to the gun blazing  karate kicking knife throwing rescue of her two fellow Soul brother’s,agents Mattew and Melvin Johnson.

The Hong Kong U.S connection Join forces to topple ‘sister big’,The ruthless’ Dragon Lady‘ played by Stella Stevens and bring her seedy drug organization crashing down in a high octane explosive blaze.

Here is another Warner Brothers production cashing in on the blaxploitation era of the early to mid 70′s.

Believe it or not,films like this actually saved Hollywood in it’s dark years.
Jive talkin soul brother nonsense, meets chinese kung fu,with automatic weapons and high explosives was what the doctor ordered in the black b movie era
These were the days when a low budget movie of the blaxploitation genre could cost a few 100 000.U.S to make, and gross 2 million dollars upwards at the badass box office.

Meanwhile back to the golden casino set…

Chinese kung fu film giant Run Run Shaw partnering with Warner brothers attempts to heat up the action. We struggle through particularly bad fight scene choreography with even worse camera angles. The Stunt doubles standing in for female fighter’s scenes are clearly men dressed as women.

‘Unfriendly fire’ as gun wielding Cleopatra Jones kill no less than 30 chinese thugs in one sitting with  weapon’s that never seem to need reloading,how many more chinese guys gonna fall from the damn balcony for us to get the point that Cleopatra Jones is whuupin ass!!

In alot of the outdoor location scenes there’s that typical low budget ‘let’s film in really bad locations were the general public get into the shot looking confused and bewildered, baffled by what’s going on,totally ruining the authenticity of the scene’.

In fact its difficult to tell if the people jumping out the path of speeding vehicles in backstreet chase scenes are stunt people,or in fact regular people ‘jumping out the way of speeding vehicles’.

Wardrobe and make up is pretty shocking as to be expected in’ b’ movie hell,the stunning Dodson appears in no fewer that six really appalling costume changes,the clownish looking make up daubed on Miss Dobsons Face cheapens and ultimately rubbishes the look of Cleopatra Jones

Scriptwise, Cleopatra Jones one liners do not end up in the book of classic blaxploitation quotables.
Although Dobson does have acting ability and screen presence, She always seems to come off second best in comparison with blaxploitation queen the fantastic Pam Greer.

Warner brothers have a whole catalog of this type of low budget movie, which in a strange twist makes them very collectable for obscure film buffs and bad badass cinema lovers.

In fairness,this movie definately should be viewed in the same way any Blaxsploitation B movie should be viewed, with that being said this film automatically is nominated for an award the category of ‘The best of the badass bad’.

If there is one thing that saves this movie,it is the soundtrack.Choppy wha wha guitars and drum breaks meets orchestral super tension
There are doubts that an album release project was in the Warner budget,so for your listening pleasure Son of Scientist has edited some of the funkiest moments together,

As for our heroine Tamara Dobson…if it’s any consolation…well this film would have ended the careers of many a promising actress.

written by Shottsmann