The Streetfighter
(1974)
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The Streetfighter
(1974)
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| Credited cast: | |||
| Sonny Chiba | ... | ||
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Goichi Yamada | ... |
Rakuda Zhang
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Yutaka Nakajima | ... |
Sarai Chuayut
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Tony Cetera | ... |
Abdul Jadot
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Masafumi Suzuki | ... |
Kendo Masaoka
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Masashi Ishibashi | ... |
Tateki Shikenbaru
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Akira Shioji | ... |
Liang Dong-Yi
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Osman Yusuf | ... |
Kingstone
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| Rest of cast listed alphabetically: | |||
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Bin Amatsu | ... |
Môrôkô
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Jirô Chiba | ... |
Gijun Shikenbaru
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Tatsuo Endô | ... |
Bayan
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| Seizô Fukumoto | ... |
Mutaguchi's Thug B
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Tsutomu Harada | ... |
Wrestler
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Jun'ichi Haruta |
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Masataka Iwao | ... |
Mutaguchi's Thug A
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Terry is a tough, mercenary, master of martial arts. When an important business magnate dies, leaving billions to his daughter, the Mafia and Yakuza try to hire Terry to kidnap the daughter. When they refuse to meet his exorbitant price, then try to kill him to conceal their secret plans, he promptly offers his services to protect her. Much ultra-violent martial-arts fighting action, as expected, ensues. This also includes a subplot of a family's bloodfeud with Terry over a disputed debt. Written by Tad Dibbern <DIBBERN_D@a1.mscf.upenn.edu>
Sonny Chiba has been described by some as an anti-Bruce Lee and I agree, but to a certain extent. You see, it's not really fair considering that Lee is dead, they both hail from separate nationalities, represent different martial arts ideals (Lee founded Jeet Kune Do, Chiba was a mean karate machine), and Chiba has demonstrated he can more than hold his own against the disposable bad guys sent in his direction. Like Christian Slater's character described in "True Romance" (1993) regarding Chiba's "The Street Fighter" (1974), "he's just a bad motherf**ker, he gets paid by people to f**k guys up." Directed by Shigehiro Ozawa, Sonny Chiba's Terry Tsurugi is that lethal, that ruthless, that dirty a fighter. He's a one-man hit-squad, paid by gangsters to spring a condemned fighter from prison but when his price gets too high on his next assignment - a kidnapping - he's forced to make his hands and feet do the talking. The action in "The Street Fighter" is fairly gruesome, allowing it to become the first film to be rated "X" for violence in the United States. He pokes eyes, kicks feet, slaps around women, rips out tonsils (and other choice body parts), targets the solar plexus, and throws dudes out of top-floor windows. I loved it from start to finish, and it's easy to why it's so beloved to Quentin Tarantino.
10/10