What if you could make your own FMA movie

I've seen it. Have it on tape somewhere. That's one of Roland Dantes' movies.

Been a while since I watched it. But it deals with the Spanish occupation, obviously. Stockwell plays one of the raping-and-pillaging conquistadors. And Dantes has to learn arnis from a blind master (if memory serves) and make his own ironwood sticks in order to defeat Spanish fencing.

There's also the much newer The Ultimate Fight, starring Ernie Reyes, Jr. and Sr. and Shishir Inocalla. That obviously has much taekwondo courtesy of the Reyes family. And frankly, it's a really flipping weird movie. But it's got a good amount of FMA in it.

The Hunted has already been mentioned. Worth checking out.

But in terms of what movies I'd like to see made, I agree with Crucible. Something dealing with the WW2 battalions. You'd need to find a reason for the FMA to take precedence over gunplay though. And what the hell. Make it a supernatural flick. Say the lone surviving member of one of those battalions gets seperated from his lines. He stumbles across a long abandoned village that happens to be the domain of a penangalan (excuse the spelling), a sort of vampire. Maybe the vampire creates zombies for the guy to fight. (I know it's not canon, but what the hell.) Maybe the village itself is sort of a time warp, so he's dealing with aggressors from an age when guns weren't an issue. I don't know. I'd pay to see it.

Actually, I'm thinking about writing it now.

 

http://www.defend.net/deluxeforums/showthread.php?t=13802
Check out this link to a thread we have going on at defend.net . There's actually plenty of historical precedence for boloplay taking place during WW2.

Good. Do your research and ask us if you have questions, I think all of us have a vested interest in a accurate movie being made.

 

And please, no melodrama. Something like "Saving Private Ryan" please, not "Thin Red Line". Please please please please.

And please, no stereotype Japanese. It would be interesting to see an honorable Japanese officer (could be samurai) who just has no choice but to follow orders. He should be good at his art. And he doesn't have to die. They could clash and after a convincing fight the Japanese officer will be defeated, but forward years later when they are old veterans but are now friends and reminiscing about their battles, and they watch their kids have a friendly match.

Is it okay if we get a foreign studio to do it? Would it be seen as violating the sariling atin thing?

 

Here's a bit of a different idea. Our pinoy hero emigrates to Hawaii or California and that allows an opportunity to showcase FMA against a variety of other arts and situations. Our humble guy has to deal with the whole stranger-in-a-strange-land scenario. This might even echo the experiences
of a lot of skilled fighters who have come to the states.

 

Read the " Balisong iron butterly" I think it's by Cacoy "Boy" Hernandez. Light reading and a fun read. Tells of his adventures as a merchant Marine who left the Philippines becasue he got into a knife fight and killed a guy. as a merchant marine he traveled to different ports and met different people and got into several fights. His skill in arnis was basic but good enough to defend himslef. he also met other practitoners of fighting arts who befriended him as he used his own FMA and did comparisons to their foreign arts (Hawaii, denmark , mexico....all over. HIs skill with the balisong kept him alive is drunken and boat dock fights. it really drives close to home in reality because I know several merchant marines and many of them being Filipino and it is a hard and dark life. HIstorically many of sea faring men were Filipinos even ass early as 1765 where the first Filipino fishing village was settled in Lousiana known as the Manila men whereas Filipinos where thought to have settled in the West coast of USa in 1900's. The Battle of New Orleans featuring the pirate Jean Le Fitte (Spelling?) as has been stated that many of the sailors on board where Filipinos who came here through the Galleon trades with the Spanish - Mexico trades routes and jumped ship in Louisiana.
Going back to his exploits as a merchnat marine, I do believe the Late Villabrille was also a Merchant Marine and did his fighting during those years spent in ports all over the world.

 

Or something like Enemy at the Gate. Man we have to get Jean Jacques Annand as director.

Considering what they did here in the Philippines, especially when they were about to lose Manila, I don't know if the image of the Japanese is as much stereotypical as it is historical. Their samurai code was, in large part, their motivating force in committing the atrocities. Having said that there were heroic Japanese who aided the Filipinos. There is a book, editied by Manuel Quezon III and who's title I cannot remember (for now), who recounts the story of a Japanese prison guard who the prisoners saw as stern, but who was actually a Japanese American spy. He saved the lives of many prisoners by allowing the Filpino resistance to smuggle in food and medicine.

As for being friends at the end? No way. There is way too much reconciliation in our movies. No matter what atrocities the bad guy commits in Filipino movies they always try to get them to be friends at the end.

 

My mother survived during WWII because a kindly Japanese officer gave his portion of rice to my lolo (grandfather). He always bowed to my lolo and when my Mom got sick, he brought her medicine. My lolo, by the way, was not a Japanese sympathizer and he, in fact, was guerilla sleeper. He had been slapped by other Japanese during the war, but this Japanese officer always treated him with respect. My lola (grandmother) remembers his name to be one Nakamura; she may be mistaken, since she laughs at the name as funny (Pinoys know what Nakamura is a pun of), but if she is correct, that Japanese officer we were dealing with was Samurai.

Besides, saying that it was the Samurai code that made the Japanese do the atrocities is unfair. Most of the real Samurai were at sea, or in battlefield positions. Garrison duty was seen as dishonorable, and were instead given to Japanese infantry who were not Samurai or even to Chosun troops (which is very controversial, since Chosun troops were Korean and not Japanese). Historically, after the Samurai were disenfranchised, these commoner soldiers started getting dreams of war glory but without Bushido to guide them.

And there have been instances of Japanese eventually becoming friends with the people they actually fought. For instance, the veterans of the Battle of Midway, Japanese and American, have been known to gather together and share war stories. Some of them were actually thrilled when they found out that they had been dogfighting each other (I saw this on the Discovery Channel). Why not some Pinoy escrimador and a Jap kejutsu exponent, especially if the Jap didn't think his country was right? For instance, Admiral Yamamoto, a samurai and the guy who was responsible for Pearl Harbor, didn't want to wage war in the first place; he was over-ruled by Tojo, who was not samurai. But he still did his duty to the best of his ability and personally went on combat missions on his bomber with his ancestral swords by his side.

So, pwede! It can be done.

 

I'll definitely have a wander over to defend.net later on and read up. Cheers!

 

some pics

I've not yet found a way of getting screen shots from the video to the PC, but here are a few pictures scanned from the video cover.

 

Crucible,

Finally got around to reading that thread over at Defend.net. Good stuff. I really enjoyed the stuff about Guro Leo Giron. And Kayanan. One of these days, I'll have to wander over the Arlington Cemetery (which I drive by virtually every day) and have a look.


Stuart

 

Personally, I'd really like to see a serious film based on the wartime experiences of the late GM Leo Giron, as described by him in his fascinating book, Memories Ride the Ebb of Tide (a must-have title for all FMA practitioners, IMO).

As far as movies I've actually seen, I'd have to go with Exposure, starring Peter Coyote and some hot British gal. The knife fighting sequences were choreographed by JKD man Chris Kent, and they are a blend of FMA and Western military knife fighting, as described by W.E. Fairbairn in Get Tough and John Styers in Cold Steel. Entertaining movie.

 

Excellent. That's one book and one movie I need to have a look for. Cheers.


Stuart

 

Stuart,

I assume you are Welsh?

Memories Ride the Ebb of Tide is awesome--the WWII combative experiences of one of the 20th century's great eskrima masters. It is available here:

http://www.gironarnisescrima.com/news.html

Exposure, on the other hand, may be a bit harder to track down--check the budget video/dvd bins, and Google around.

Good luck,

E

 

I'm English really. Of Welsh descent. And living on the East Coast of the US like you. I'm a mutt.

Maybe I'll have to drop some hints about Christmas gifts and see if I can score the Giron book.

Cheers.


Stuart

 

Oh Dear, you are realy messed up, I will have to send you another one of my Rubber Cheques so you can buy something to ease the pain of being Welsh.

Regards


Pat

 

Mind you, I have a Welsh Father, Scottish Mother, Irish Grand father, I have a Cockney (East London) Accent.

And you think your a mutt, that makes me a Celtic Mongrel.

Oh Dear, I need to go drown my sorrows. More beer please vicar.:cry:

 

Wait til my kid comes along. English father. Grandfather's cockney. Grandmother's not. He's of Welsh descent. She's of Norman descent. Mother's American. Of Scottish descent (great grandfather). Family's from West Virginia. And we all live a stone's throw from Washington DC.

I'll have a pint of Hobgoblin myself, while you're at it.


Stuart

 

we're making a low budget comedy horror in the new year and mixing it up with brutal fight scenes.
using practicing artists as actors, stuntmen and fight choreographers we're mixing and mashing kali, jkd, silat, brazilian ju-jitsu, panantukan and muay thai with as many weapon forms as we can possibly get in there.
the plans to make 'em laugh, then shock the pants off 'em with some decent action.
ong bak was a major inspiration in terms of dynamic action and brutality.

as fight choreography, storyboards and script evolve i'll make a point of posting stuff here.

as for in an ideal world. i'd give us a bigger budget!
as i've mentioned on other posts before-i'm itching to see an animated show showcasing FMA. they did a great job of portraying jkd in cowboy beebop. it didn't detract from the fun but martial artists dug it too. i think FMA needs the same promotion.

 

Can I play the bad guy, PLEEEEESE

 

sorry bud. that was the first one to go!
people make jokes about the villains always being english. but we all want to be the bad guy.
darth vaders fault i'm sure.

we're still attempting to hammer out technical problems on the movie front. consulting with the fight choreographer and the FX guy to come up with some realistic sustained injuries (as well as a fair few absurd ones!).
so far the weapons line up already includes single/double stick, barong, bullwhip, bandana/sarong, double knife and improv weapons. so this should be fun.
for me the locks, strips, take downs and breaks are going to be really fun from an FX point of view.
we should use the dogbrothers gallery for makeup/prosthetic reference!

i'll keep posting as and when stuff gets organised (probably next year by now) and show storyboards etc as it goes.
also, you can bet i'll be coming here for suggestions as the plot thickens!