The American Martial Arts Film (review)

Capitalist Agenda

M. Ray Lott's The American Martial Arts Film is an attempt at academically establishing a new genre in what has become an already saturated collegiate industrial complex filled with scholarship geared towards text classification. This attempt, although somewhat viable even when consistently rehashed, becomes problematic only due to Lott's erroneous claim that his project "examines English language martial arts films in terms of both their historical development and their critical relevance" (1). Instead Lott, even when concise and seemingly knowledgeable in the creation of a proper generic framework, summarizes and simply states rather than critiques the American martial arts film, leaving the reader with less than a feeling of completion and satisfaction.

David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, although claiming that "[m]ost scholars now agree that no genre can be defined in a single hard and fast way" (52), define genre in their glossary of film terms as "[v]arious types of films which audiences and filmmakers recognize by their familiar narrative conventions" (479). This way of thinking, that genre is based in narrative convention, stems from, what Dudley Andrew recognizes as, formalist philosophic thought (107). But, Andrew extends the definition to "specific networks of formulas which deliver a certified product to the waiting customer" (110). Andrew acknowledges that there is a capitalist agenda associated with the production of genre pictures; an acknowledgement that is alluded to throughout Lott's text as well. However, Lott, rather than critiquing this point, which he suggests he will do, seems to pay homage to the capitalist agenda promoted by English speaking/American martial arts cinema, thus going against his proposed thesis.

Lott does make occasional astute observations, especially in his chapter on the 1980's, making the claim that mainstream cinema, and martial arts films in particular, have a "conservative tilt" (73) conducive to the Presidency of Ronald Reagan. Lott also makes brief mention of the violent and misogynistic imagery that coincides with American martial arts cinema. While analyzing and summarizing Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon, for example, Lott calls the film "a reactionary knee jerk to feminism" (13), a claim that certainly warrants further observation. Lott, however, does not elaborate and continues on to another fascinating, yet truncated point of interest. Lott states that Enter the Dragon "played upon two prevalent attitudes of the time: a growing distrust of authority and a concomitant fear that crime was overwhelming said authority and menacing the public" (13). In an apparent cultural contradiction, Lott later mentions that enrollment at karate studios in America went up with the advent of American martial arts films, especially the enrollment of children.

Where films like Enter the Dragon were going against American authority figures, parents instead were taking their children to karate studios so they could become more disciplined and follow authority; in other words, there is a complete miscommunication between the film and the audience that needs addressing. With this miscommunication comes the idea that the American martial arts cinema may, in fact, not be a genre since one aspect of genre (if one were to define it) is that there are narrative motifs and conventions that are recognized and understood by knowing audience members. Apparently, adult audience members of the American martial arts film did not recognize the film-makers' intentions.

There is no doubt that The American Martial Arts Film is an excellent reference book for anyone interested in action motion pictures. Lott presents an extensive list of A- and B-films while also providing adequate summaries for each title throughout the text. As a detailed academic study, he gives the reader much to think about.