When this book hit the shelves in 1985, there had never been anything like it. Critics looked down their noses at martial arts movies, and even TV Guide refused to rate the films that ran every Sunday afternoon on the USA Network's Kung Fu Theatre...as if they weren't films at all, but uncategorizable entities that fell somewhere between pro wrestling and sitcoms on the cinematic value scale. Today, of course, numerous books have been written about martial arts movies, and they enjoy critical as well as popular acclaim all over the world. But Richard Meyers's book was the first to say: Yes, we take these films seriously. If you've got a problem with that, go to hell.

Meyers and his co-authors--Amy Harlib and Bill & Karen Palmer--are fans, but they're also good writers. You won't find a single line of terse urban sociolect here: these folks write eloquently and at length about the films they love, treating Chinese and Japanese action cinema as a subject of legitimate study. And, while I don't always see eye to eye with them (the authors have a clear affinity for the low-budget comedic kung fu flicks of the late '70s and early '80s, while I prefer the so-called "bashers" of the early '70s), I'm in total agreement with Meyers when he writes, "Why the martial arts movie? Because it can be beautiful, extreme, emotional, soaring, and freeing for an audience. That is what it is all about. Exhilaration."

Essential reading for fans, and it might even win over a few skeptics with its intelligent, scholarly approach. Fabulously illustrated, too: not just with the standard Bruce Lee pics you've seen a hundred times, but dozens of photos of Japanese samurai films and obscure (at the time) productions from Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers Studio.

Here's the top ten list compiled by the authors:
Fist of Fury (aka The Chinese Connection)
Enter the Dragon
Drunken Master
Project A
The Shaolin Temple
Legendary Weapons of China
Baby Cart in the Land of Demons
The Human Tarantula (aka In the Spider's Lair)
Zatoichi's Cane Sword
The Seven Samurai ( )