Shaolin Kids got released in America as Shaolin Death Squads
SHAOLIN KIDS (88 min; 1975)
Written, Produced, and Directed by: Joseph Kuo
Starring: Polly Shang-kuan, Tien Ping, Carter Huang
Streaming Online!
In the early Ming Dynasty, the first Emperor Zhu believed his Chancellor, Wu Wei-yung, wanted to take over the throne. In retaliation, he had Wu, his family, and 30,000 of his nearest and dearest murdered. Despite this, history generally remembers Emperor Zhu fondly as a kind and effective leader. Wu, on the other hand, is remembered as a dirty traitor and Shaolin Kids (aka Shaolin Death Squads) is the largely fictitious tale of the brave heroes and tragic martyrs who worked to bring his treachery to the attention of kindly old Emperor Zhu.
Only World of the Drunken Master boasts the kind of budgets Kuo has in Shaolin Kung Fu, and this posh period exercise allows him to return to the world of wu xia swordplay, this time putting a woman in the driver’s seat. Polly Shang-kuan (18 Bronzemen, Return of 18 Bronzemen), was discovered by King Hu when he cast her in his groundbreaking Dragon Inn, and here she plays the daughter of a court official murdered by Chancellor Wu in step one of his attempt to stage a coup, and she takes it on herself to round up a bunch of friends to form a ragtag band of freedom fighters, except they’re actually fighting to preserve the power of the emperor, so they’re more like non-freedom fighters, but they’re still ragtag and that counts. Their mission: stop the coup!
The fights are frequent and so many characters come flying off the screen that you need a scorecard to keep track, and even that might not help, but the essential core of this story with its underdogs racing against overwhelming odds to save the day is eternal, and along the way you’ll learn the unbeatable Heaven Matches Ground stance. Go, Kuo!
