MOVIE REVIEW : ‘WARRIOR’: 13 MARTIAL ARTS MASTERS

“The Warrior Within” (at Fox International) is a decidedly academic survey of the various martial arts, focusing on some of their key practitioners, including--very briefly--Chuck Norris.

This 1976 documentary, apparently never previously released, will have to draw upon the already converted, for it’s too dull to pull the rest of us into its special world of those who have brought a spiritual discipline to the mastery of their bodies. (Tonight’s opening will have the benefit of an hourlong live demonstration featuring 10 martial artists, preceding the 7:30 film.)

In action, the 13 masters highlighted in “The Warrior Within” are terrific, displaying that wizardly balletic grace that seems to characterize all martial artists, whether they are kendo experts wielding samurai swords or jiujitsu champions whose supple bodies are their only instrument. But in conversation they all tend to be repetitive in stressing the spiritual aspects of their respective disciplines; it might have been interesting to know more about how they became involved in a way of life that they say is as rewarding as it is demanding.

Rabbi Alex Sternberg--who happens to be a fourth-degree black belt in Shotokan karate--remarks that “If you teach karate without philosophy, it’s simply street fighting.” “The Warrior Within” leaves you with the feeling that the martial arts have much to offer anyone with the discipline and determination to pursue them and that they’re especially valuable for the minority youths that they so clearly attract.

Director Burt Rashby and writer-researcher Karen Lase Golightly, however, don’t examine the appeal of the martial arts to minority males, for whom they can offer both practical self-defense techniques and invaluable self-esteem. Rashby and Golightly understandably want to make a distinction between the martial arts and the kung fu exploitation pictures that popularized them--but without assessing why the kung fu epics, particularly those with the late Bruce Lee, were so phenomenally popular.

With poor sound and poor photography, “The Warrior Within” (Times-rated Family) is unfortunately as plodding as it is undeniably informative for those interested in the distinctions between the various martial arts schools. There’s surely a livelier and more entertaining film to be made on the subject.

‘THE WARRIOR WITHIN’

An International Home Cinema release. Executive producer Manuel Ortiz Braschi. Producer Robert Plone. Director Burt Rashby. Writer-researcher Karen Lase Golightly. Camera Lowell McFarland. Music Jack Smalley. Art director Don Gilman. Film editor Arthur Ginsburg. With Ron Taganashi, Master Chan Pui, Rabbi Alex Sternberg, Master Moses Powell, Hui Cambrelen, Chaka Zulu, Tomojo Ebihara, Fumio Demura, Mike Stone, Chuck Norris, Dan Inosanto, Master Florendo Visitasion, Master Wai Hong, Master Shum Leung.

Running time: 1 hour, 19 minutes.

Times-rated: Family.