Why have you never heard of Filipino Martial arts? A look at FMA in popular culture Part 2

This is part 2/2 please view part 1 first!

Riddick

The 2000s marked a turn in the world media that began to showcase Filipino Martial Arts to a wider audience, consequently it was also the time in which many martial arts schools began to adopt Filipino Martial Arts into their curriculum and Discovery channel went on its “Fight Quest” while History channel decided to create a “Human weapon” both showing styles of FMA.  In 2002 “Equilibrium” was released and in the commentary it was revealed that Escrima techniques were the inspiration for the fight scene between John Preston and Brandt despite a samurai sword being used to decapitate Brandt. Another 2002 film that depicted FMA was “Ballistic” which showed Lucy Lui using Arnis sticks to fend off her attackers. In the 2003 movie “The hunted” Tommy Lee Jones uses FMA in a cool knife fight scene choreographed by Rafeal Kayanan from Sayoc Kali.

Bourne Block clear strike!

FMA was sweeping Hollywood like a fire because of its brutality, simplicity and effectiveness, even Vin Diesel had to use it in “Chronicles of Riddick” in 2004 which was Cheorographed by  Kali de Leon fighter Paul Rapovski. Females do not worry! In the 2004 “Resident Evil:Apocoypse” movie a scene where the main character used expendable batons to dispose of her enemies and was choreographed by Ron Balicki whose wife is none other than Diana Lee Inosanto. In 2006 even Scientology nut, Tom Cruise used FMA in “Mission impossible”. Now let us not also forget “the Bourne” trilogy one of the greatest series to showcase FMA from 2002-2007. Matt Damon spent countless hours practising FMA choreography taught to him by Jeff Imada, just to keep the film realistic. Interestingly it is because of this efficiency and simplicity that people discount these moves as not originating from FMA because to the public eye this is just hardcore fighting and not a martial art.

300 "This is FMA!!!"

FMA was becoming that popular that even James Bond had to get a piece of the action with Daniel Craig using FMA to subdue a knife welding assassin in “Quantum of Solace” in 2008.  The craze even swept into the territory of the ninja, with “Ninja assassin” being choreographed using Kali in 2009. It was that hot that even half-filipino Rob Schnieder used FMA in his first self directed movie “Big Stan” in 2008. The warrior art was even picked up by good old Sparta in the epic 2007 movie “300”  which was choreographed by one of Dan Inosanto’s senior students Damien Caro, now imagine if the dude yelled “This is FMA!” when he front kicked the fool.

In 2010 three of the most graphic movies to ever show case FMA were released, the first was a satirical look at comic books and showed gore to the max titled “Kick Ass” showed Hit Girl using Balisong to dispose of her enemies. The next was the Bible loving, Christian beat em up movie “The book of Eli” which showed Denzel Washington used the Bolo to carve up some evil ass while he stayed on the path God gave him; again this film was choreographed by Jeff Imada and Dan Inosanto showcasing moves from the lesser known Kalis based FMAs. Finally one of the most direct straight to the point (get it POINT as in blade tip? no pun intended) movies of all time to show case FMA was “Repo Men” which depicted some of the most realistic, killing based FMA seen on film, once again choreographed by the infamous Jeff Imada.

Repo Men

Now in 2011 we look forward to premier of the much anticipated “Bladed hand” documentary filmed and produced by Jay Ignacio and Sonny Sosin. This documentary is said to look at the global impact of FMA not only in pop culture, but in training methods, styles, thinking and culture.

If you got down to this final paragraph congratulations. It is strange considering the presence of FMA is so many movies, video games and comic books that FMA is not more widely recognised outside of the martial art community. However, this is probably due to the fact that in none of the bigger films showcasing FMA did the character ever explicitly said this is FMA “DIE!” Because, well they were too busy being efficient and kicking ass.  If you want to see some wicked scenes from these movies check out the links below and IF YOU WANT TO LEARN FMA then checkout an FMA school near you. If you happen to be in Perth come down to ASTIG FMA and checkout Arnis De Mano, Sabong kickboxing or Sikaran-Arnis (www.astigfma.com for details).


Cool movie links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vSRWJ2oW0Q – Bourne 2002-2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xtYvoF3OJ4&feature=related – Big Stan 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb_9icqB1SA – Book of Eli 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yd_UNW8uw1A – Repo men 2010