KUNG FU was a revelation back when it first aired. This American-made telemovie has turned out to be one of the defining moments in martial arts movie history. While precious few of the hundreds of kung fu movies I've seen have ever bothered to espouse a philosophy of any kind, this made-for-TV movie delved deeply into the raison d'etre for the martial arts. (Ironically, the one shortcoming- a noticeable one for those of us who had already familiarized ourselves at least to some degree with martial arts- was the lack of genuine gung fu skill evinced by the star of the show. David Carradine, by his own admission "a dancer," was able to fake it well enough, but, looking back on the series now, his Dung Fu is almost laughable.) It'd be great to see some real-life martial artists in a weekly series (as long as it didn't degenerate into another MARTIAL LAW or WALKER), but maybe martial arts is still considered "unbankable" by the Hollywood powers that be.
