Movie Ad of the Week: ESCAPE THE FURY (1982)

WU XING BA QUAN (1977) a.k.a. SECRET OF CHINESE KUNG FU, chopped and kicked its way into two theaters in Fort Myers, FL under the title ESCAPE THE FURY on July 9, 1982. Ark Films was the distributor.

Mystery Movie solved! LADY LEE'S REVENGE (1978)

Another day, another Ark Films release without a billing block -- but once we recognized Kathy 'Kat' Lee as Polly Shang-Kuan, LADY LEE'S REVENGE (U.S. release: 1978) was pretty easy to nail down as GAN LIAN ZHU DAI PO HONG LIAN SI / GAN LIAN ZHU DESTROYS THE RED LOTUS (1976) a.k.a. HEROINE KAN LIEN CHU. The above ad is from Odessa, TX on March 6th, 1981 (The second feature, HAMMERFIST, is the John Liu movie RENEGADE MONK). The ad below is from Miami on January 19, 1979.

Mystery Movie solved! BLACK BELT ANGELS (1980)

There's a big empty space on this poster where the billing block should be, but we've managed to identify BLACK BELT ANGELS (U.S. release: 1980) as FEI YAN SHUANG JIAO (1978), a.k.a. THE LADY CONSTABLES, starring Angela Mao and Judy Lee.

Movie Ad of the Week: JAWS OF THE BLACK DRAGON w/ BAMBOO TRAP and FIERCE KUNG FU BROTHERS (1979)

A triple bill of kung fu movies from Ark Films opened at the Fox Theatre in Detroit on December 19, 1979.

JAWS OF THE BLACK DRAGON is SHI BA YU LUO HAN a.k.a. EIGHTEEN JADE ARHATS, THE EIGHTEEN JADE PEARLS and 18 CLAWS OF SHAOLIN (1979).

BAMBOO TRAP is a Filipino production originally titled MABABAGSIK NA ANGHELAND and also known as THE BLACK PANTHER OF SHAOLIN (1975), starring Leo Fong and Ron Van Clief.

FIERCE KUNG FU BROTHERS is TIAN YA GUAI KE Y ZHEN FENG a.k.a. GOLD CONSTABLES and THE NINJA PIRATES, which most sources claim is a 1981 film but here it is in downtown Detroit at the end of 1979.

Movie Ad of the Week: THE DRAGON AND HERCULES TEAM UP (1981)

A double bill of "Dragon" kung fu movies from Ark Films opened at the Video Park Drive-In Theatre in Odessa, TX on December 4, 1981. We're still trying to ID the second feature, but THE DRAGON AND HERCULES TEAM UP is JUAN XING QUAN FA YU FA (1978) a.k.a. WAYS OF KUNG FU.

Mystery Movies solved!

In a Mystery Movie post from nearly four years ago, we surmised that ONE-NIGHT STAND was a re-release of PETS (1973) going solely on actress Candice Rialson's presence in the one newspaper ad we turned up. Based on evidence that has recently come into our possession -- the ad above, from a Madison, Wisconsin showing on September 4, 1981 -- it appears that we were correct in our supposition. The co-feature, OFFICE GIRLS, is a West German "sex report" originally released stateside in 1972 by International Producers Corporation (IPC), the same company that unleashed PETS a year later. Raphael Nussbaum, the vice president of IPC (and director of PETS), later headed Burbank International Pictures, the company that still owned PETS and OFFICE GIRLS when home video rights for both were licensed to Imperial Video Corporation in 1983, along with other IPC and Burbank releases like THE CONTRACT, 2069: A SEX ODYSSEY and BARBED WIRE DOLLS.

An anonymous comment, also dating back to 2010, suggested HOT TO TROT was a re-release of Lucio Fulci's ONE ON TOP OF THE OTHER, first released in the U.S. by GGP Releasing in 1971. We now have confirmation that this is correct, ONE ON TOP OF THE OTHER was indeed re-released as HOT TO TROT beginning in 1979.

Our friend Raleigh Bronkowski of Screen 13 has figured out that BLACK BELT SOUL BROTHER is LONG XING DAO SHOU JIN ZHONG JUN (1978), better known as THE MAGNIFICENT and DRAGON MASTER, starring Carter Wong, Chen Sing, Casanova Wong, and Doris Chen.

While we're at it, let's tackle two additional Mystery Movies, INSIDE LAURA ANTONELLI and VALIUM HIGH, which we never posted about because we couldn't find decent graphics for either of them...

INSIDE LAURA ANTONELLI, which played U.S. theaters in 1979 to cash in on the higher profile Antonelli imports released in the States the same year (THE INNOCENT, WIFEMISTRESS, THE DIVINE NYMPH), is another re-titling of Massimo Dallamano's LE MALIZIE DI VENERE (1969), which had already played stateside as DEVIL IN THE FLESH, FIRE IN THE FLESH, and SCHOOL GIRL TEMPTATIONS.

VALIUM HIGH, which Clark Film Releasing had on the drive-in circuit during the summer of 1978, is a re-titling of THE STUDENT BODY (1976), directed by Gus Trikonis and starring Jillian Kesner, June Fairchild and Janice Heiden. It was re-released again in 1981 as CLASSROOM TEASERS.