During the main title sequence, the film's lead cast members demonstrate various kicking styles under a voice over. Tan Tao Liang shows off the flashy "Tan Kick", Shen Kwan-Li demos the "Mole Kick" and the deadly "Dance of the Phoenix" while Peng Kang illustrates the deadly "Ground Kick" derived from Wu Tang. The film proper begins with a challenge between two sworn enemies--Tan (Tan Tao Liang), the chief proponent of the Northern Tan Kick style and Pan Fei, a rival Southern Ground Kick Clan member. Tan tries to talk his opponent out of the unnecessary match to no effect. Tan effortlessly teaches his opponent a lesson with some fast, precision high kicks (Tan is doubled for some of the somersaults). Rather than face a humiliating defeat, the sore loser pulls a knife on Tan and wounds him in the leg. Tan retaliates with a devastating flurry of kicks that send the spoil sport into the afterlife. At his brother's funeral, white-haired Ground Kick Clan leader, Pan Pak (Peng Kang), swears vengeance for his brother. He vows to kick off Tan's head and lay it on his brother's grave! Meanwhile, Old Master Mo (Suen Rong-chi) puts a tall, spoiled rich girl, Phoenix (Shen Kwan-Li), through some especially grueling and painful leg stretching exercises. Her goofy male servant friend and the film's comic relief, Chin Fa (Jing Long), tries to interrupt the training but ends up enduring the wrath of Master Mo, himself. That day, Master Mo informs Phoenix's father that he must unexpectedly leave his teaching position to attend to his ailing wife. The overjoyed Phoenix assumes that her torturous training has been brought to a halt but the old master promises to return and provide a substitute teacher in the interim. When Phoenix and Chin get into a scuffle with five brother thugs caught molesting a young girl in the village, Tan arrives and interrupts the fight. He scolds Phoenix for being overly sadistic to the would-be rapist-thugs and asks her to forgive them! After some light sparring, Phoenix gets the point and goes home. Upon her arrival at home, Phoenix is introduced to her new substitute sifu, Tan, whom she just had a run-in with in the village! Chen takes the blame for his mistress' mischief and gets a bare-bottom beating for punishment.

Tan proves to be as tough a taskmaster as old Mo. Phoenix refuses to accept the new teacher and she makes it almost impossible for him to teach. With the help of Chin, she sets up a series of booby traps and obstacles to frustrate her teacher in the hopes that he will give up and quit. No such luck! At a teahouse, Phoenix witnesses the local bully, Master Ding Dong beating up a poor traveling bell salesman. Hot-headed Phoenix teaches Ding Dong a lesson. Feeling cocky after defeating Ding Dong, Phoenix still refuses to study under Tan after he announces that he is her permanent sifu and that Master Mo will not be returning. After a slap in the face from her father for showing disrespect, Phoenix leaves home and runs into the vengeful Master Ding Dong and his brother Dong Dong who plan to give her a taste of the Ding Dong style! Tan comes upon the scene and encourages the Dongs to teach the girl a lesson even suggesting that they molest her! Phoenix realizes she can't win and reluctantly concedes to become Tan's student in exchange for his immediate martial aid. After a swift ass-kicking from Tan, the Dongs get their boss to fight Tan. Tan has a tough time and is mystified by his opponent's invisible armor but eventually wins.

Meanwhile, Pan the Ground Kicker shows up at Tan's old school looking for him. A student mentions that Tan left after receiving a letter from Master Mo. In his ruthless search for Tan, Pan Pak locates and kills Master Mo and his wife. Finally, Phoenix ceremoniously bows down to Tan and willingly becomes his student. With her improved skills, Phoenix, the new "Queen of the South", easily defeats the Dongs in a comical fight. Tan receives a letter containing Pan's challenge and the two face-off in a field the next day. This is THE LEG FIGHTERS most vicious fight and it proves tough going when Pan unleashes his 9 Bird Style! Phoenix and Chin show up and it eventually takes all of them to defeat the super-skilled villain. With a blurred barrage of high roundhouse and spin kicks, the Ground Kicker painfully experiences Phoenix's lethal Upside Down Style! The final freeze frame has the villain receiving his final duel death blows from Tan and Phoenix-a jaw-dropping display of gravity-defying, mid-air flying kicks!

THE LEG FIGHTERS is an above average old school kung fu comedy. The film is loaded with a mixture of comical and serious fight scenes and the lead actors are all impressive leg fighters. Some annoying frame clipping is utilized to advance the action ahead by a split second. This visual device proves needless considering THE LEG FIGHTERS' high caliber of martial artists. Tan Tao Liang, nicknamed "Flash Legs" by his fans, shares the action with the talented Shen Kwan-Li, an impressive kicker in her own right. The film boasts a tight, simple plot, loads of fight scenes and authentic period locations (even though overhead electric lines are briefly glimpsed during the final fight). Veteran director Lee Tso Nam can claim a slew of top-notch indie Mandarin kung fu features to his credit, including EAGLE'S CLAW, THE HOT, THE COOL & THE VICIOUS, CHALLENGE OF DEATH (all three available on Tai Seng DVD), SHAOLIN VS. LAMA (on Lions Den DVD) and TATTOO CONNECTION.

SIGHT

As with all of Tai Seng's Martial Arts Theater titles, the less than state-of-the-art video masters are the very same ones used for the Ocean Shores VHS releases of a decade ago. The disc boasts a sharp and colorful digital transfer from a full-frame, worn and scratchy source print. The film's main titles are squeezed to fit the TV aspect ratio. The film's on-screen title is INVINCIBLE KUNG FU LEGS with a small computer generated subtitle, THE LEG FIGHTERS.

SOUND

The strong but crude mono sound does the job and there are no major flaws. The English dubbing is the standard hack job for this type of production and die-hard fans will no doubt recognize all the familiar voices.

FEATURES

The only extra is the same old Martial Arts Theater promo trailer (full frame, Dolby Digital 1.0, :33).

CONCLUSION

It's about time Tai Seng started putting more care into the production of these discs. For instance, it would be nice to have each film's original trailer instead of the lame, generic Tai Seng promo that doesn't identify the films' stars or titles. If lesser labels like Xenon, Platinum, and Palm Beach can provide trailers, quizzes, biographies and credit information then Tai Seng could do the same! I'm sure some knowledgeable fans would freely donate their services. And in a perfect world, wouldn't it make sense if all Kung Fu DVDs were chaptered at every fight scene (like Brentwood's recent GREEN HORNET DVD)? Thankfully, Tai Seng has lowered the retail list price of this and other titles in the Martial Arts Theater series from $19.98 to $14.98.

                                              Rating (out of 5):