The Bodyguard (1973) (Widescreen & Fullscreen) Viva Chiba!
KonCATIII
⚠ Unverified — hosted on the Internet Archive, not confirmed public domain. Opens on archive.org; nothing plays here directly.
released in the United States in 1976 as The Bodyguard, with added footage in the first ten minutes of the film. Bodyguard Kiba was followed by the sequel Bodigaado Kiba: Hissatsu sankaku tobi, released later that same year. There were then three more film adaptations with Takeshi Yamato in the role of Kiba released in 1993, 1994, and 1995 by Takashi Miike at the beginning of his career.[5] Plot summaryOn his way home to Japan, karate master Kiba thwarts a terrorist attack on the airplane. He then gives a press conference, stating he saw the attack as a good opportunity to promote his karate school and announces that he's starting a bodyguard service. He is soon approached by his first customer, a woman who pays him for four days of protection but is secretive about the nature of the threat against herself. Kiba finds himself wrapped up in the international drug trade and has to fight the mafia. CastShin'ichi Chiba as Naoto Kiba (as Sonny Chiba)Mari Atsumi as Reiko MiwaKinji Takinami as Shigeru KumazawaYayoi Watanabe as Maki KasugaMas Oyama as Tetsugen Daito (as Masutatsu Oyama)Takashi Hio as Alkaid HoshinoAkira Kuji as MerakRyôjirô Nishimoto as PhecdaToshiyuki Tsuchiyama as AliothHajime Kubo as AyutaHiroshi Date as IshimochiHideo Murata as Hijacker ATadashi Takatsuki as Hijacker B (as Chû Takatsuki)Hisao Mizoguchi as Hijacker CHatsue Tonooka as StripperHome mediaOn November 20, 2007, BCI Eclipse released the film in their Sonny Chiba Collection DVD set, which also includes Golgo 13: Assignment Kowloon, The Bullet Train, Dragon Princess, Karate Warriors, and Sister Street Fighter.[6] In 2024, Eureka released the film as "Bodyguard Kiba 1 & 2", on a 2-Disk Blu-ray. The extras include "The Bodyguard – alternate US version of Bodyguard Kiba".[7] SequelDirector Ryuichi Takamori released a sequel, Bodigaado Kiba: Hissatsu sankaku tobi on October 13, 1973.[8] The sequel also starred Sonny Chiba as Kiba Naoto.[9][10] In popular cultureThe American version of the film opens with a quotation: The path of the righteous man and defender is beset on all sides by the iniquity of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper, and the father of lost children. And I will execute great vengeance upon them with furious anger, who poison and destroy my brothers; and they shall know that I am CHIBA the BODYGUARD when I shall lay my vengeance upon them. — Ezekiel 25:17 An altered version of the same passage (substituting "Chiba the bodyguard" with "the Lord"), complete with erroneous attribution to Ezekiel by the character of Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson), appears in Quentin Tarantino's 1994 film Pulp Fiction. Quentin Tarantino, the old rascal: He obviously didn't pick up the (alleged) Bible quote Ezekiel 25:17 from Pulp Fiction in the holy book, but it comes from the US version of the film we're talking about in this article. Karate Kiba or Bodyguard Kiba was made in 1973 shortly before Sonny Chiba's mega-success as The Street Fighter. The film is based on a manga by Ikki Kajiwara and naturally provided a nice vehicle for Chiba, who portrays a similarly overpowering character here as in his subsequent hit. In the 90s, Takashi Miike produced three new adaptations of the material. There are two main versions of the film, but they differ even more fundamentally in terms of content than we can naturally reproduce here in the report. The English dubbing is extremely unique in this case: While Chiba is a karate master in the original who wants to bring his martial art to America and build up a bodyguard business on the side, so to speak, in the US version he is a typical loner hero who consistently stands up to drug-related crime. Any philosophy about karate and approaches influenced by Chiba's real master Masutatsu Oyama are more or less consistently ignored in favor of a conventional action story. And the other changes can be categorized in the same way. On the one hand, there is additional material, which should provide more appeal in the West with references to Bruce Lee and American martial artists as guest stars. And that includes the cool quote at the beginning. On the other hand, dialogue scenes have been cut, most of which are about Chiba's karate mission. Dramatic climaxes towards the end with the two women at Chiba's side have also been cut. There weren't many international releases yet and on DVDs in English-speaking countries, the US version was of course usually more common - often nastily zoomed to full screen and of lower VHS quality. Since March 25, 2024, a highly recommended Blu-ray set has once again been available in the UK from Eureka Entertainment, which includes both versions of the film and also Part 2. As can be guessed from a few moments with burnt-in Japanese subtitles, the US version was apparently reconstructed on the basis of the HD master of the original uncut version. Runtime information is arranged according to the scheme US version on British Blu-ray in 23.976fps / original version on British Blu-ray in 23.976fps