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The Documentary Filming of America’s Legends of the Martial Arts has begun… --Castro
Valley, CA. August 30, 2005 The
flight of the legends is a monumental project that documents the legendary
American martial artist that started a cultural evolution! The World Martial Arts Masters Association
has embarked on a monumental task of documenting the lives, times and
exploits of the greatest martial artists of the 20th century. Naturally,
this cinematic endeavor will go on into the 21st century and way
beyond. Master Mark Gerry is currently producing
what he believes to be the very first cinematically documented series of live
DVD interviews with the legendary martial artists that started the martial
phenomena here in America. These are the renowned Great Grandmasters and
Grandmasters that were instrumental in introducing the martial arts to the
western world. Many are presently Hall of Fame Inductees in the World Martial
Arts Masters Association of which he is a founding member. This major project began when World Martial
Arts Masters Association founding members thought it would be a great idea to
chronicle and document the great masters that were responsible for
introducing and proliferating the Asian fighting traditions for posterity
sake both here and abroad. Basically, their reasoning was to film
interviews of all of the legendary great masters that are still living and
document them so that history will have a chronicled account of their life,
times and contributions the world. In what has to be one of the most ambitious
projects, the “America’s Martial Arts
Legends” series will feature the true career martial artists that have charted
the course of their “art” through their deeds, actions, films, words and
dedicated teachings. For, it is these older dedicated martial arts masters
that have carried on the tradition that we practice today. Unfortunately, many great legendary martial
arts pioneers that preceded their contemporaries never lived in a time where
their knowledge could be documented in such fashion as live DVD filming. But,
we are thankful that, through their students, these teachings have arrived in
tact and that the martial traditions are carried forth. Through them, their teacher’s
personalities, beliefs, philosophies, and actual imagery of these legendary
martial artists remain alive. These are the men that will be featured in this
extensive series sponsored and produced by the World Martial Arts Masters
Association. Gerry’s ambitious undertaking has began
with actually interviewing and filming the original Grandmasters that were
inducted into the Martial Arts Masters Association “Hall of Fame”. These distinguished Great Grandmasters and
Grandmasters have already earned a birth in the America’s Martial Arts
Legends by virtue of being inducted into the “Hall of Fame” and it was
decided that it was a very good place to start filming. Presently, the preliminary filming and
documentary schedule includes featuring such legendary martial arts icons as Al
Novak, Ralph Castro, Wally Jay, Adriano Emperado, Al
Dacascos, Gene LeBell, Bob Wall, Ming
Lum, Dan Tosh, Bob Maschmeier, Cynthia
Rothrock, Max Pallen, T.R. Crimi, Clarence Lee, Ted Tabura, George Anderson,
Bill “Superfoot” Wallace, Don “The Dragon” Wilson, Joe Lewis, Willy Cahill,
Emil Bautista, Carlos Navarro and many other early
America martial artists that introduced their styles to the western world. Should one think that this endeavor is a
personality profile for celebrity status among martial artists, we should
reiterate that it is meant to document history, not to publicize a
personality for publicity sake. The inclusions in this series have been responsible
for essentially keeping the connection to the past alive and those are the
honored and distinguished legends that will be documented for posterity. The featured host of the series will be
Master (Sigung) Mark Gerry, President of the World Martial arts Masters
Association. He will be hosting each
2-hour segment. Naturally, asking the questions that the world wants to know
about their art, their teachings and their life. These filmed interviews will
be quite candid ---{on and off of the dojo floor} ---and will be as personal
in nature as have ever been asked of the masters. This is simply because we
are documenting history for posterity sake and do not want to have any
ambiguities. Sigung Gerry’s candid conversations with
the grandmasters will include such interesting subjects as the history of
their art, their teachers, students, training methods, contributions to the
martial arts, anecdotes, verbal lessons passed from their teacher, training
experiences, hardships in progressing, and all of the tough questions in
between. Stay tuned to learn a lot about the art you
thought you knew… |
