Coming soon to a theater near you: Immortal Kickboxer
by Carmen Van Kerckhove
I’ve been enjoying the hell out of slam poet Bao Phi’s “Racist Hollywood” — a series of fake movie pitches in which he pokes fun at Hollywood’s racist depictions of Asians.
But his latest one is by far my favorite, because it’s so scarily real:
BAO PHI’S IDEAS FOR RACIST HOLLYWOOD 5: IMMORTAL KICKBOXER
Tagline: When you know your fate, high kick. When you don’t… high kick anyway.
THE PITCH: Spencer Whidmore is just your average middle-class white Blockbuster clerk with an affinity for anime, Johnny To films, and pad thai from that greasy spoon around the block. But when a mysterious stranger returns a damaged copy of Tony Jaa’s Ong Bak late and forgets to pay the $1.50 re-stocking fee, Spencer chases him down the block, tugs on his shoulder… and is knocked out when the stranger (cameo by Chuck Norris) mistakes him for a mugger and spin-kicks him in the head.
Spencer wakes up to find that he has magically been transported back in time to Thailand, where a cruel warlord named Jo Jafar is oppressing the good, hardworking, pious, humble, communal, defenseless Thai peasants in the kingdom. Spencer is shocked to learn that, at this point in time in Thailand’s history, kickboxing has not yet been invented–but the Thai shamans and holy men whisper of a prophecy: a savior will come deliver the good people of Thailand from their oppressors and teach them the martial arts. Conveniently, an emasculinated Asian male buddy named Toofo befriends Spencer for no reason–and as they are cornered in the jungle by Thai ruffians, in a flurry of martial arts mayhem Spencer discovers that HE is the storied hero that the Thai people have been waiting for, that he is the great teacher who brought Thai kickboxing to the Thai people: he is no longer Spencer Whidmore, he is the IMMORTAL KICKBOXER. At first, Spencer revels in his new and wholly un-earned skill in kickboxing, showing off for the locals and enjoying his white saviour celebrity status. But then, when his emasculinated sidekick Toofo returns home to his village without Spencer and is killed in an ambush by thugs, Spencer throws his arms to the heavens over the body of his humble brown friend and screams “WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!” He has paid a terrible price to learn that brown men must die so that great white men can learn responsibility.
ABOUT THE FILM: The producer of the film claims that there were no qualified Asian actors to be in this film, so they picked a random white guy with no experience for the role and asked Josh Whedon to write in the time traveling plot. When asked about whether or not people would be offended by the issue of appropriation, the producer replied, “well, my best friend is Thai and he took some kickboxing lessons, and he loved the idea and says race is not an issue, so I don’t think anyone will have a problem with it.”
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
ruud_scooter wrote:
This movie has already been made. Its called Forbidden Kingdom.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 9:41 am ¶
justin wrote:
I’m more familiar with the films were Michael Dudikoff gets to have sex with someone’s widow as a payoff for his righteous vengeance.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 9:42 am ¶
justin wrote:
whoops
I confused Dudikoff and Van Damme . They are both worse than Chuck Norris.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 9:47 am ¶
Sara wrote:
Yeah, Forbidden Kingdom was a lot like this.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 10:09 am ¶
coco wrote:
This is also what happens on the tv show “Heroes” when Hiro Nakamura travels back in time and discovers that the show’s fictional legendary swordsman, Takezo Kensei, is actually an Englishman, and not too heroic. Hiro then, helps Takezo fufill the legends that had been ascribed to him.
It’s also in Ironman when the medic Yinsin sacrifices his life to help Ironman escape the terrorist faction holding him hostage. When Ironman asks why he deviated from the plan, which was to let Ironman go first and carve a path for him to escape, Yinsin’s replies “this was the plan all along…” and dies. The movie explains that his family had been killed, but could Yinsin have had some life goals outside of sacrificing himself for the next hostage who came along? No medical research to complete upon escape? No plans to return to his home and start up a community clinic? No property to build a retirement home on? Nothing?
Posted 20 May 2008 at 10:13 am ¶
Carmen Van Kerckhove wrote:
One of my favorite lines from this:
“Conveniently, an emasculinated Asian male buddy named Toofo befriends Spencer for no reason”
Totally reminds me of that character on Prison Break. You know, that short guy with the basketball jersey who for no reason at all befriends Scofield.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 10:16 am ¶
B wrote:
This pitch also reminds me of “Batman Begins,” in which not only is Bruce Wayne trained by an elite group of Asian warriors, that same group is responsible for the downfall of a number of great western civilizations, and is led by an Englishman. I just couldn’t get on board with everyone else who said how awesome the movie was.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 10:39 am ¶
Treacle wrote:
Batman -was- awesome, but mostly because of Christian Bale’s magnificent cheekbones.
Anyway, this made me laugh. Out loud.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 11:04 am ¶
The Cruel Secretary wrote:
“But then, when his emasculinated sidekick Toofo returns home to his village without Spencer and is killed in an ambush by thugs, Spencer throws his arms to the heavens over the body of his humble brown friend and screams “WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!” He has paid a terrible price to learn that brown men must die so that great white men can learn responsibility.”
Bao Phi’s series is SMH-funny as is. But I about died from laughter when I read that.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 11:04 am ¶
atlasien wrote:
I would love to see all the Bao Phi Ideas, combined with The Last Confederate, actually filmed together and turned into a movie a la Hollywood Shuffle.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 11:09 am ¶
Kai wrote:
Hehehe very good shit, Carmen. Hilarious and on point. I could rattle off at least two dozen flicks that ran through my mind as I read it.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 11:13 am ¶
kd wrote:
You could title this Forbidden Kingdom, Kill Bill, The last Samurai, etc.
Posted 20 May 2008 at 12:09 pm ¶
Roxie wrote:
“He has paid a terrible price to learn that brown men must die so that great white men can learn responsibility.”
When I pointed this out in Iron Man, everyone dismissed my claims and said I was “looking” for it.
Also, lol Josh(?)
Posted 20 May 2008 at 1:58 pm ¶
BORED KIDZ !!!!!!!!! wrote:
Everybody!!!
we NEED a white man/white woman to save us all!!!!
*sigh*
Posted 20 May 2008 at 5:42 pm ¶