Circle of Irony

I'm going to blame Circle of Iron (1978) On Rod Heath of This Island Rod. He explained this movie as a late 70s martial arts fantasy/mystical journey, and we had to watch it.

It starts by claiming that Bruce Lee proposed this story to James Coburn and Sterling Silliphant. Be that as it may. Lee did not live to make it (or turn it down), but Silliphant did write it. Coburn wisely avoided it. Instead it stars Jeff Cooper as a martial artist. He competes in a tournament held by Roddy McDowell and makes it to the final round. Then he is disqualified for hitting his opponent when he is already down. So he doesn't get to go search for the Zetan (in the end revealed to be Christopher Lee) and the Book of Knowledge. 

Except - who's stopping him? He follows the winner, but notices a blind man with a flute staff pass by several times. It is, yes, David Carradine, old Kung Fu himself. He follows the blind man and sees him fight off a tribe of bandits, using his whistling flute staff, and asked if Carradine would be his teacher. He is denied, but follows Carradine anyway, until he gets sick of his Zen-lite pronouncements.

He goes through a number of extremely odd adventures, like fighting a band of monkey people (with Carradine playing the monkey king). The monkeys tell him to seek a rose in the desert, so he heads that way. He comes across Eli Wallach in a pot of oil. Wallach is trying to dissolve the bottom half of his body to purify his mind, and when Cooper peeks in, sees that his "thing" is nothing but a tiny worm. But Cooper figures his vow of chastity will be enough, and declines to join Wallach.

It doesn't take him long to meet a desert warlord (Carradine again) who gives him one of his wives. So much for chastity. And so on.

The acting and production of this one the level of Ator, the Golden Eagle meets American Ninja. The deep "Oriental" philosophy is mostly on or below Kung Fu level. Yet, odd touches like Eli Wallach dissolving his nethers in oil keep this from being a total waste of time. This also goes by the title The Silent Flute - although it isn't silent, although Carradine can't see it. 

So if I've convinced you to watch this, forget it. Don't be like me.