Plenty of martial arts movies focus on characters with various impediments. In the case of 1979’s The Crippled Masters, however, we get a flick that stars performers with actual disabilities.

Skilled martial artist Lee Ho (Frankie Shum) gets accused of betraying his master Lin Chang Cao (Chen Mu Chuan). As punishment, Lin’s henchman Tang (Jackie Conn) supervises the amputation of Lee Ho’s arms.

Eventually Lin feels betrayed by Tang as well and causes Tang to lose his legs. Despite their substantial physical impediments, Lee Ho and Tang eventually re-develop their skills and plot revenge against Lin.

As noted as the start of my review, Masters doesn’t fake the disabilities of its leads. Both Shum and Conn lacked the limbs seen via their characters.

That gives Masters an intriguing twist. The question becomes whether or not the film exists as a thrilling action flick and not just a curiosity.

My answer? Not really, as Masters never goes much of anywhere beyond its basic gimmick.

Which doesn’t even make sense in some ways, mainly because it wants us to accept amputation of Lee Ho’s arms. The problem stems from the fact the actor clearly never had arms – unless somehow a vestigial hand grew out of the amputated stump.

Granted, no one sees movies like this for consistency and logic. Still, I would think the filmmakers might’ve used makeup effects to hide Shum’s remaining appendage.

Beyond that, Masters struggles because it doesn’t tell much of a story. Again, I get that martial arts flicks often boast the skimpiest of plots, but that nonetheless becomes an issue here.

Actually, the problem stems more from the spotty way Masters pursues its narrative than the actual concept itself. Rather than provide a tight tale of revenge, Masters rambles and ambles on its way to that goal.

This leaves the plot as meandering and not very compelling. The end result lacks the urgency and tension it needs.

Much of Masters also tends to feel more like a compilation of scenes in which our disabled leads cope than anything else. We get endless shots of Conn and especially Shum as they deal with their new circumstances.

These get tedious, and the eventual fight sequences do little to compensate. In theory, I like the idea that our impaired characters can still take care of business, but the battles don’t feel especially effective or exciting.

I get the impression the filmmakers understood the limitations of the title characters’ fights so the movie eventually introduces a non-disabled role named Ah Po. With full use of arms and legs, he provides more standard martial arts action.

Does the story need Ah Po? Not at all, but he allows for more traditional action.

Throw in a mix of perplexing detours along the way and Masters never clicks. Essentially a gimmick in search of a story, it fails to connect.

The Crippled Masters appears in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Though some parts worked well, the image seemed inconsistent.

Sharpness became one of these up and down elements. At times, the film exhibited positive accuracy and matters improved somewhat as the flick progressed, but many segments looked soft and ill-defined.

No issues with jagged edges or moiré effects materialized, and I saw no edge haloes. Print flaws became a distraction, though, as the movie manifested sporadic instances of lines and scratches.

Colors tended to appear dull and faded. Again, some aspects of the movie fared better than others, but in general the hues lacked life.

Blacks came across as inky and crushed, while shadows offered acceptable clarity. Nothing here made the movie truly unappealing, but it gave us an erratic presentation.

Don’t expect much from the movie’s DTS-HD MA monaural soundtrack, as it came with the lackluster quality I anticipated. The dubbed speech appeared clumsy and rough.

Music appeared shrill, while effects delivered thin, distorted elements. Given the movie’s age and origins, the iffy audio didn’t surprise me, but it nonetheless remained flawed.

Note that my comments reflect the film’s Mandarin soundtrack. The Blu-ray also comes with a DTS-HD MA monaural English dub.

In terms of quality, both seemed similar. The English version did nothing to better the sound of the Mandarin version.

Unsurprisingly, performances seemed worse for the English edition, and the lines blended less well. Even though the Mandarin dialogue got looped as well, it nonetheless seemed more suited for the situations.

Neither mix excels in any way. The Mandarin track makes more sense for the film, though.

When we go to extras, we begin with an audio commentary from podcasters Will Sloan and Justin Decloux. Both sit together for this running discussion of their experiences with the film and their thoughts about it well as historical elements related to Asian cinema, with an emphasis on 1970s martial arts films.

Note the absence of “screen-specific” in that last sentence. Sloan and Decloux offer a rollicking track that leans toward stream of consciousness much of the time.

This means the commentary lacks a whole lot of specifics about Masters itself, and the rapidity with which Sloan and Decloux bounce from one topic to another can become a bit dizzying. Still, they seem enthusiastic and deliver a lot of interesting thoughts.

A documentary called Kings of Kung Fu runs 30 minutes, 48 seconds. It provides notes from film historian Chris Poggiali.

The program looks at the distribution of martial arts movies in the US over the years. Poggiali offers a good view of an unusual topic.

We get a raw scan of Crippled Masters. This spans one hour, 31 minutes, 33 seconds – or five seconds longer than the “restored” feature.

This just presents the movie without any attempts to clean it and make it look good. I don’t know why anyone would watch it but there you go!

In the same vein, Before/After Restoration provides a two-minute, 21-second comparison to demonstrate the work done on the film. It seems somewhat pointless.

We get some trailers as well. We locate the original ad for Masters as well as a recut 2024 promo and a “Kung Fu Trailer Compilation” that lasts 18 minutes, 31 seconds and covers a slew of movies.

That last one feels weird – why not present the segments individually instead of as a long collection? At least chapter stops allow viewers to skip from one to the next easily.

The package finishes with a booklet. It features art, an intro from Philip Elliott Hopkins and an essay by Lawrence Carter-Long. It ends the set well.

The Crippled Masters lives and dies with its unusual concept. Unfortunately, it mostly falters because the movie can’t rise above its basic gimmick to become a quality martial arts tale in its own right. The Blu-ray delivers inconsistent visuals, dated audio and a smattering of bonus features. I like the notion behind Masters but the end result doesn’t work.