David Carradine - Icon Then and Now

By Michael Murray

David Carradine was definitely an iconic presence in the world of entertainment and of martial arts movies. I remember his vibe, the feeling her brought to the work he acted in, rather than any particular scenes. He was implicit, not explicit. To me, he was always a mysterious and weighty presence that loomed beside us, without ever actually revealing what it was that made him so mysterious and weighty.

At any rate, if you are over 30, you probably remember him from the classic TV series Kung-Fu, and if you’re under 30, you probably know him best for his role in the Kill Bill movies. I used to watch reruns of Kung-Fu as a boy and I absolutely loved it, especially the introduction.

In it, a lone note is held suspended as a blood red sun descends beyond the horizon. As the music breaks into the familiar melancholia of a spaghetti western, we see a man emerging from a vast expanse of sand dunes. He walks heavily, labouring beneath the weight of the sun, and whatever internal baggage he’s carrying. In spite of this, there’s a stoic determination to his presentation, and we suspect a resolute and unflinching character hidden beneath the peasant clothes he wears. It’s an allusive, kind of disorienting passage, and it immediately sparks our curiosity.

Mystical music then tinkles away, and through a series of flashbacks, we catch glimpses of the life that led the man to this point in time he now finds himself in. We watch as young boy has his head shaved and is trained in the martial arts by monks. We then see clips of David Carradine, the man in the desert, doing all sorts of impressive Kung-Fu moves, and then being told that his education was over and it was time for him to leave the monastery. It was an epic story-- full of all sorts of compelling narratives-- that had been condensed into two minutes, and it was awesome.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0DCnEI0HFY( this is the Youtube link should you wish to embed it in the text)


On the show, Carradine played a Shaolin monk named Kwai Chang Caine, who after being orphaned by his mixed race parents, was raised by monks to become a Shaolin master. Armed only with his skills as a martial artist, he combs through the American old west, pursued by Chinese assassins, as he seeks his half-brother. Complicating things further is Caine’s strong sense of social justice and priestly compassion, which compels him, against his wont, to do battle with the enemies of the good.

There’s Caine, beautifully composed in a resplendent gold robe, preparing to do battle with a martial artist clad all in black. Around them stand worried villagers, and as the two men circle one another, the tension increases and dust hard scrabble of the west blows over them. Caine, of course, is ultimately triumphant, but he takes no pleasure in his victory, telling the villagers that, “ the taking of a life does no one honour.”

Kung-Fu dressed up the classic and familiar western in the Far East exoticism of martial arts, managing to throw in a little bit of fortune cookie Chinese philosophy, for good measure. It was an absolutely winning formula, and what really grabbed me was the alternate depiction of violence and combat it presented.

Growing up in North America, I was used to the garish violence of Saturday afternoon wrestling and Dirty Harry movies. Violence was aggressive and blunt, an expression of rage that was unleashed rather than contained. However, in Kung-Fu, what I was watching was understated and artistic, the sublimation of our primal instincts to do battle, instead of the more typical amplification.

Carradine’s depiction of Caine always reminded me a little bit of Spock. There was an alien quality to him, and he spoke in a manner that suggested he was stripping his emotions, and himself, in fact, from the world in which he lived. Unlike the John Wayne depiction of American masculinity, Carradine presented us with something else, suggesting that power and respect could be achieved using a grace and intelligence, both moral and physical, that was positively refreshing.

David Carradine, who came from acting royalty, had a natural and powerful presence. Shorn of hair or any other visible signifier of status-- as he was in his role as Caine on Kung-Fu-- you could still feel his strength and the unshakeable confidence he had in himself, and although there was a kind of wholesome modesty to his face, there was also an impenetrable depth. He looked like he was capable of anything, the sort of person that you should never underestimate.

The Kung-Fu series ended in 1975, and Carradine, living in a state of florid alcoholism, became a monster within the entertainment industry. His indulgent and ungovernable behavior was legendary, and he burned bridges with reckless abandon, finding himself, in short order, teetering on the brink of destitution and death.

However, he found the strength to get sober, and in collaboration with Quentin Tarrantino, enjoyed a career renaissance when he was cast as the ultimate baddie—Bill-- in the Kill Bill films (2003 and 2004). In the role, Carradine brings all the subtext of his past, both as the serene warrior priest of Kung-Fu, and the raging madman of Hollywood.

The Bill that Carradine created was the dark potential of Caine, the embodiment of a warrior who wandered for years, only to find his character corrupted by the forces he started doing battle with, rather than reinforced. If things had gone bad for Caine, Bill is what he would have become.

Employing a soft-spoken intensity that was equal measures strength and brutality, he delivered the idiosyncratic Tarrantino dialogue with an almost charming sangfroid. He wasn’t exactly likeable, but he was convincing, and he emanated an effortless charisma that was fixating. Whenever he was on the screen, I wanted to hear more of what he had to say, seeing in his beaten face a compelling mess of wisdom, evil and indifference.

On June 4th, at the age of 72, David Carradine was found dead in his Bangkok hotel room, hanging in the closet. The cause of his death is still under investigation, but it seems likely that no western man ever really dies of “natural causes” in a place like Bangkok. Family and friends attest to his happiness, insisting that his death was not a suicide, and there’s absolutely no reason to dispute this. It seems pretty evident that his death was autoerotic asphyxiation gone wrong, with all sorts of circumstantial evidence, as well as the weight of his peculiar and inscrutable history, pushing the world toward this conclusion.

Regardless of what verdict is reached in determining the cause of his death, we’ve lost a huge, practically mythic figure in the world of pop culture. Over the course of his career, Carradine existed as a paradox. His life and art were depictions of extremes, and we never figured out exactly how, or where amongst them, he managed to exist, before he vanished, returning to the mystery from which he first emerged.

© Showflicks Inc 2010

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