Kung-fu Elliot is a documentary spanning two years in the life of Elliot “White Lightning” Scott, a man who planned on becoming Canada’s first action hero with his no-budget karate epic, Blood Fight. Writing, directing and starring in his indie action epics, the heavily decorated karate champion is assisted by his ever-loyal girlfriend Linda. There is just one little problem, NOTHING about Elliot is quite as it seems.
The film begins as a clichéd look at an eccentric low-budget filmmaker dreaming of stardom, while his girlfriend dreams of marriage. But the longer the camera dwells on Elliot the stranger and more uncomfortable this doc gets. There is a rawness on screen as the film captures the relationship between Elliot and Linda, who enables Elliot in his endeavors that never seem to come to any type of conclusion. Blood Fight is soon put on hold along with their plans of marriage so Elliot can explore a career as an acupuncturist and travel to China on a class trip.
While in China, more than a few things become apparent as Elliot travels the Chinese countryside trying to pick up women and attempting to spar with a Shaolin Monk. It’s there this documentary becomes equal parts engrossing and horrifying, as Elliot gets so comfortable on camera you begin to ask yourself: do these things happen because he had a film crew following him or did he honestly forget they were there?
The documentary devolves into a strange voyeuristic exercise that is very akin to watching a car accident in slow motion as Elliot continues his pathological spree even when the camera is on back home. While in the first two acts there was some question about what Elliot was fabricating and what was real, by the third act we begin to see both worlds collide. What transpires is often times hard to watch even in this age of the Schadenfreude glee of reality television.
Kung-fu Elliot is equal parts American movie, Gambler and Overnight and a must for filmmakers and genre fans alike. Directors Jaret Belliveau, Matthew Bauckman paint a horrifically compelling and transparent picture of their subject that often times borders on exploitation. It’s easily one of my favorite docs of the year. Masterfully executed, the film ends in the only possible way it could. Much like Catfish, the biggest questions Kung-Fu Elliot left me with were: Is this film real? And: Where can I buy this guy’s movies?