Ken Swift formed his own chapter of Rock Steady in 1996, RSC Seven Grandmasters, based on the Joseph Kuo movie 7 Grandmasters. RSC Seven Grandmasters was a battle clique. Ken Swift, “And that was the elite unit of Rock Steady that was all about win, lose, or draw, battling anybody, going out there to war, and it had the same concept as Seven Grandmasters, going all over the country, doing different styles, fighting and challenging, that’s a little what the movie was about.”

RSC Seven…

The B-Boys that started out imitating their heroes on the big screen eventually got to be in movies themselves, performing their own footwork, kicks and flips in films like Flashdance, Wildstyle, and Beatstreet. Beatstreet features the rivalry between RSC and NYCB prominently in the story line. Kuriaki is doing footwork, and Powerful Pexter says, “You’re biters, all you’re homeboys are biters.” Kuriaki responds, “I ain’t never stole no moves from you, your moves ain’t’ worth to be bit, so…

While serious filmgoers denounced kung fu films, the B-Boys took to the films as their own. Ken Swift explains, “42nd St. was like ‘wow!’, these are subtitled, they’re putting these English voices over, these movies aren’t even made in the States, that’s even more like ’wow!,’ you feel like you’re really a part of something.”

The DJ’s, MC’s, B-Boy’s, and graffiti artists would go to see these films together, and it was a participatory experience. They would get so hyped up during the…

Back in the mid-to-late 1970s, the earliest power moves of Breaking were created by B-Boy masters living in New York City. One of the biggest influences on the creation of moves like the “headspin” and the “windmill” was the Hong Kong kung fu movie. B-boys watched the amazing physical abilities of their favorite kung fu actors in films by Shaw Brothers, Seasonal Films, and Golden Harvest Studios. They imitated and expanded upon the ritualized combat they saw in these films, adding new moves…