Legendary director Albert Pyun would love to hear from fans in his final days

Director Albert Pyun has built a great career over the past forty years. He began with the aptly titled sword and sorcery classic The Sword and the Wizard and has since directed films such as Cyborg, Captain America (1990), Kickboxer 2, Kickboxer 4, Arcade, Nemesis, Dollman, Mean Gun, Infection, and many more. So many more, he has around fifty feature directing credits to his name. Unfortunately, Pyun was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis a few years ago… and it seems he is now in his final days. His wife Cynthia Curnan took to Facebook to ask fans to send personal messages so she can read them to him. Curnan’s request for news then received a signal boost from a Sam Peckinpah fan site.

Check out Curnan’s Facebook post HERE. She said, “Albert experienced another downturn. I could tell he was scared of going under again. He worked too feverishly. I asked, “What’s the rush?” He said, “If I stop, that’s it.” … Please write him a message that I can read. A personal message from you to him will make him really happy. You think he doesn’t have much time left. Update: Albert cried happy and sad tears upon hearing your messages for him. He feels terrible for letting you down. by not finishing his last 2 films. He wanted it to be a 6 part TV series. He worked and tried like a madman; it was all he really cared about. For Albert, failure was never an option.“

The post from the Sam Peckinpah site is HERE. Said, “It has come to my attention that cult film director and direct-to-video pioneer Albert Pyun is very ill and doesn’t have much time left. The Hawaiian-born filmmaker began his career under the tutelage of Toshiro Mifune and made a name for himself as a B-level action/sci-fi director, bringing unforgettable imagery and endless imagination to films typically made on very limited budgets awarded.
Best known for his kickboxing/apocalyptic extravaganzas, Pyun was clearly a student of the likes of Sergio Leone, John Woo, Akira Kurosawa and Sam Peckinpah in the way he staged his action scenes, often setting them in surreal landscapes for its eccentric characters transformed inhabit. Cult classics like THE SWORD AND THE SORCERER (1982), RADIOACTIVE DREAMS (1985), CYBORG (1989), CAPTAIN AMERICA (1990), NEMESIS (1992), KNIGHTS (1993) and MEAN GUNS (1997) will never exist for cinematic masterpieces held, and certainly many of Pyun’s films happily fall into the so-bad-is-good corner of cinematic heritage – but they were all made on a wing and a prayer by a director with a distinctive artistic vision with a slew of impressive cinematic tricks up your sleeve. Also, check out some of the legendary actors Albert Pyun has worked with: Burt Reynolds, Jean Claude Van Damme, Charlie Sheen, Lance Henriksen, Ice T, Christopher Lambert, Ronny Cox, Darren McGavin – and Peckinpah alumni Kris Kristofferson, James Coburn, Rutger Hauer and Dennis Hopper.

Albert’s wife Cynthia has been posting updates on his condition on her personal page for some time and has let us know that Albert would like to hear from fans in his final days. She has given me permission to post this request here for the benefit of my readers – and I now ask you to take the opportunity. Albert has been ill for some time, but his love of cinema keeps him going; Indeed, he has spent those twilight years of his life working tirelessly on new projects that he will never live to see completed. I think it would mean a hell of a lot if those of us here who love cinema could say a few words of gratitude to a man who has spent his life in the industry, working fearlessly against an often unforgiving industry to to bring his artistic vision to the world on screen.

If you would like to leave some words of thanks for Albert, please do so in the comments below. Cynthia will make sure Albert sees her. And by all means – share this post everywhere. Thank you team“

So if you’re a fan of Pyun’s work, now is the time to reach out and let him know that you appreciate the entertainment he’s provided over the decades. We hope that his health will actually take a turn for the better, but it will be good for him to hear from the fans either way.