Meanings
- uncountableSynonym of gun fu (a style of balletic gunplay in action films)
I learn from Nick Nunziata at www.CHUD.com that the form of battle used in the movie is “Gun-Kata,” which is “a martial art completely based around guns.” I credit Nunziata because I think he may have invented this term.
2005, Roger Ebert, Roger Ebert’s Movie Yearbook 2005, review of Equilibrium, page 208Synonyms: gun fu
- uncountableA fictional martial art based on gun fu.
1 more example
The early 21st century. The totalitarian state of Libria has been established following a third world war and is presided over by the ubiquitous video-image of ‘Father’. To maintain harmony, the populace are forced to self-medicate with the emotion-suppressant Prozium. Sense Offenders, who skip doses and secretly hoard artworks, are hunted down by an elite squad of Clerics, trained in the martial art Gun-Kata (which enables its practitioners to predict the path of bullets fired at them).
2003 April, Andy Richards, “Equilibrium”, in Sight and Sound, volume 13, page 35
Synonyms & antonyms
nounSynonym of gun fu (a style of balletic gunplay in action films)
Origin
- Japanese型“style, pattern”
- Englishgun kata
Compound of gun + kata (“martial art movements”), from Japanese 型 (kata, “style, pattern”). Attested from, and possibly coined around 2003 for the film Equilibrium (see quotation below).
More words from Japanese
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
gun kata. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gun%20kata
“gun kata.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gun%20kata. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “gun kata,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gun%20kata.
Source: gun kata on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.