Crouching Librarian, Hidden Meaning?

I suppose I’m treading on cultural toes here but I don’t understand martial arts movies; at least I don’t THINK I understand martial arts movies. I’ve never been able to watch one through to the end. The movies I’ve started to watch seem to consist of unlikely “action” sequences of people posing, grunting, and fighting with each combatant taking his or her turn at whacking and getting whacked. Often there are several fighters ganging up on one guy who by whirling around and performing various other gyrations manages to dispatch all of his attackers who never really seem to go at him all at once but kind of wait their turn as it were (maybe this is martial arts etiquette, I don’t know). In the more recent films, there are even scenes of people flying (yes flying) in and out of trees and jumping several stories high, possessed, I guess, of some special kind of force or power. The first time I saw this I started laughing thinking it was a spoof but such was not the case. I’ve seen more realistic fighting in old Gene Autry movies. Anyway, it seems to me that this kind of thing might appeal to boys from perhaps 11 through 15 and at best is harmless fun. Now I find that many grown-up people take these films pretty seriously as being great cinematic works of art on the same level with, say, “Lawrence of Arabia” or “On the Waterfront.” Now I understand that many of these fighting flicks have great “production value” and have been scored by wonderful composers. The actors must also have grace and skill to do some of these things (albeit aided by special effects). But that’s not enough to get me past the fact that each of the films is essentially people beating each other up with fists, swords, and bamboo sticks in an unconvincing and often commical manner. What am I missing here?