A 63-year-old Japanese man says he used his karate skills to fight off a black bear that attacked him in a mountain creek.

Atsushi Aoki was fishing when the 190-centimetre animal set upon him in what he said was an unprovoked attack.

In scenes seemingly reminiscent of Leonardo Di Caprio's epic tussle with an angry bear in the Oscar-winning film The Revenant, Mr Aoki was bitten and scratched repeatedly, including on his head.

"The bear was so strong, and it knocked me down," Mr Aoki told Tokyo Broadcasting System.

"It turned me over and bit me right here," he added, pointing to his bandaged leg.

But instead of trying to outrun the animal — an Asian black bear — the fisherman decided he would use his well-honed karate skills.

After assuming a fighting stance with his right fist in front of him, Mr Aoki jabbed at his attacker's eyes, which sent the creature scrambling away into the woods.

"I thought it's either I kill him or he kills me," Mr Aoki told public broadcaster NHK.

The plucky fisherman managed to get back to his car and get himself to a hospital in Gunma, north-west of Tokyo, despite the mauling that left him with injuries to his head, arm and leg.

"He drove himself to hospital, and he even remembered to grab the fish that he had caught," a local police officer told AFP.

Despite media excitement over the episode, authorities in Japan advised against this course of action when confronted by one of Japan's numerous wild bears.

Earlier this year four people were killed in separate bear attacks.

AFP