What do you get when you mix Dolph Lundgren, Tia Carrere, Shang Tsung from Mortal Kombat, Tatsu from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Captain Ming from Surf Ninjas, Dae Han from Best of the Best, and Brandon Lee in his first American theatrical release? 100% pure awesome is what you get!
Let’s be honest here, if you’re still reading, you agree with that last statement. If a cast like that says to you “yes, I need to see that” then you do. If you groan when seeing that list, nothing I say in this review can change your mind because you are not the audience this movie is for. It is pure late 80s/early 90s martial arts action, sometimes referred to as “chopsocky.” You have bad acting, bad writing, bad music, martial arts, shooting, and explosions. Oh yeah, and boobs. It’s the kind of movie that Spike TV would be proud to show on a Sunday afternoon when they aren’t showing UFC or 007 movies. Here is a clip from the movie for a good example:
Ready for the plot? Like it matters, but here is the genius of it all. A badass cop played by Lundgren is trying to bring down some Yakuza in Little Tokyo. He is given a new partner who he doesn’t realize is his partner at first, so they fight each other! I know, never been done before or since, right? So they realize they are on the same side, they are partners that hate each other, and then grow to like each other! Ok, I’m done with the sarcasm. So just by chance the guy that killed Dolph’s parents right in front of him is the new head of the Yakuza in the area and buys a brewery so that he can distribute “ice” and make more money. That is not a typo, it was Dolph’s parents that were killed. You see, the writers felt it would be a twist by making it so that he played someone raised in Japan while Brandon Lee was someone who was 100% American raised in Malibu.
Like I said, story doesn’t matter, it’s about the action, and this movie is full of it. It is nothing extraordinary, it is exactly what you would expect it to be, and if that is something you normally enjoy you will be entertained by this movie. It will not blow you away, it will not change your life, but you won’t be bored (and you’ll get some laughs along the way too). There’s a scene where Dolph Lundgren grabs a dude by the balls after punching through a door and then pulls him out the doorway. Yeah, that’s what you can expect from this.
NetFlix Instant has the same full frame presentation that the DVD has, but I never saw any panning and scanning with the picture. They knew this was something that was more for the home video and cable TV market when they shot it so I’m sure they either kept all the action in the center of the frame or shot it open matte. Either way you don’t miss anything and as far as picture quality it’s on par with other movies from that time frame with that kind of budget. Again, not something to show off what your new HDTV can do, but it gets the job done. I did notice some slight choppiness to the picture when panning despite having a full speed connection so I figure that’s just how it looked as well. It was mostly in the beginning and a bit distracting at first but after a while I didn’t notice it and/or it went away. Click here to watch it if you have a NetFlix account.
3/5 stars – Typical late 80s/early 90s martial arts action movie. Guns, swords, punching and kicking, drugs, boobs, and Yakuza. Throw in some bad dialogue and you have a movie that is entertaining if you are into that sort of thing. This is probably the most that has been written about this movie in a long time.
