Sworn to Justice (1996)

PLOT: After her sister and nephew are murdered during a break-in at her home,  a psychologist must pick up the shattered fragments of her life. Will she be doomed to step on tiny shards she may have missed during the clean-up? (It’s tough to find them all with high pile carpeting).

Director: Paul Maslak
Writers: Robert Easter, Paul Maslak, Neva Friedenn
Cast: Cynthia Rothrock, Kurt McKinney, Tony Lo Bianco, Kenn Scott, Katie Mitchell, Mako, Brad Dourif, Max Thayer, Vince Murdocco, Eric Lee, Art Camacho, Ian Jacklin

PLOT THICKENER

Beginning in 1985, Cynthia Rothrock appeared in seven Hong Kong action films over four years, smack dab in the middle of the territory’s cinematic golden age. They didn’t all reach the cinematic high of Yes, Madam! but this run of films was instrumental in making her a star. She parlayed this status into steady paychecks and softer landings in an American film industry that was less mindful of the level of effort that went into action choreography, and much easier on the bodies of its performers. She worked steadily in the U.S. after her time abroad -- starring in five films in 1990 alone, and ten films between 1992 and 1994 -- but by the mid 1990s that pace had slowed considerably. In spite of this, Rothrock used Paul Maslak’s 1996 debut film, Sworn to Justice to effectively point down at her hypothetical diamond-encrusted name plate necklace (“ACTION SUPERSTAR”) to remind all of us that she still ran the game.

Janna (Rothrock) comes home during a home invasion to find her nephew murdered and her sister succumbing to fatal injuries. She escapes a similar fate from the same violent burglars but incurs trauma to her head during a daring escape. The upside? By touching any object, she now has the psychic ability of psychometry, which allows her to “see” the recent past of anyone else who has touched it previously. This might come in handy with her day job as a psychologist at Forensitec, where she works as an expert witness for criminal defense lawyers, but it’s tough to focus on work with hunky new copyright lawyer and publisher, Nicholas (McKinney) strutting around the office. Her boss, Lorraine (Mitchell) think she’s coming back to work too early after the tragedy, but Janna needs a healthy distraction from the sputtering investigation led by Detective Briggs (Lo Bianco), still ongoing at her home.

Idle hands hands do the devil’s work, and Janna can’t help from using her newfound abilities to solve the crime for herself. What starts off as some harmless snooping soon turns into her dispensing vigilante justice on a nightly basis to the city’s criminals. All the while, a major court case looms and she’s beginning to fall in love with Nicholas. Will the local crime kingpin, Eugene (Scott) squash her efforts before she can find the men responsible for her family members’ deaths? In a world full of shadows, who can she really trust? And how can she really be falling for a guy who wears tighty whities?

This film has it all: action, melodrama, martial-arts-sparring-as-foreplay, and a terrific cast. I’m a sucker for a star-studded ensemble, but very few films in our wheelhouse ever approach the dense clustering of b-movie action stars that Sworn to Justice manages. Ian Jacklin, a guy who has starred in his own films and appeared in countless others, shows up for a cameo where he spouts three lines and gets thrown through an office window! Max Thayer, the Han Solo of No Retreat, No Surrender 2, shows up in an arrowhead bolo tie and slick hair for a quick cigarette and some hearty laughs at an office party! Art Camacho robs an armored truck, Vince Murdocco is a meathead gang member, and Mako gets three scenes as a blind guy who runs a newstand in a lobby. This is Cynthia Rothrock’s constellation of friends, and they’ll happily put in a day’s work and get paid in meatball subs.

This film does a fair amount of thematic shape-shifting over the course of its 90 minutes -- psychological thriller, court-room drama, romantic romp -- but it’s an action film at heart, so let’s start there. The opening is a damn barn-burner! Janna fights the home invaders tooth-and-nail, throwing one guy through a glass table and smashing another guy’s head through a vase. As another aggressor unleashes a barrage of gunshots, she runs *through* a glass door to her balcony, and continues to outrun the gunfire. When she reaches the railing, she throws herself off to evade the thieves and falls about two or three stories through the branches and foliage of a tree before landing on the manicured lawn below. Considering the variety and intensity of the action in the opening, it’s a little puzzling how the rest of these scenes took shape.

Both Eric Lee and Tak Yuen (Douglas Kung in the credits) were credited as fight choreographers on this set, with Art Camacho acting as second unit director. I won’t use the differences in the fight scene quality to criticize any of the personnel, but they are worth pointing out. One scene in the storage room of a convenience store has Janna fighting off some would-be robbers with a lethal combination duct tape, cardboard, and slapstick, complete with cartoon sound effects. Oh, and Latin instrumental pop music!

A fight scene later in the film features Janna fighting off Eugene’s gang in his chop shop. One sequence has her fighting an attacker on the roof of the car before the action spills to the floor and leads to a fast exchange of blocking-and-punching techniques (i.e., the closest the film gets to Hong Kong style fight choreography). The fighter then tries to electrocute Janna with car battery cables before being downed for good. What’s my point with all these details? They demonstrate major differences in the underlying tones of each fight scene -- one comedic and clumsy, one gritty and technical -- and different approaches to how the action flows from shot to shot. For some that’s a draw, for others it’s a hurdle.

This might be the best acting we’ve ever seen from Rothrock, and from a dramatic perspective, Maslak makes sure she runs the gauntlet: there are crying scenes, flirty scenes, fighting scenes, love scenes, and intense scenes in which she has to hold her own alongside seasoned actors like Dourif and Lo Bianco. Her and McKinney have a genuine chemistry and it was surprisingly enjoyable to watch that relationship play out. Now, I’m no James Lipton and this ol’ blog is chewed gum on the underside of the table where they film Inside the Actors’ Studio, but I was really impressed by the completeness of her performance. In the past, most directors for her American films had a tendency to leave her out to dry with awkward dialogue and unearned emotion; that’s (mostly) not the case here. Maslak’s direction is good, and Rothrock is great as a result.

The only thing that may have surprised me more than Rothrock’s solid acting was Kenn Scott’s turn as a dickish villain. As an actor of somewhat short stature and relaxed demeanor, he was convincing as a bullying victim who learns to defend himself in 1994’s Showdown. He even played a Ninja Turtle (not here, I hope). Everything about what we know about Scott as an on-screen performer screams wholesome. But between his snarky insults, brutal methods of intimidation, and a blazer at least two sizes too big for him, he manages to make Eugene the sort of jerk we love to hate. (To that end, his hoop earrings and stubbly beard evoke roughly one-fifth of all late-‘90s boy-band members).

VERDICT

Even though Sworn to Justice is a later Cynthia Rothrock film, and the fight scene quality is all over the place like your grandma after three mint juleps, and it wasn’t filmed by Godfrey Ho in the state of Maryland, I dug this film on balance. Between the great cast of familiar faces, the solid action, a wacky story, and a pace that keeps you engaged, this film offers plenty of positives for Rothrock fans and fight film aficionados alike. Recommended.

AVAILABILITY

Currently streaming on Amazon Prime. DVD on Amazon, Netflix, or eBay.

4.5 / 7

Manhattan Chase (2000)

PLOT: A former hitman for a drug gang is recently released from prison, and must put his life together, raise his estranged son, and help a victim of drug violence evade his former cohorts. Can he find an apartment in the Five Boroughs for less than $1200 a month so he has decent place to sleep in between all this stuff?

Director: Godfrey Ho
Writer: Lisa Cory
Cast: Loren Avedon, Cynthia Rothrock, Steve Tartalia, Nicol Zanzarella, Roberto Gutierrez, Robin Berry, Ron Van Clief

 

PLOT THICKENER

As many New York City visitors can attest, walking its streets can feel like walking through the set of a movie. From Juice and West Side Story to Mean Streets and Annie Hall, some of the greatest films in the history of cinema were filmed in New York City, the biggest city in the world (if you ignore the rest of the world). Countless critics have astutely pointed out that the Big Apple itself often serves as a character in the films in which it appears, and in no film is that more apparent than 2000’s Manhattan Chase, where NYC plays an innocent urban landscape terrorized by a low budget Godfrey Ho film production.

Loren Avedon plays Jason Reed, a former drug gang hitman who gets released from prison after serving a six-year sentence for attempted murder. He’s not about that life anymore, though, and he attempts to leave behind his checkered past so he can raise his estranged son, Tommy (Berry). But only *after* having his former gang cohort, Keith (Tartalia), give him a lift home from prison. Because who’s keeping track, amirite? Keith mocks Jason for his likely employment options with his criminal record (e.g., K-Mart), and his continued refusal to return to the gang fold. Part of raising his son will require some semblance of financial stability, and in that regard, Jason is entering an uncertain future rife with risk (and either a bike messenger gig or dressing up as a knock-off Batman in Times Square).

Jason’s attempted reconciliation with Tommy is strained, at best (as is the dramatic scene that depicts it). Despite his private wishes to have his father in his life -- which the audience learns from his telepathic monologue with the wish-granting sea gulls of Coney Island -- Tommy offers only a cold shoulder upon his dad’s return. Had Jason simply noted the current year, he could have avoided at least one major misstep. Gifting your child with a decade-old handheld gaming device like the original Gameboy is not usually the best method to getting back into the good graces of a surly kid. Just last year I got my 11-year-old cousin a game for the PS3 and he tried to gut me with a cake cutter. Kids grow up so fast!

As fate would have it, circumstances beyond Jason’s control add another roadblock to his attempt at responsible parenting. After her wicked stepfather’s stash of heroin goes missing, Jennifer (Zanzarella) escapes her home after the rest of her family is gunned down in a brutal drug-killing led by Keith. During her desperate sprint from the killers -- they want their drugs back, naturally -- she ends up on the hood of Jason’s moving vehicle (!) and is driven to safety. Jason is hesitant to help her after that point, but Tommy convinces him otherwise, and they find refuge at the apartment of Victor (Gutierrez), Jason’s old prison buddy. Let’s recap: ex-convicts, the lone survivor of a drug hit, a gang in hot pursuit, and an 11-year-old? This should end fine.

To complicate matters, Jason’s ex and Tommy’s mother, Brenda (Sweeney), is back in town after sobering up in California. After running into her cop sister, Nancy (Rothrock), during a purse snatching (don’t ask) we get a huge lunch-time exposition scene with all of the gory details. Did I mention that Nancy was the cop who arrested Jason during an attempted hit six years ago and put him in prison? I didn’t? I must have been distracted by all of these shiny, wild coincidences!

Following Undefeatable and Honor and Glory, Manhattan Chase was the third and final film in an unofficial trilogy of late-cycle Godfrey Ho films that were: a) filmed in the U.S.; b) featured mostly American casts; and c) strangely coherent with no traces of Ho’s trademark cut-and-paste technique. Of the three, this might be the most violent and nihilistic among them, and given that Undefeatable featured a serial-killing kung fu rapist, that’s saying something. The drug violence throughout the movie is quite grisly, and the climax contains a character death that may legitimately surprise viewers.

All that said, the film suffers from the absence of a colorful and equally unlikable main heavy. Tartalia as the gang lackey, Keith, is the closest thing to a real villain, and he has the necessary fighting chops to gel with both Avedon and Rothrock (though he only fights with the former). However, the character lacks the over-the-top qualities of Stingray from Undefeatable, the pompous presence of Jason Slade from Honor and Glory, and the sustained screen-time and narrative focus of either character. Tartalia made a career playing the evil gwailo, so I’m not totally sure why he didn’t get top baddie billing here. He does have a protracted and curiously graphic and out-of-place sex scene, though, so maybe it was in his contract?

The fights are actually pretty good -- quickly paced with good striking and blocking combinations -- and it’s always cool to see Hong Kong action choreography to go along with some familiar American faces with experience. Avedon runs with that ball for most of the film, and Rothrock’s fight scenes are unfortunately minimal. The pair of NRNS2 alumni is kept largely separated for the majority of the film, which feels like a major missed opportunity (though not as egregious as Ron Van Clief’s 120-second appearance as a mini-van kidnapper).

VERDICT

Manhattan Chase is not a “good” movie in the traditional sense, but I think there’s enough happening here to keep you -- rabid and unpretentious b-movie chopsocky fan -- engaged throughout the run-time: upbeat fight scenes, quirky dialogue, a sincere Loren Avedon performance, and enough squibs to fill a bucket typically used to hold acorns. It’s a shockingly coherent capstone to a unique filmmaking career.

AVAILABILITY

Streaming on Amazon Prime.,YouTube.

3 / 7

Fight to Win (1987)

PLOT: After a humiliating loss, an arrogant fighter must relearn his craft from a new teacher who has a romantic past with their common enemy. It wasn’t very serious though -- they only got to second base before she called it off.

Director: Leo Fong
Writers: James Belmessieri, George Chung
Cast: George Chung, Cynthia Rothrock, Chuck Jeffreys, Richard Norton, Juan Chapa, Hidy Ochai, Bill “Superfoot” Wallace, Ronnie Lott

PLOT THICKENER

The early members of the West Coast Demo Team included founder Ernie Reyes Sr., Ernies Reyes Jr., Margie Betke, Cynthia Rothrock, Tom Callos, Scott Coker, Belinda Davis, Gary Nakahama, Dayton Pang, George Chung, and Soo Gin Lee. We can’t blame you if you don’t recognize more than a couple of those names -- few went into the film industry at all -- and no one would dispute that Cynthia Rothrock is the most prolific among them. Yet 1993’s kid-friendly Surf Ninjas, which featured the most involvement from the former demonstration teammates, didn’t have Rothrock at all. Who, then, of her West Coast Demo brethren, did the Blonde Fury actually work with in film? If you guessed George Chung, give yourself a gold star. It’s shiny and gluten-free, though I wouldn’t recommend eating it.

About a year before Leo Fong cut a car-roof-shaped hole into our collective hearts in Low Blow, he directed Rothrock’s brief appearance in her first film, 24 Hours to Midnight. Not long afterwards, she would trek overseas to Hong Kong for Yes, Madam! and another trio of films on her way to becoming a bonafide action star. Fast-forward to 1987, where Fong brought her back into the fold in a supporting role. This time, however, she’d be joined by West Coast Demo teammate George Chung, her 24 Hours… co-star Juan Chapa, and martial arts superfriends like Chuck Jeffreys and her Magic Crystal co-star, Richard Norton. Given her upward trajectory at that time, it’s more than a bit puzzling to see her playing second fiddle to Chung in his first film role. I’m going to go out on a limb and call it a friendly favor. Or maybe she needed beer money.

Ryan Kim (Chung) is a cocky but skilled martial artist who helps out at his master’s dojo by occasionally teaching teenaged Valley Girls private lessons in self-defense while his pal, Jerry (Chapa) teaches youth classes. We find him fending off the angry, burly brother of his latest trainees before he meets with a Harvard archaeology professor who shows up to facilitate the requisite plot exposition. It turns out that Ryan inherited one of three priceless statues that were awarded to the winners of a martial arts tournament arranged by an eccentric art collector years ago. Ryan’s Sensei (Ochai) owns another and an Australian fighter named Armstrong (Norton) owns the third. The professor believes they have mystical properties and encourages Ryan to consider donating them them to a museum, noting, “when you do nice things, nice things come back to you.” Of course, Ryan’s not hearing that shit.

Following a successful team exhibition, Ryan and Sensei are confronted in the parking lot by Armstrong himself. He proposes a fight between Ryan and his top student -- Tankston, played by Bill “Superfoot” Wallace -- with each man’s statue on the line. After Sensei has a health scare and Ryan fails to adequately train himself, Sensei calls in a favor to Lauren (Rothrock) to become his primary teacher. As the only fighter to vanquish Tankston and someone who knows Armstrong from a previously failed relationship, she’s uniquely qualified to push Ryan to the next level. What follows is a phased tug-of-war for possession of all three priceless artifacts. Ryan experiences a crisis of self-confidence. Frequent ball-busting from his friends Jerry and Michael (Jeffreys) doesn’t help, and he and Lauren bicker like teenagers. And then San Francisco 49ers defensive back Ronnie Lott shows up because 1980s action movie reasons.

Given that this was an obscure and narrowly distributed film, critical coverage is pretty thin. Our pal the Direct to Video Connoisseur was entertained by its “really good 80s bad action” but I couldn’t find another standalone review out there that gave it a thorough look. Opinion from the Letterboxd crowd is decidedly average, which is peaches and cream compared to the savaging it’s received from the desolate wasteland that is the Amazon User Review-verse. Perhaps the most disparaging among them -- claiming “there is nothing left in this movie that will cause memory retention upon any accidental viewing” -- was written by the film’s own screenwriter, James Belmessieri! Apparently, the fact that most of his re-write -- from the expository dialogue to his “story development scenes” and “thoughtfully developed characters” -- didn’t end up on the screen left him with sour feelings. Uh, did James know he was supposed to be writing a chopsocky movie and not a historical drama? We want fight scenes, some quotable lines, a few montages with an upbeat rock or synth track, and a visible boom mic or two. So, if this movie didn’t resemble the one Belmessieri wrote, that might be for the best. (The boom mics were definitely visible).

The humor in the film -- much like the fight scenes -- prove to be rather hit and miss. Can any 80s action film resist the low-hanging fruit of the “we’ve got company!” line? This one certainly didn’t. This is somehow more surprising than the protagonist’s obsession with the fact that a woman -- yes, a woman with different hormones and a few different body parts! -- is trying to train him in the martial arts. (I’m not sure whether to give or deduct points for the movie limiting itself to just one menstruation joke). Didn’t homeboy watch Come Drink with Me?! It gets worse. In the film’s climax, some of our supporting heroes pretend to be aloof but well-dressed homosexuals in order to fool Armstrong’s guards about their intentions on his sprawling property. You consider all of these shallow jabs intended to be humor alongside its 1987 born-on date -- not exactly the most progressive era for identity politics or equal treatment -- and somehow all of this stuff seems typical, if not forgivable. On the other hand, the humor that works really well can be found in the heroic group’s banter, some of it ball-busting, some of it self-deprecating. Sensei’s confusion over American slang (“What is dicknose?”) is reasonably funny. The trope of Ryan repeatedly getting hit in the nose by his enemies is amusing, if a little overused. And the dynamic between Ryan and Lauren is also engaging, because she believably (and consistently) shows him up or puts him in his place.

Without giving too much away, the last 20 minutes of the film come out of left field. It rapidly morphs from a whimsical story about discarding one’s ego and opening oneself to learning, to a violent men-on-a-mission home invasion set-piece with fatal consequences. I frankly never saw the climax taking this form based on the story’s trajectory. It was as if the filmmakers stumbled upon a pile of cash and free guns during the final weekend of shooting and decided to throw everything at the wall in a mad dash to the finish. A lot of people are going to be more confused at my mention of Ronnie Lott than this plot derailing, but I assure you it makes total sense. (Chung worked with the 49ers during the 1990s and put Lott in his other film, Hawkeye, aka Karate Cops).

VERDICT

While I won’t sit here with a straight face and try to sell you on Fight to Win as an above-average fight film, I will say that it entertained me more than other films with more production sheen but less of an inclination to cut loose and get silly. All too often, American chopsocky films try to play things serious and end up looking ridiculous for it (there’s value in this approach too). Humor often doesn’t work in action films when it’s forced, but a lot of the quips here arise from the ball-busting banter between real-life pals. That sense of enjoyment translates on screen and no amount of visible boom mics or awkward insert scenes can undermine it. Ready-made for fans of Chuck Jeffreys and the original members of the West Coast Demo Team ... or NFL Hall of Famer, Ronnie Lott.

AVAILABILITY

Try your luck on YouTube or go with the tried and true method of hoarding VHS copies off eBay. Tough to find.

3 / 7

Martial Law (1990)

PLOT: When he discovers that his younger brother has been stealing cars for a local crime kingpin, a cop is forced to choose between his family and his badge. Though it goes unmentioned, we can assume option C includes fleeing to Canada to enjoy a lifetime of free health care and maple syrup.

Director: Steve Cohen

Writer: Richard Brandes

Cast: Chad McQueen, Cynthia Rothrock, David Carradine, Andy McCutcheon, Philip Tan, Vincent Craig Dupree, Tony Longo, John Fujioka, Benny “The Jet” Urquidez, James Lew, Jeff Pruitt

PLOT THICKENER

I appreciate it when filmmakers go the extra yard to subvert genre conventions. The “reluctant partners” trope rears its head in 1990’s Martial Law, but director Steve Cohen has an ace up his sleeve. Not only are the partners at the center of this story willing to pair up professionally as police officers, but they’re also romantically involved and -- OH BY THE WAY -- martial artists. This comes from the widely held belief that the couples that stay together, play together, but also work with each other, and frequently bang each other. My feeling is that given the evolving cultural climate, it’s only a matter of time before we see a new genre of “more-than-buddies” cop movies. I’m all for future iterations of Riggs and Murtaugh living freely and openly.

Sean Thompson (McQueen) is a good cop. He makes a convincing pizza delivery man during hostage situations. He shakes down Chinatown gangsters with ease, and he can back-fist and sidekick with the best of them. But beneath that skill and toughness, there lies a palpable sadness. In the wake of his parents’ premature deaths, he has struggled to maintain a relationship with his younger brother, Michael (McCutcheon). It may have something to do with his complete inability to communicate, about which his girlfriend and fellow officer, Billie Blake (Rothrock), frequently complains. In any case, the raging teen has begun to go astray.

Michael now works for a crime lord named Rhodes (Carradine) who deals in expensive stolen cars, among other lucrative business pursuits. Of course, no gang is complete without hired muscle. Martial arts expert Wu Han (Tan) and lumbering oaf, Booker (Longo) flank Rhodes as his trusted advisers, and throw their weight around with aplomb. Michael’s skills as a carjacker are just fine and dandy, but as Rhodes points out, his burgeoning martial arts expertise cemented his made man status. This film will make you long for the cinematic underworld where employability is not dictated by one’s penchant for loyalty, ability to multitask, or skills in resource coordination, but instead by one’s skills in the dojo.

As Rhodes and his goons continue their violent and illegal business practices, from which dead bodies are just one biproduct, the cops take notice. With Michael caught between two roles -- a carjacker trying to make a good impression on his new boss, and the estranged brother of an emotionally distant cop -- tragedy seems a likely outcome. Can the elder Thompson bring his brother back from the dark side? What will Rhodes do if he discovers that his golden boy has a cop for a brother? Is it humanly possible to stage a nunchucks fight in an office with a drop ceiling?

It was only while conducting background research in conjunction with this review that I discovered that not only was McQueen trained by Chuck Norris, but he was a member of Johnny’s Cobra Kai homeboys in the original Karate Kid. Most of ya’ll are going, “YEAH NO KIDDING K-BREZ,” which is the new nickname I gave to myself just now. I would say this qualifies as another example of why my “martial arts b-movie reviewer on the Internet” card should be revoked but it’s not my fault. The minimum qualifications are really archaic: all you need is a 486 computer and the ability to tell the difference between Don “The Dragon” Wilson and Don Cheadle or Owen Wilson. In any case, on both the acting and fighting fronts, McQueen is pretty good, and I’m surprised he didn’t end up doing more films like this (he was replaced in the sequel by Jeff Wincott).

This was a cliched story with a few decent performances from Carradine, McQueen, and Vincent Craig Dupree as a paranoid gang member, but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the fight scenes. Rothrock expectedly brings the thunder, but as an added bonus she gets a short fight with Benny “The Jet” Urquidez in a Stateside collision of 1980s Hong Kong action gweilo icons! Tan is a great athlete and an eminently watchable martial artist, and Carradine is, well… Carradine is a good actor. The stunt performers sell everything, the strike combinations are swift and logical, and there’s enough cardboard boxes to go around for all of us to pack up and move to Delaware. (Not necessarily recommended).

VERDICT

Solid execution is the cackling arch-nemesis of low expectations, and I’ll be the first to admit that I was surprised by the level of competency across the board. The performances were adequate for this type of film, the fights had good energy, and Cohen sidestepped a lot of the fatal flaws that often dog this subgenre. Sure, I could have used a bit more fighting with better sound effects. Maybe the secondary characters could have been more distinctive. More Rothrock would have been great (but when is that not the case?) Rather than downgrade Martial Law for quantities, however, I’ll give it credit for what’s on screen: a highly serviceable crime kickfighter.

AVAILABILITY
There are definitely all region PAL discs floating around, but your best bet might be a used VHS copy.

4 / 7

Fist of Feature: The Year in Search

A burgeoning area in the world of Internet marketing, search engine optimization is not something to which we pay much attention here at Fist of B-List. However, in my annual review of back-end web analytics -- coincidentally, conducted about 15 minutes before writing this feature -- I discovered a number of interesting searches that led users here during the 2012 calendar year. I’m consistently amazed that anyone besides me actually reads this stuff, so I just wanted to highlight some of the more unique starting points. In no particular order, here are the ten most unique searches which brought users to this blog in 2012.

“shower sex”
A 2008 study by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that an estimated 234,094 nonfatal bathroom injuries were treated in the U.S., making shower sex a risky proposition. A major disparity in height can make sex in the shower terribly uncomfortable. Hard water can cause painful losses in the body's natural lubrication. Arguments can arise out of the differences between preferences in water pressure and temperature. None of this stopped the filmmakers behind 1992's Talons of the Eagle from featuring a shower sex scene between Jalal Merhi and veteran actress Priscilla Barnes, because it looked pretty good on VHS. This was the most popular search leading users to this blog in the past year.

“don the dragon wilson is a doctor”
Is not! He’s a martial arts actor and former kickboxing champion!

Oh. I stand corrected.

“just want a list of movies made about fucking highschool movies where a janitor teaches the new kid how to defend himslef”
Sometimes you want to find out what’s coming out on the Criterion Collection label in 2013. Other times you want to know the best movies of 2012. Other times you just want a list of movies made about fucking high school movies where a janitor teaches the new kid how to defend himself.

“fridays with tadashi yamashita”
If nothing else, the obscure 1980s late-night sketch comedy show Fridays was famous for a staged melee involving Andy Kaufman and future Seinfeld cast member Michael Richards. But who knew that American Ninja actor Tadashi Yamashita was the host?

“my wife beat me”
Sorry to hear that. Maybe you should stop spending so much time on the Internet and learn how to properly defend yourself.

“b-rated martial arts actor with blond hair and a black belt in martial arts in the 1980's”

 

 Oh, OK. That narrows it down.

“why you shouldn’t smoke weed”
...and Fist of B-List comes up in the search results.

“does the billy blanks movie, back in action, have any rape scenes”
Nope, only murder, drug trafficking, and Canada’s McNamara brothers. Hope that helps!

“bolo yeung get in the soup”
Come on, Bolo! What are you waiting for?

“lost hacky sack”
Maybe you shouldn’t have smoked all that weed.

Any strange turns of phrase that brought users to your blog or website recently? Share them in the comments below.

Honor and Glory (1993)

PLOT: A team of sisters, one an FBI agent, the other a television news reporter, attempts to bring down an insane kickboxing bank executive before he can acquire a nuclear arms trigger. Wait, is this a bio-pic about disgraced former Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis?

Director: Godfrey Ho
Writer: Herb Borkland
Cast: Cynthia Rothrock, Donna Jason, John Miller, Chuck Jeffreys, Robin Shou, Gerald Klein, Leo Rocca, Richard Yuen, Yip Yim Hing


PLOT THICKENER:
The rich, white man might be the most overused villain archetype in the history of action movies. I won’t bore anyone with a laundry list of past examples, but trust me that it’s as redundant and uncomfortably long as a gag on Family Guy. For 1993’s Honor and Glory, Godfrey Ho assembled a cast of principals with which he’d double-dip later in the year for his American masterpiece, Undefeatable. As you’ll recall from our coverage of that film, Cynthia Rothrock was teamed with an unreasonably sweaty John Miller, but Honor and Glory finds them on opposite sides of the law. For my money, the result of this villain casting has become the stick by which all other rich white man villain roles should be measured.

Not everyone shares our enthusiasm for rich, white, male villains, though. Hotshot television reporter Joyce Pride (Jason) has staked her career on digging up sleaze and truth, and she’s just turned her sights on local bank executive Jason Slade (Miller). His shady business practices and alleged physical intimidation of investigators and regulators have made him a very controversial topic in the news media.

He’s a martial arts practitioner and a raging dickhead, but Slade still feels the need to employ an army of bodyguards headed by Jake Armstrong (Jeffreys) a well-dressed kung fu and boxing expert. Jake is constantly attached at his boss’s hip to assure that pesky, scandal-seeking reporters and photographers are put in their place. You know, the place where people in the news media get beat up for asking questions and cameras are smashed on sight (China, and occasionally, the Michelle Bachmann campaign trail). Jake has never really pondered the implications of Slade’s business activities but a recent flurry of media inquiries and assassination attempts has him rethinking the ethical value of his gig.

What’s a maligned financial figure to do when regulators are knocking at the door, assassins are around every corner, and a driven reporter is sitting on video testimony detailing the fraud you committed to the tune of $1 billion? First, you clear your calendar and cancel your prayer breakfast with ex-President Ronald Reagan. Then blow off some steam by angrily practice kung fu weapon forms on your back patio. But you want to stay productive, so you acquire a stolen activator to a nuclear weapon from an Arab businessman in a deal arranged by a white street pimp named Silk (Klein). Makes sense, right?

The latter point has drawn the attention of federal agencies, and Joyce’s FBI agent sister, Tracy (Rothrock) has come back from an assignment in Hong Kong to sniff out the stolen and extremely volatile goods. For most, black-market nuclear espionage would be enough on your plate but Tracy also uses her time at home to play peacemaker between her younger sister and their semi-retired workaholic covert agent father. Joyce resents her Pops for sending her to live with her mother while Tracy resided with her father following their parents’ separation. In itself, it’s not such a terrible thing unless you conclude that the living situation led her to pursue a career in a dying journalism industry, while Tracy probably got to learn about cool shit like waterboarding and handgun recoil management.

The film juggles its loose ends all the way to the finish line (no easy task) and while you won’t be left scratching your head, you might be left palming your face. This is a Godfrey Ho movie, after all. Things come to a head in a warehouse of all places, and you might be equally surprised to find that the climax is comprised of three different climactic fights intercut together! Ho breaks out all the stops: cardboard boxes, confounding cargo nets, and Jason Slade in a tracksuit drinking a Heineken while also handling a pair of Chinese meditation balls.

Understandably, Cynthia Rothrock gets top billing but this is more of an ensemble piece with emphases on the Joyce Pride and Jason Slade character arcs. As the chippy news reporter, Donna Jason does an admirable job and both her acting and fighting skills are more than competent. Also along for the ride as visiting Interpol agent Dragon Lee is Robin Shou but his scattered inclusion feels like he might have just been killing time before a red-eye flight. Ho juggles the characters as best he can, but it often takes away from the best elements of his movie: the action, and the villain.

John Miller really only had two big film roles in an otherwise brief career, but he should be thanking his lucky stars for the silver platter handed to him in Honor and Glory. He’s equipped with some of the best lines ever written for a martial arts villain. After Silk expresses his displeasure at Slade’s inclusion of an outside expert for their nuclear trigger deal, Slade coolly replies: “Do you know an atomic trigger from a Bulgarian dildo? Because I don't.” Pressed both internally and externally to step down from his post during his company’s scandal, he repeatedly screams: “only death can retire Jason Slade!” If you thought Warbeck from Expect No Mercy had the market cornered on megalomaniacal monologues in martial arts b-movies, think again. Slade reminds a second-guessing business associate that: “I have arrived at the top of the world. No man has control of more money. No man can fight me and live. No woman can share my bed and not be mine for life. I am like a god! I piss on you, from a great height.” Seriously, who writes this stuff? Oh right, “Herb Borkland.” Definitely a real person. No matter the creative source, Miller hits the role out of the park and it’s a welcomed change from his unbearably wholesome performance in Undefeatable.

Is it possible to discuss a movie featuring Chuck Jeffreys without mentioning his similarities in cadence and line delivery to Eddie Murphy? Well, shit -- I kind of just undermined myself so I guess not. With the Murphy factor turned down to a tawdry 4, Jeffreys is engaging as usual, and despite not getting a properly climactic fight, he still brings terrific athleticism to his action scenes. Director Godfrey Ho even hints at some martial artist romance between the Jake and Joyce characters in a scene where they lock chopsticks while battling over a lunch of green beans. HOT.

Similarly to Undefeatable, the fight choreography is above-average for an American martial arts film. Nothing here is as goofy and unhinged as that film’s sweaty basement fight climax, but the action moves at a good clip and everyone gets an opportunity to show their skills. For an obvious low-budget film, Ho makes decent use of different fighting locations and talent, but I’d be remiss if I failed to mention that the climax in Honor and Glory is a bit too abrupt and way too clean. I blame my inflated expectations on the protracted eye-trauma carnage of Undeatable, but I would guess that Slade’s comeuppance is fitting when you consider that most white-collar crimes are forgiven after nothing more than hefty fines and early retirement.

VERDICT:
While it doesn’t reach the same levels of camp and absurdity that audiences saw in Undefeatable, Honor and Glory makes a damn fine companion piece. You get a bit less Rothrock (bad), but a lot more Chuck Jeffreys (good) and villainous John Miller (incredible). It’s a bit of a shame that Godfrey Ho is better known for his cut-and-paste ninja shenanigans than (somewhat) original films like this, because he had the capacity to create an enjoyable action romp. Give it a watch, or risk having your “testicles peeled like grapes.”

AVAILABILITY:
Stuck in Save purgatory on Netflix, but pick your format poison (VHS or DVD) on Amazon and EBay.

5.5 / 7

Rage and Honor (1992)

PLOT: An Australian cop and a public school teacher team up to bring down an amazing mullet with a ruthless criminal mastermind. Yes, his misdeeds are, in fact, secondary to the crime against nature that is his hair.

Director: Terence H. Winkless
Writer: Terence H. Winkless
Cast: Cynthia Rothrock, Richard Norton, Brian Thompson, Terri Treas, Stephen Davies, Patrick Malone, Peter Cunningham, Kathy Long, Roger Yuan



PLOT THICKENER:
Despite fast getaways with Corey Haim and treks through jungles with Loren Avedon, none of the team-ups in Cynthia Rothrock’s films are as consistently fulfilling as those with Richard Norton. Armed with a chemistry perhaps born out of the collective experience of cutting their teeth as bad-ass gweilos in 1980s Hong Kong films, they’ve enjoyed at least 10 on-screen collaborations, more than a half-dozen of which have been released Stateside. The 1992 Terence H. Winkless film Rage and Honor is their first proper team-up, having left Keith Cooke and his Native American biker character behind in the universe of the China O’Brien franchise. No doubt, before peeling away in their car, they threw beer bottles all over the ground as a single tear rolled down Cooke’s face.

This is not a film in which the punny title contains nouns which are also the surnames of the main characters, but Rothrock does play a public school teacher, so I’d have to guess that she’s the “Rage” in this equation. As Kris Fairchild, she channels said rage in the most productive manner possible as a martial arts guru who gives regular lectures about “the art of martial science.” One of the guests for her latest demonstration of applied concepts is an Australian cop named Preston Michaels (Norton). As an observational guest of the local police department, he’s under strict orders not to blow his cover by doing any actual police work.

That arrangement lasts all of about five minutes and Michaels finds himself in hot water after seeing some crooked cops deal drugs and trying to bust them for it. The woman in charge, Rita (Treas), shoots one of the bumbling lawmen and plans to pin it on Michaels, but she overlooks one critical rule: you shouldn’t kill cops if there’s a high-school AV-nerd skate punk on the roof filming the entire thing with a Hi-8 camera. OK, fine. Sorry, you fucking nerds -- TAPING.

The nosy videographer just happens to be one of Fairchild’s students, and after taking him to a hospital, Michaels goes to her dojo for help. Before getting his ass kicked by the other crooked cop, the student apparently left the tape in the hands of a homeless friend who lives in an alley … because where else would you leave something that important? For Michaels, finding the tape means exoneration for the murder for which he’s now being sought by the authorities. Unfortunately, they’re not the only ones looking for it.

Desperate for assistance, Rita has reported back to her full-time peen and the criminal mastermind behind the drug-running operation, Conrad Drago (Thompson). He believes that killing Michaels -- the first-hand witness -- is more important than finding the tape. That’s arguable, but whatever he might lack in judgement, he makes up for in turtlenecks and long, ratty, glorious mullet hair. Despite the festive vibes given off by his mop, Drago harbors a dark and terrible secret. Yes, I know what it is. No, I will not tell you. It is simply too dark and terrible for this review.

Throughout most of its 90-minute runtime, Rage and Honor feels more like a loosely connected web of weird moments and wacky characters than a cohesive film. There’s definitely a plot here, but some of the motivations and events are so half-baked that it seems obvious the writers were just trying to move our heroes from one fight scene to the next. I don’t necessarily have an issue with that strategy, especially because of the can-do, kitchen-sink energy they use to do it. One scene finds Roger Yuan and Peter “Sugarfoot” Cunningham dressed to the nines and shaking down a sex worker for money, while another finds Kathy Long as one of several Amazonian glam-rock female assassins trying to kill Michaels. You get drugs, splosions, and even character actor Stephen Davies as a stockbroker-turned-junkie leading our heroes through the criminal underworld.

However, if you’re going to skimp on plot and logic for the purpose of ramping up your action quotient, those scenes need to be stellar. Outside of one good scene where Michaels and Fairfield are forced to fight each other by a ruthless gang of Vanity 6 rejects, the fight scenes are pretty straight-forward by DTV action standards. The fighters’ forms on their strikes are good and the selling is reasonable for the most part, but the fights are marked by a stilted feel that prevents any one from really sticking out from the pack. There is one kill that deserves special mention, where a character’s finger trigger is manipulated via pressure points and the end result is a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Pretty cool stuff, but my favorite action sequence in the film wasn’t a fight or a kill for that matter. During the back-end, Peter Cunningham’s character gets a hold of the incriminating tape and runs for the fucking end zone as Michaels gives chase. It wasn’t anything spectacular per se, but there’s something hilarious and sort of dangerous about pursuits where both characters are in ill-suited footware, like cowboy boots and dress shoes. I am a simple man.

In terms of characters, Rage and Honor is a bit unusual in that the teacher displays greater street smarts than the cop, ignoring the fact that Michaels is from Australia and very likely puts beets on his hamburgers. This gave the story a fish-out-of-water element but it was run into the ground by having every other character that Michaels meets make a crack about kangaroos or boomerangs. Just perform a terrible imitation of his funny accent and be done with it.

With Brian Thompson’s portrayal of Drago, we’re treated to one of the more awe-inspiring villain introductions in martial arts b-movies. After holding his palm over a lit candle, he struts across his tiny apartment and smashes to pieces a block of ice roughly the size of an adult sea turtle. All while listening to opera. You could almost hear him thinking aloud, “Yes, all of this is terribly impractical but smashing blocks of ice is very cinematic and oh, by the way, I’m really classy and rich as fuck.” Thompson tows the line between intellectual pontificator and crazy-eyed psycho but his behavior isn’t nearly as unhinged and maniacal as his hair. I’m going out on a limb here: it’s the most ridiculous mullet in cinema history, and by ridiculous, I mean amazing.

VERDICT:
This was a mixed bag. The positive components included the chemistry between Norton and Rothrock, a fun performance by Brian Thompson, and a seemingly endless parade of random b-movie martial artists in small roles. However, the story still manages to drag for stretches and the action is often overedited and shot from poor viewing angles. So what nudges Rage and Honor towards above-average territory for me? Hmm...let me think on it...

AVAILABILITY:
Amazon, EBay, Netflix.

4 / 7

When B-List Goes Hollywood: Ten Random Appearances by Martial Arts Actors in Mainstream Media

Partly because I have too much free time, but mostly because of this blog (which was more or less born out of having too much free time), I often pore over the filmographies of martial arts b-movie actors to track down films to review. Because of the niche skill-sets that these actors brandish, many of them have done little else but martial arts or action film and television work. Thus, most of my searches reveal no surprises. Every once in a while, though, I’ll stumble across an acting credit that’s unique because of the role the actor is playing, or because of the visibility of the production itself. When an actor jumps from PM Entertainment to an 8 PM prime-time television slot, it’s cause for celebration. Plenty of martial arts b-movie actors have logged screen-time in mainstream film and television productions. Some of these I knew and some were new to me, but compiled below is a short and random list of some of my favorite examples.


Dale Jacoby - Step by Step (1994)
The owner of one of the most incredible early-90s pompadours in action film history had few roles where he didn’t play a raging, Zabka-lite douchebag. So it’s no great surprise that he visited familiar territory for this supporting television role on a 1994 episode of TGIF’s saccharine stepfamily sitcom, Step by Step. Jacoby plays an evil and arrogant karate coach opposite Sasha Mitchell’s Zen-surfer martial artist, Cody, who’s trying to instill the fighting spirit in his nerdy step-cousin. The casting is a little less random when you consider that Jacoby and Mitchell worked together on Albert Pyun’s Kickboxer sequel in 1991.

Chuck Jeffreys - Pootie Tang (2001)
It was a bit of an inevitability that the Shaolin Wushu expert and Bloodmoon co-star would appear on this list. His list of various stunt credits in Hollywood productions is impressive and he’s one of the most prolific American fight coordinators of the modern film age. In a two-decade career that’s found him training Wesley Snipes for sword battles in the Blade films and choreographing fights in Spider-Man, perhaps none of his cinematic contributions were more memorable than selling the awesome power of the belt in the 2001 cult comedy Pootie Tang. Sine your pitty on the runny kine!

Jeff Wincott - The Wire (2008)
Jeff Wincott is probably the most “actorly” of the bunch on this list and has had a ton of mainstream film and television roles (The Invasion and last year’s Unstoppable among them). After combing through his credits, I’d narrowed it down to his role as an undercover "homeless" cop on HBO's The Wire, or his part in 2008’s Lake City, where he plays a menacing drug kingpin who slaps the shit out of Dave Matthews and strangles his balls, striking a mighty blow for jam-band haters everywhere. Odd as that might be, it gets no bigger than the series finale of the best television show in history.

Cynthia Rothrock - Eye for an Eye (1996)
More than any other part listed here, Rothrock’s role as a self-defense instructor is so short and fleeting that you will literally miss it if you blink. A Sally Field revenge thriller is pretty much the last place you’d expect to find a martial arts actor of Rothrock’s stature, but you can’t blame her for taking a break from the Herculean task of carrying Jalal Merhi to watchable movies.

Matthias Hues, Big Top Pee Wee (1988)
If you can find something more random than Matthias Hues running around in a lion-tamer’s outfit acting alongside Kris Kristofferson in this oft-reviled sequel to Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, I will give you my last can of Crystal Pepsi.

Loren Avedon - In Living Color (1991)
What makes Avedon’s cameo on the legendary Fox sketch-comedy show interesting is not that he plays a redneck cowboy, or even that he has to sell a terrible stomach punch by Damon Wayans (playing hilarious vocabulary manipulator Oswald Bates). Rather, this guest role came shortly after what arguably remains his best and most popular film, The King of the Kickboxers. Avedon shouldn’t feel too bad though; Wayans pilfered his co-star for a role in another mainstream production on this list.

Don “The Dragon” Wilson - Stealing Harvard (2002)
I was ready to put The Dragon down for his role as the gang leader who sets his day-glo goons on Robin in Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever. However, because the skull make-up turned him nearly unrecognizable, and “gang leader” isn’t quite so strange a part for a martial arts actor, I had to give top prize to his even more random role in the 2002 comedy Stealing Harvard. Wilson counted the late Chris Penn as one of his best friends in Hollywood and plays one of the Reservoir Dogs star’s drug gang thugs. Seeing him as a neon nightmare in a superhero summer blockbuster is pretty cool, but the viewing experience of the Bloodfist star trying to kick Tom Green’s head off while adorned in not much more than flip-flops and boxer shorts is fucking surreal.

Gary Daniels - The Expendables (2010)
There’s nothing unusual about a prolific DTV action star playing a supporting role in a Hollywood action production. What makes Gary Daniels’s role in the 2010 action throwback The Expendables unique is that Sylvester Stallone had literally dozens of actors he could have used to stoke the flames of action b-film nostalgia. While most of Gary’s action scenes in the film fell victim to choppy editing and the dreaded Hollywood shaky-cam, his inclusion suggests that Stallone has at least some admiration for DTV action of the 1990s. This might portend more interesting casting choices when you consider the rumor that Stallone’s vision for the sequel will be a “love letter to martial arts.” GASP.

Billy Blanks - The Last Boy Scout (1991)
I apologize to those of you who have been unable to fit this film into your viewing schedule at some point during the last 20 years, but Blanks might have the most impactful screen time of all the parts listed here. As star football running-back Billy Cole, Blanks has the joy of doing a bunch of PCP at halftime during a game and then shooting several would-be tacklers with a firearm during a breakaway running route in the film’s opening. After scoring a touchdown, he blows his brains out. Umm... Tae-Bo anyone?

 

Jerry Trimble - Heat (1995)
In his film debut, champion kickboxer Jerry Trimble played a mulleted drug dealer who gets his face burned with a space heater in The King of the Kickboxers. Five years later, he had a speaking part in some marginally successful crime drama directed by Michael Mann, and starring actors like Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Val Kilmer, Jon Voight, and Natalie Portman. Um...so...yeah. Jerry Trimble rules this list forever.

I know that I’ve missed a ton of equally deserving parts, so feel free to contribute your favorites in the comments below.