Fists of Iron (1995)

PLOT: A single dad with an engineering degree who works as an auto mechanic decides to pursue underground kickboxing after his friend is killed. Will his drunken has-been trainers teach him enough to avoid a similar fate?

Director: Richard W. Munchkin
Writers: Sean Dash
Cast: Michael Worth, Marshall Teague, Sam Jones, Eric Lee, Matthias Hues, Jenilee Harrison, Nicholas Hill, Lelagi Togisala, Michael DeLano, Art Camacho, Nick Koga

 

PLOT THICKENER 

Recent reports indicate that nearly half of college graduates got their first job outside their field of study. Taking a longer view, around one-third of college graduates will never work in the field in which they pursued their degree. I myself went to school for alternative medicine and now I work in the legal field. Hmm, or did I go to school and partake in self-medicating which wasn’t legal? It’s all a bit foggy (much like my dorm room at the time). The central character in 1995’s Fists of Iron may have wasted his college years by getting some newfangled engineering degree, but his job as an auto mechanic gives him enough money to live on the beach (in a mobile home), drink like a connoisseur (at a dive bar), and buy expensive clothes (baggy silk shirts and suspenders). Take that, higher education!

Dale (Worth) is the young and single father to an adolescent daughter. Things with his ex-lady didn’t work out, but Dale is a stand-up guy who made sacrifices to give his daughter a stable environment. He sold a business to help put his ex and his daughter in a proper home, while he lives the dream of residing in a mobile home on the beach like Riggs in Lethal Weapon. He makes his living as an ace mechanic during the day, and spends many of his evenings at a local watering hole with his best friend, Matt (Hill), getting into skirmishes with drunken riffraff. While attending a kickboxing event at the sprawling estate of a local fight promoter, the devious Peter Gallagher (Teague), Dale playfully reminds his pal of all the fighting he’s done on his behalf. Matt’s pride gets the better of him, and when a $2,000 open challenge to survive two minutes with Gallagher’s prized monster Victor Bragg (Hues) is announced, Matt is the first to throw his name in the hat. Surprisingly, he lasts the requisite 120 seconds and takes the cash prize home, but not without cuts, lumps, and internal bleeding to go along with it.

While recouping on the beach outside of Dale’s house, Matt succumbs to his injuries during a nap. Furious and filled with remorse over the death of his childhood friend, Dale does what anyone would do: he goes to the bar to get drunk. While there, he fends off a disgruntled customer from his car garage and then confronts two old-timers who were purportedly once fighters but now like to cut loose and observe instead of engage: Daniel (Lee) and Tyler (Jones). Dale asks them for their help so he can take on Gallagher and his fighters, but they rebuke this silly notion, and Tyler even stops Dale’s punch bare-handed when the young upstart gets frustrated. Because this is a 1990s kickboxing film, this resistance only lasts for about another 10 minutes. Before you know it, the pair of former fighters are instilling their wisdom in a fresh young fighter who’s gifted, as Tyler puts it, with “an iron fist.”

Due to this being such a cookie-cutter subgenre, I was prepared to hit the snooze button on this but was surprised at how much I enjoyed the film. The hero is sympathetic given his circumstances, Marshall Teague plays a terrific and dickish villain in Gallagher, and Sam Jones and Eric Lee have great chemistry with each other and with their trainee. This is one of those cases where a film becomes more than the sum of its parts because the performances are spot-on, and there's some humor peppered throughout to make these characters relatable. Sure, there are missteps. All of Gallagher’s fighters are dressed up in the most unintimidating K-Mart-level ring gear I’ve ever seen. It really undercuts the brutality of the monstrous Victor Bragg when he’s dressed in the same loose, star-print pants and matching cut-off sweatshirt that my mom used to wear to her aerobics class. The screenwriter went a bit too heavy on exposition-heavy dialogue at times, leading to some clunky, unnatural exchanges between characters. But when a movie features a line as unabashedly 1990s as “see the girls in the flowered vests to place your bets,” it’s hard not to jump on the bandwagon despite some flaws.

In an odd bit of serendipity, we’ve now covered consecutive films featuring actresses from the television show, Dallas. Jenilee Harrison -- who famously replaced Suzanne Somers on Three’s Company and played Jamie Ewing on Dallas -- appears here as a love interest to the story’s hero, much like her Dallas colleague Charlene Tilton did in Deadly Bet (see prior post). The tangled web doesn’t stop weaving there! The actress who replaced Harrison on Three’s Company, Priscilla Barnes, appeared in Talons of the Eagle as -- who would have guessed it? -- the hero’s love interest. Before he appeared in the Kickboxer sequels as David Sloane, Sasha Mitchell played the illegitimate son of J.R. Ewing on Dallas. Andrew Stevens -- who co-starred with Karen Sheperd in Blood Chase and directed Don Wilson in Virtual Combat -- played a hustler working for J.R. Ewing. Will the chopsocky film connections to Dallas ever end? More likely, it will puzzle and enthrall researchers for centuries.

Fight choreographer Art Camacho and director Richard Munchkin have worked together eight times, starting with 1991’s Ring of Fire and ending in 2004 in one of those hilarious chimpanzee action films. Either as a result of their cinematic chemistry or the efforts of a crafty second unit director, the fight scenes in Fists of Iron look quite good. Fighters' heads and the punches that hit them snap with intensity. Just about every fight is lively, with striking and countering combinations that make sense. Different fighters have distinctive styles and their abilities are showcased by camera angles that allow the choreography to breathe. Worth’s character tests his mettle against a variety of fighting mini-bosses, all the way up to his climactic fight with Hues’s heavy-hitting behemoth. Their match is fairly entertaining while still maintaining some semblance of believability -- the strategic advice dispensed by Dale’s teachers is actually deployed in the fight itself (and by extension, the choreography) and all too often, films fail to stick to this formula. Combine that with plenty of cutaway shots to people in the crowd dressed in the finest threads this era had to offer, and I’m a happy viewer.

VERDICT

Some will gloss over the plot of Fists of Iron and conclude, “another post, another kickboxing tournament film,” and they wouldn’t be wrong. The main difference between this film from many others with a similar story, is that this film has a lot of heart. It also has a bruised spleen, broken ribs, and cauliflower ear. The fight scenes are fun, the dynamic between the hero and his teachers is entertaining, and the film has some of the most amazingly weird underground fight tournament crowd shots I’ve ever seen. Dig it.

AVAILABILITY

Amazon, eBay.

4.5 / 7

 

Silent Assassins (1988)

PLOT: A scientist who holds the secret to a biochemical weapon is kidnapped by an ex-CIA agent and rogue criminal. Humanity's only hope to avoid germ warfare is a clumsy cop who eats raw hot dogs with peanut butter, a dude in red sweatpants, and the guy from L.A. Streetfighters who was clearly too old for high school.

Director: Doo-yong Lee, Scott Thomas
Writers: Lin Ada, Will Gates
Cast: Sam Jones, Jun Chong, Phillip Rhee, Mako, Bill Erwin, Linda Blair, Gustav Vintas, Rebecca Ferratti, Bill Wallace, Ken Nagayama
  
PLOT THICKENER
Sometime after the release of the iPhone, David Lynch sat down to record some bonus content for the special edition release of his film, Inland Empire. During that session, Lynch made a remark that people who watch films on mobile devices like their “fucking telephone” are cheating themselves out of the cinematic experience and need to “get real.” Some clever soul set this clip to music and uploaded it to YouTube as an iPhone commercial parody, and the rest is viral video history. I’m proud to say that I’ve never tried watching a full-length movie on my fucking telephone, and didn’t even purchase a smartphone until 2011. I have, however, watched a grainy VHS rip of 1988’s Silent Assassins on the 2.2-inch screen of a 5th-generation iPod Nano while enduring a five-hour bus ride somewhere on I-95. Sorry, David -- I was desperate.

DTV action films of the 1980s that dared to combine scientific elements with espionage often involved stolen microfilm, black market nuclear material, or secret formulas for dangerous but ambiguous weaponry. This film falls into the latter camp, where an elderly biochemist, Dr. London (Erwin), is kidnapped for his knowledge of a secret chemical formula that could be exploited for germ warfare. The abductors include a sultry killing machine, Miss Amy (Ferratti) and an ex-CIA agent named Kendrick (Vintas) along with an army of masked foot soldiers who may or may not be Iga ninja clan members. This lethal group gives no fucks, as evidenced by their snatching of not only London, but the small, Asian, and completely unrelated girl who he happens to be holding at the time of the abduction in a parking garage elevator. Let this be a lesson to all of you in the scientific community: if you’re working on anything remotely interesting to our nation’s enemies, they will not be deterred by your use of children as human shields. And don’t ask to hold people’s kids if they’re old enough to walk, it’s friggin creepy.

In hot pursuit of Kendrick is Sam Kettle (Jones), a wisecracking everyman cop who very nearly busted him just days before, during a sting operation. How did Kendrick get away? He ran to a warehouse pier and threw a baby in the water before boarding a speedboat. Why was a baby hanging out on a dock in the middle of the night, you ask? Who knows, but like any other good cop, Kettle dove in after it for the save. Upon discovering the baby was a doll, our hero actually yelled, “IT’S A DOLL!” Kendrick responded by cackling and firing his gun into the air as his boat sped away, because he’s the villain in a 1988 DTV action movie. Predictable.

The flipside to Kettle’s cocky can-do attitude is occasional meatheaded incompetence, so he obviously can’t be trusted to do things alone. He’s joined by Jun Kim (Chong) the distressed uncle of the kidnapped little girl, and he wants nothing more than to rescue her. This leads to some strange moments between the two men: Kim hides out in Kettle’s jeep, shows up randomly at police HQ for progress reports, and at one point finds himself sitting between Kettle and his wife, Sara (Blair) as Kettle eats a dinner of raw hot dogs and peanut butter while arguing about his increasing involvement in the case. When Sam and Sara get up from the couch to giggle and play grab-ass (they’re childless, so still having fun!) Kim discovers the majesty of heavily processed meat product combined with peanut butter. The heroes are eventually joined by Bernard (Rhee), the wise-ass son of a reformed Yakuza gangster and art collector (Mako). Bernard is also a Kendo instructor who is consistently flanked by at least one pretty, bleach-blonde California girl at any time.

In terms of production value, technical competence, and overall narrative coherence, this was a major step up for co-stars Philip Rhee and Jun Chong from their previous collaboration, L.A. Streetfighters. Multiple directors is usually an indicator of a glorious mess (see: Breathing Fire) but directors Scott Thomas and Doo-Yong Lee do a solid job. I’ll dock them a few points for some bad lighting choices in the climax, but they otherwise keep the action moving at a good clip and utilize varied settings. I was surprised to see legitimate character development in Bernard, turning from an obnoxious and flippant California ladies man to a vengeful whirlwind through metered motivating incidents.  It should also be mentioned that while the onscreen chemistry between Chong and Jones isn’t great, the character dynamic was well-formed -- Kettle’s cocky, rapid-fire chatter plays well with Kim’s more downbeat demeanor. You could just as easily see a guy like Roddy Piper sliding into the Kettle role, but perhaps the world was not ready for a Piper-Chong collaboration. Humanity is so backwards, at times.

The action, for the most part, is well-executed and everyone gets an opportunity to shine. There are shoot-outs, foot chases, vehicle chases, smashed windows, rooftop jumps, 'splosions, and plenty of hand to hand combat. Chong and Rhee, as fight choreographers, make great use of the production’s willing stuntmen and unlimited inventory of breakaway furniture. No book case or end table was safe! Rhee, in particular, has a memorable scene in a public bathroom against two goons that leaves no stall divider untouched. Thankfully, no one was taking a shit at the time, so this saved everyone from that unique brand of action movie embarrassment.

Oddly, this is the last cinematic appearance from Chong we’ll cover, and he goes out on a high note with his best (dramatic) performance. (Amazing titles aside, 2006’s Maximum Cage Fighting and 1976’s Bruce Lee Fights Back from the Grave are decidedly non-canon in our theme of Western martial arts b-movies of the 1980s and 1990s). Despite less than a half-dozen acting roles, Master Chong’s contributions to cinema as a martial artist can’t be overstated: his pupils have included action genre mainstays such as Phillip and Simon Rhee, Loren Avedon, Thomas Ian Griffith, Lorenzo Lamas, and even Sam Jones himself. Regardless of how you feel about them as dramatic actors, that’s an impressive crop of on-screen fighters to have helped to elevate to lead star status. His crowning cinematic achievement is probably the amazing gangland shit-show L.A. Streetfighters, truly one of our pantheon films. So we bid adieu to Jun Chong, a man who was so much more than jump kicks and an awesome moustache, but also a teacher, learner, and master of the fighting arts.

VERDICT
On a second watch at a more reasonable resolution, I really enjoyed Silent Assassins. The plot and reliance upon exposition is a little hamfisted at times, but it’s a breezy 90 minutes of enjoyable action and it features one of those b-movie casts that was only possible during the golden age of direct-to-video. While it’s not quite a hidden gem, Rhee, Jones, and Chong completists will definitely want to bump this up in their respective queues.

AVAILABILITY
Used VHS and non-R1 DVD copies are available on Amazon, but it’s also on YouTube in full. Not to be confused with Godfrey Ho’s Ninja: Silent Assassin.

4 / 7 

Expert Weapon (1993)

PLOT: An illiterate convict is sprung from death row and undergoes training to become an assassin. As it turns out, learning the finer details of killing people covertly is a hell of a lot easier than those prison GED programs.

Director: Steven Austin
Writer: Steven Austin, David Huey
Cast: Ian Jacklin, Sam J. Jones, Mel Novak, Joe Estevez, Julie Merrill, David Loo, Judy Landers




PLOT THICKENER:
If you chart the career trajectory of a randomly selected marital arts actor who started his or career in the late 1980s or early 1990s, you’ll notice one of two themes. The actor’s filmography either fits on a postage stamp, or it contains a long and winding road of bit parts and stunt work that may or may not have paved the way for lead roles. Examples of the former include actors Rion Hunter and Brad Morris, both of whom turned in great lead villain performances but never again returned to the action genre. On the flipside is a guy like Billy Blanks. He played uncredited henchmen or mini-bosses before graduating to main villain in The King of the Kickboxers and finally settling in as an action lead during his prime DTV years in the 1990s. After several supporting roles in films with Gary Daniels and Don “The Dragon” Wilson, former kickboxer Ian Jacklin answered a similar call for 1993’s Expert Weapon. Did his early film work prepare him for the burden of carrying a film? Um … we’ll get to that.

Jacklin plays Adam Collins, a disrespectful street tough who gets his jollies from carjacking with his partner, Rex (Loo). They botch their latest attempt so badly that the car never leaves its parking space and the duo is forced to flee the police on foot after Rex shoots the car’s female owner in the back. Collins doesn’t appreciate the cruelty of his partner’s methods; after all, he took a nicer approach by only punching her in the face. During the ensuing stand-off with the cops, Collins struggles with one of the officers over a gun and guess who gets shot in the process? No, not Carrot Top. Why would you say that? Random.

While waiting in prison on death row and contemplating the next day’s usual onslaught of high-fives and extra pudding cups as a branded cop-killer, Collins receives a visit from a kindly middle-aged priest who wishes to pray for his eternal soul. The hardened convict responds by whipping out his member and unleashing a weak stream of urine on the priest’s Bible. While most priests might show forgiving disappointment toward this act of disrespect, this man of the cloth kicks Collins in the pills and starts raining blows on him before telling him that he has a choice: come with him, or die by execution. Collins isn’t about to go anywhere with some creepy priest, so he chooses the latter.

As he later watches noxious vapors fill the gas chamber on the day of his execution, Collins falls unconscious, only to awaken in a state of confusion on a cot in a darkened room. So ... there’s a Hell? And you have to sleep on rickety cots? No, actually. Collins has been transported to an underground facility run by Janson (Flash Gordon’s Sam Jones) and his co-pilot and priest impersonator Frank Miller (Novak). They’ve selected Collins for training in a shadowy program designed to turn ruthless and undereducated killers into elite assassins, and Miller has six months to shine this rough stone into a lethal gem.

Is six months enough time to create an elite assassin out of a convict who can’t read or write? When you’ve got the right mix of drama training, computer classes, and karate lessons, it’s apparently more than enough. From the waking hours through the end of the night, Collins is exposed to a smorgasbord of highly specialized training. A drama class is run by the sultry Lynn (Landers) to teach recruits how to perform undercover roles convincingly. A computer class teaches recruits how to hack networks. On the violence front, a course in firearms is taught by the hammy Joe Estevez, and Miller handles the fighting instruction by teaching students karate.

After Collins executes his preliminary assignments and later eliminates a mafia narcotics dealer, he becomes conflicted about the welfare of the kingpin’s blind widow, Vicky (Merrill). In an effort to wipe away the sins of the carjacking which left an innocent woman dead, Collins takes the widow into his care and they go on the run.

So, yeah, this isn’t a good film. In most cases, having a man on fire appear within the first three minutes of your film is a good sign, but the training scenes are pieced together haphazardly and the film gets excessively talky once Jacklin’s character turns into Hitman with a Heart of Gold. It would be all too easy to hang the anchor of blame for this movie’s failures around the neck of Ian Jacklin; after all, he’s the star and gets the lion’s share of screen time. However, I think the combination of a bad script and Jacklin being too green dramatically to carry a film is ultimately what sinks this. Like many martial artists thrust into the cinematic spotlight during the golden age of American DTV films, Jacklin was a kickboxer first and dramatic actor second. I'm not sure you could expect him to convincingly perform dialogue like “Screw you, nobody tells me what to do. I'll see you in hell!” Are there any actors who could? OK, fine ... any actors besides Nic Cage? Jacklin delivers most of his lines with all of the wooden disbelief you’d expect out of a twenty-something non-actor betrayed by poor writing and direction.

The pairing of bad acting and poorly choreographed martial arts can lead to magical, off-kilter cinema, but Expert Weapon isn’t awful enough on either front to embody the kind of reckless DIY spirit typified by films like No Retreat, No Surrender or even City Dragon. The action is pedestrian with poor camera angles on the fight scenes and a lack of imagination in the choreography. The actual techniques of Jacklin’s offense look good, but the filmmakers fail to make his moves flow together and these scenes have a stilted vibe. The wooden staff fight near the end of the film between Collins and an old crime partner is a cut above the rest, but it’s below-average even when compared to similarly below-average films.

As far as mentors go, Mel Novak’s asthmatic karate instructor Frank Milller is pretty good. It’s somewhat interesting to note that his initial appearance in Adam’s jail cell as a priest wasn’t such a stretch dramatically; Novak has apparently been involved with prison ministry for many years. Whether or not he kicks pestilent inmates in the balls and recruits them into secretive assassination squads, we can’t be sure.

While the film overall is rather poorly written and acted, the filmmakers make a genuine attempt at contrasting the Miller and Janson characters. Janson is the brash drill sergeant, always chewing on a stogie and referring to underlings as maggots. When he’s not sucking on his inhaler, the asthmatic Miller attempts to instill flimsy facsimiles of Eastern philosophy during martial arts training sessions. Performance-wise, Jones and Novak are the best parts of this movie, but even their collective dramatic competence isn’t enough to offset the film’s various technical and narrative flaws.

VERDICT:
The only condition under which I could recommend Expert Weapon would be if someone asked me what movie might cause a spouse to withhold sex indefinitely. It’s a rough watch. There are a few small morsels of hokey violence and unintentional humor to savor, but not enough to satisfy a healthy craving for either element. For a kinder and gentler experience with the work of Ian Jacklin, try Death Match or his wigged-out turn as main villain in Don Wilson’s Ring of Fire 2.

AVAILABILITY:
Netflix, Amazon, EBay.

2.5 / 7