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

Nightmaster (1987)

PLOT: A group of high school students gets their kicks by competing in ninja-themed, capture-the-flag games at night. Coupled with their sunrise martial arts practices, this hectic pace leaves most of them snoozing in class during the school day. The result? They have no time to plagiarize homework or smoke dope behind the bowling alley.

Director: Mark Joffe
Writer: Michael McGennan
Cast: Tom Jennings, Nicole Kidman, Vince Martin, Joanne Samuel, Craig Pearce, Doug Parkinson, Laurence Clifford, Jeremy Shadlow, Alex Broun

PLOT THICKENER

As the competition for university admissions grows more fierce, the high school students of today must be more well-rounded and active than ever before. In addition to being a star athlete and successful academic, a student also needs to play a musical instrument, write for the student newspaper, and volunteer time outside of school if they hope to attend a top institution. The students in Mark Joffe’s 1987 film, Nightmaster, have a similar dearth of leisure time. Playing ninja dress-up and staying after school for kendo practice might not be pre-requisites for getting into elite colleges, but they provide discipline, improve cardiovascular conditioning, and teach you techniques for beating up drug dealers (if needed). These are life skills, people!

Every high school has their stereotypical cliques: the jocks, the nerds, the burnouts, the art kids, etc. Somewhere in that mix are kids who practice martial arts together. As students in Mr. Beck’s (Martin) before-school martial arts course, Amy (Kidman), Robby (Jennings), Simon (Shadlow), Brian (Clifford), and Henry (Broun) are one such crew. After then sleepwalking through a day of classes, they sharpen their skills at night by participating in an elaborate game of capture-the-flag at an abandoned factory. Gamers are cloaked in black hoods and garb and supplied with maps and various paintball-slinging devices; be the first one reach the “sanctuary” (a bell) without any paint on you, and you win. Losers who get marked with paint during the game are forced to wear it to school the next day as a badge of incompetence. Aside from all the mental exercise, physical exertion, and lack of sleep, it sounds like a good time.

The reigning champion in this game is Robby, and his advanced skills are the result of grueling, one-on-one instruction with Beck, a former military man and the only surviving member of his platoon. Lately, however, the intensity of the training has made Robby negligent in his schooling and his primary instructor, Ms. Spane (Samuel), believes that the influence of Beck (her former love interest) is having a negative effect on the the gang of martial arts misfits, Robby especially. Amy grows jealous over Spane’s concern for Robby, because she harbors romantic feelings for him. The school’s sleazy drug dealer, Duncan (Pearce), has his eyes on Amy and enjoys antagonizing Robby, but he also hangs around the martial arts practices for unknown reasons. Is Beck such a bad guy? Will Amy confess her true feelings to Robby? Are any of these people even ninjas?

Nightmaster is not a prototypical ninja film, and it may not qualify under most circumstances. The word “ninja” isn’t uttered by anyone during the film’s 87-minute run-time. The martial arts class curiously focuses more on gymnastics, and the only identifiable martial arts style depicted in the film (save for some kickboxing) is a kendo sparring match between Beck and Robby. Outside the night games, no one really dresses like a ninja or employs common ninja tactics or weapons (e.g., smoke, grappling hooks, shurikens). To put it in a modern context, these high school kids are cosplaying as ninjas, and Joffe is appropriating the ninja archetype to use it in a very specific way: masks and black garb make it easier for the gamers to slink around a dark factory at night. He’s evoking what viewers know about ninjas (cinematically speaking) but any connection to ninjutsu or ninjas is flimsy, at best. So, if it’s not much of an action film and not really a ninja film, what are we left with? A teen drama! ... *shudder* ...

When games of paintball and gymnastics routines are more frequent than fight scenes in an action movie, you’re gonna have a bad time. The personnel is more than capable -- Mad Max: Fury Road stunt players Rocky McDonald and Guy Norris are among the stunt performers here -- but the film fails to carve out enough space for any interesting action scenes for the stunt team to execute. The ninja games have some visual flourish with the misty factory and the neon colors of the paintballs, but the scenes aren’t edited in a way that builds any tension. The kickboxing scenes are a messy blur, and the kendo fight and a rooftop battle in the climax are the only fight scenes worth writing home about. To blame screenwriter Michael McGennan’s story or Mark Joffe’s direction would be speculative; there are a lot of reasons for why films handle action poorly. Regardless of the factors, the net effect of this failure of imagination is a dull pace that nearly sinks the film.

Perhaps the only reason anyone would know about this film in the first place is that Nicole Kidman is in it. She’s cool here -- likable with a good amount of screen presence despite being stuck in the “secretly fawning friend of Robby” role. She doesn’t get much screen-time in terms of the action scenes, though the epilogue references a development that puts her on equal competitive footing with her crush. Watching her early-career films like this one offers few clues about her future success, or the fact that she would one day urinate on Zac Efron. Sometimes you get hints of that glimmer in a star’s early performances, but this is not one of those cases. The rest of the cast is serviceable. Tom Jennings, of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome fame, is decent as a lead; his character ranges from arrogant to pissy and eventually humble, and he’s up for playing all of those tones. The real revelation, if there’s one at all, is Vince Martin channeling his inner Martin Kove to do his best John Kreese impression. He strikes the right balance between taskmaster and chummy and charismatic teacher, while letting some internal conflict bubble up at the appropriate times. I found myself engaged with his arc above the others despite some pretty ham-handed foreshadowing in the beginning of the film. Taken in total, the dramatic performances are the best part about the movie.

VERDICT

Well-acted chopsocky films are few and far between, and those without much martial arts may be even more rare. This combination makes Nightmaster a bit difficult to evaluate. On the one hand, it’s an overly talky film that plods along while lacking either the narrative weirdness or pace of action to make it compelling viewing. On the other hand, the acting is a lot better here than in most films of its ilk and it offers a mildly interesting subversion of the master-student dynamic. That alone makes it different a different brand of ninja film, though not one I’d go out of my way to recommend.

AVAILABILITY

Streaming on Amazon Prime! DVD on Amazon, eBay.

3 / 7

Weapons of Death (1981)

PLOT: When his sister is kidnapped by a group of hired hoodlums working for a crime boss, a martial arts instructor must save her. But he won’t do it alone. His martial arts pals come along to provide fighting expertise, and his deadbeat father comes along to provide awkward emotions and dad-strength.

Director: Paul Kyriazi
Writer: Paul Kyriazi
Cast: Eric Lee, Louis Bailey, Gerald Okamura, Bob Ramos, Ralph Castellanos, Alan Gin, Paul Kyriazi, Garrick Huey, Joshua Johnson, Gina Lau



PLOT THICKENER
In the right hands, almost any everyday object -- car keys, a doorknob, a stale baguette -- can become a weapon. We've seen this lesson repeated in countless 1980s self defense videos. In the hands of trained martial artists, though, these objects become even more dangerous. What would happen then, if you gave these same martial artists swords and spears instead of pineapples and hardcover books? For the answer, we turn to Paul Kyriazi’s 1981 film, Weapons of Death.

It seems almost far-fetched now, but there was once a time when San Francisco was filled with leather bars and martial arts schools instead of unaffordable housing and tech startups. Grizzled bikers brushed shoulders with liberal activists. And somewhere in the hills of Marin County, Danny Tanner was probably laying the foundation for his reign of terror. Our story begins in the dusty confines of one of the city’s scummiest booze joints, where a down-on-his-luck drunk named Carter (Bailey) gets bailed out of a raucous bar fight by his old troublemaking pal, Bishop (Castellanos). Fortune smiles upon Carter when Bishop offers him a spot on a team running a special sort of errand for local crime boss, Foon (Gin).

Upon meeting the gangster at his hide-out in the desert near the woods (!?) they’re tasked with kidnapping the daughter of a Chinatown businesswoman, Sue-Lin (Leemoi), who has refused to pay Foon protection money. Her oldest son, Eric (Lee), runs a martial arts school, her youngest son David (Huey) is a skilled archer, and her daughter Angela (Nancy Lee) rarely speaks but giggles a lot. They’re all over the age of 16, so you’d expect them to have real jobs or at least more promising career paths, but alas -- this is what often happens when fathers skip out on their family responsibilities. (No offense to you shitty dads out there).

Despite the best efforts of this fighting family, the band of mercenaries invade their home and kidnap Angela. During the confusion, Eric is distracted by Foon’s main muscle, Chong (Okamura), not just because he’s confused by Chong’s black leather and turtleneck in 70-degree weather, but because Chong is a really good fighter! You’d expect him to overheat in those threads but he presents a fierce challenge to Eric in short time, foreshadowing a climactic showdown. In the aftermath, Eric wants to pursue the goons immediately with David and martial arts friends, Joshua (Johnson) and Paul (Kyriazi), but Mama Bear has other plans: she’s calling her old flame, Curt (Ramos) for support.

As Eric and company gear up to track down his sister and her kidnappers, the addition of Curt becomes something of an emotional monkey-wrench in these plans. This is the man who skipped out on his mother. A person whose crude remarks and flippant prejudice grate everyone around him. A man whose fondness for Hawaiian shirts is a crime against fashion. Eric isn’t the only one contending with internal conflict as he heads into battle, though. Joshua is skittish about the lethal force this situation will require. David doesn’t completely trust his archery skills. Paul is contemplating his supporting second-banana status in this mission despite the fact that Angela is supposedly his girlfriend. Such issues are no easier for the kidnappers. Carter needs the money, but his heart might be too pure for this brand of crime. Foon's squad of lady ninjas are more than happy to fight, but will they turn their weapons against the obvious gender pay gap that only serves to inflame a tense work environment? Overall, Kyriazi does a good job injecting his characters with believable motivations, and there’s even a fairly sordid family twist as we approach the conclusion.

But are there any actual weapons of death in Weapons of Death?

Yes. So many goddamn weapons of death. In a throwback to the American Western, Paul opts for the six shooter. Despite some initial hesitation, Joshua warms up to the lethal length and pointy death of the spear. David loves the sniper-like precision of his bow-and-arrow, and Eric can fill both hands with swords like few others. At various points, enemies wield guns, knives, and swords, and Chong even breaks out the dreaded tiger claw for the climax fight. Kyriazi does well by placing these weapon selections in context throughout the film, and the various callbacks and character development we see while the characters use them was a nice touch. Going into a film like this from an era when martial arts movies were very hit-or-miss, I couldn’t shake the suspicion that the film wouldn’t live up to its actual title. Thankfully, the filmmakers deliver. The orchestral score adds an epic feel to the exterior fight scenes and the action has room to breathe for the most part.

Eric Lee has had a long and productive Hollywood career performing stunts and acting in supporting roles. Fortunately, he’s the centerpiece here and despite some occasionally clunky line delivery, he’s a total house of fire. His character is jaded by his upbringing and turned reactive and violent by the circumstances, but he also has a cool toughness as evidenced by an early sword lesson to his kung fu students (“a sloppy mental attitude turns into a sloppy sword”), and a legitimately tense scene where he dares David to shoot an arrow at a target which he happens to be holding inches from his face. He’s not quite Martin Riggs levels of crazy, but the characterization was a far cry from the jokester I’ve seen in other films, and he gets plenty of scenes to show off the fighting skill that made him one of martial arts’ most famous kata champions.

VERDICT
Like a limp body flying over the bar and smashing only the bottom-shelf vodka, this movie comes out of nowhere to surprise and delight. This is the sort of drive-in fare that passed me by due to generational differences, but I’d always stumble upon during weekend afternoons on cable TV. Exploitation-era men-on-a-mission kung-fu throwdown in the woods… on a budget. Recommended.

AVAILABILITY
View it online at YouTube or try to find a hard copy on Amazon.

4 / 7

Contemporary Gladiator (1989)

PLOT: A kickboxing karate-fighting college drop-out attempts to establish his identity in both the material and spiritual worlds. He can also get you a great deal on shag carpeting.

Director: Anthony Elmore
Writer: Anthony Elmore
Cast: Anthony Elmore, George M. Young, Julius Dorsey, Donny Bumpus, Traci Cloyd






PLOT THICKENER
Of all the adjectives one could pick to describe super-heavyweight kickboxing champion Anthony “Amp” Elmore, sincere would have to be at the top of the list. His 1989 film Contemporary Gladiator (also known as Iron Justice) was his only cinematic effort, and while we can speculate about the reasons for that, no one can deny that Elmore made a personal and genuine film. Not unlike low-budget vanity projects such as City Dragon and Miami Connection, Contemporary Gladiator situates its star’s personal worldview against a variety of roadblocks and internal conflicts. Whereas Stan Derain believed tank-tops and bad rapping could score lots of chicks, and Kim believed taekwondo was the key to success and happiness, Elmore’s dream was to “sell kickboxing to the world.”

Even the biggest dreams have humble beginnings. Anthony plays a vague version of himself as a struggling college student and dedicated martial artist empowered by Afrocentrist politics during what appears to 1970s Memphis (the afro haircut and dashiki were giveaways). He lives with his adoring mother and controlling father, the latter of whom sees his politics and hobbies as one big waste of time. Anthony finds comfort in his all-black karate school but it’s intense, as evidenced by his final black belt test where he’s required to punch the floor. “Floor not hit back,” you might say. To which I’d respond, “oh, have you ever punched a floor? Because that shit fucking hurts.”

As the turbulent 1970s give way to the consumerist 1980s, Anthony has traded in college politics and his dashiki for a suit and a career as a successful carpet salesman. He owns a house, has a loyal girlfriend, and he even got a new haircut. He still practices karate, and wins a first-place trophy in a contact tournament. When he brings the prize back home to his karate school, though, his sensei (Dorsey) embarrasses him in front of the entire class, beating him without mercy and literally stripping him of his black belt for fighting competitively. Not long after that, his girlfriend breaks off their relationship. Anthony finds himself at his lowest emotional point.

He doesn’t seek answers to his troubles at the bottom of a bottle. Nor does he run through the wide open field of loose women. He finds himself in the company of someone who does both, though. Kingfish (Young) is a local shit-talker, hustler, and apparent friend of Anthony’s family. After he wakes up hungover on Anthony’s couch and watches a few kickboxing matches with him, he promotes himself to the position of Anthony's spiritual adviser and de facto manager. In no time at all, the pair are united in a mission to turn Memphis into a hotbed of championship kickboxing. Will Anthony turn his dream of establishing kickboxing as a serious sport into reality? Will Kingfish succeed in his desire to turn Anthony’s dream into a never-ending parade of fat asses? (His words, not mine).

Damn, where to start? No discussion of Contemporary Gladiator can end without noting the contributions of George M. Young as Kingfish, the horniest spiritual adviser in the history of cinema. He chases skirts, he cuts great promos, and he even sings the national anthem. The fight scenes -- almost all of which take place in the ring -- appear to be taken from actual fight footage from Elmore’s career. That said, there’s not much creative choreography of which to speak. The lighting is mostly horrendous, and the ADR is entirely horrendous -- it sounds like it was recorded at the bottom of the ocean. There’s also an odd fixation on mixing music in over scenes of dialogue and the result is (usually) an undecipherable mess. In news that should surprise no one, I loved it.

Elmore is a kickboxer first, a Buddhist second, and an actor probably eighth or ninth. I can’t decide if this is a compliment, because there might be lots of things he considers himself before actor comes up (e.g. water color painter? good bowler? fun dad?) All of this is to say his acting isn’t great and has the markings of a rushed production and someone trying to remember his lines instead of using inflection to suggest human emotion. This trait isn’t unique to Elmore but I found it was most egregious with him. Some might be interested to know that in the years since this film, Elmore has embraced the Internet and fortified his online presence with a fairly prolific YouTube channel through which he publishes music videos, his old kickboxing matches, serious lectures on Afrocentric Buddhism, and this very film. Happy hunting!

This is a movie which teaches us that even if your father hates your lifestyle choices, and your karate teacher threatens homicide over your accomplishments, and your girlfriend sees no future with you, and everyone around you disagrees with everything you do except for a mildly perverted alcoholic spiritual adviser, you should still pursue whatever you want. I think most of us find these circumstances relatable. 

VERDICT

It’s no technical marvel but Contemporary Gladiator joins the ranks of other films which had no business being as entertaining as they were. Created during a time when the only thing that prevented champion kickboxers from appearing in movies was sheer will, this is a unique artifact from a strange era. Recommended for adventurous viewers. 

AVAILABILITY

YouTube and Amazon (VHS).

3.5 / 7

The Last Ninja (1983)

PLOT: A group of terrorists infiltrates an important business meeting with national defense implications, and threatens to kill the hostages unless their demands are met. The tactical force charged with rescuing the hostages passes the buck to a guy who may or may not be a ninja, but definitely is an art and antiques dealer who can sniff out a good deal on a 19th-century chaise lounge.

Director: William A. Graham
Writer: Ed Spielman
Cast: Michael Beck, Mako, Richard Lynch, Nancy Kwan, John McMartin


PLOT THICKENER
Among other important lessons during my upbringing, my father taught me how to throw a football, hook live bait on a fishing line, and draw both cat and dog cartoon faces with relative ease. These details may strike most readers as ordinary fixtures of an American male’s formative years, but they’re totally boring to anyone who grew up as an orphaned caucasian adopted by a middle-aged Asian martial arts master. Michael Beck’s character in 1983’s The Last Ninja looks at your idyllic childhood and does a sarcastic jerk-off motion before disappearing behind an exploding cloud of ninja smoke. After all, playing catch can’t hold a candle to throwing your first shuriken into a tree.

From where did this whiteboy karate fantasy originate? I would think that Kwai Chang Caine in the 1970s Kung Fu television series served as the first model for orphans learning fighting skills under the tutelage of their older Asian masters. (Other examples include the protagonists in Bloodsport and American Ninja, respectively). It may surprise no one to learn that Ed Spielman, creator of the original Kung Fu series, wrote the screenplay for The Last Ninja, an ABC TV pilot that never took hold as a regular series. Did Spielman go to the well of head-scratching cultural appropriation once too many times? Fuck yeah he did, but read on anyways.

Michael Beck (Swan of The Warriors fame) plays Ken Sakura, an art and antiques collector who makes his home in California. By all indications, he lives on a sprawling estate with his step-sister, Noriko (Kwan), but this detail puts no cramp in his debonair life of bachelorhood. When he’s not appraising vases or charming strangers at soirees, Ken is a heroic ninja who breaks up dope rings and captures serial killers and rapists. Only Noriko knows of his secretive triple life of art-collecting, man-whoring, and crime-fighting.

Mr. Cosmo (McMartin), the government agent who was legitimately born with that name, may have an inkling about Ken’s post-work activities. He pays Ken a visit one afternoon and details a series of correlations between Ken’s whereabouts and the captures of criminals on various dates by a mysterious ninja. Despite the implication, Ken laughs it off and chalks it all up to (a shitload of) simple coincidences. Not to be dissuaded, Cosmo intends to reveal Ken’s vigilante deeds to the newspapers unless said ninja hero infiltrates a Dallas skyscraper where a group of defense industry employees is being held hostage. The ninja, quite simply, is the only chance they have to save them.

Not that head kidnapper Dr. Gustav Norden (Lynch) is such a bad guy. He’s professorial (tan corduroy coat), direct (“the mobile laser system, that’s what we want”), and extremely sweaty. A disgruntled former colleague of his hostages, Norden simply wants the plans for some nondescript military technology to benefit himself and his kidnapping brethren instead of the annoying assholes with whom he used to work. Don’t we all want that at the end of the day?

For the remainder of the story, Ken’s past is slowly revealed through a series of flashbacks. As a newborn, he was left on the doorstep of the Sakura family during a stormy night. After his biological sons are killed in the Korean War, Mataro Sakura (Mako) has no direct heirs for his ninjitsu wisdom, but tosses baby Ken into a pool as a test of his suitability for training. Ken survives! Mataro doesn’t get arrested for attempted infanticide! Mataro kicks adolescent Ken out of the house for a week to teach him humility. He gives him a kitten upon his return to teach him about balance. He performs sleight-of-hand tricks to teach him about misdirection. He shows him that the catch and release of a fly is more skillful and virtuous than catching and killing it. I’m sure there was an awkward talk about “the birds and bees” that involved a katana blade and a watermelon, but it probably ended up on the cutting room floor. THANKS REAGAN.

It should be noted that the showdown between Ken’s ninja persona and Norden’s gang arrives with about 20 minutes remaining in the 93-minute film. Most would agree that’s not a lot of time for insane ninja action. Ken has only two fight scenes that I can recall, and the most notable aspect of the action scenes is the raspy and oddly cosmic voice he uses when talking from under his mask. (Imagine Christian Bale’s Batman voice hooked up to a reverb pedal). Instead, the emphasis here is on the training and origins underpinning the central character -- keep in mind this was a pilot for a TV series -- and the central relationship between a father and son. There’s roughly a 60-40 split between flashbacks and “present day” footage, so viewers should be prepared for a lot of bouncing back and forth. And more clever disguises and silly voices than the transformation scene from Mrs. Doubtfire.

If you peruse the user reviews on the film’s IMDb page, you’ll notice that it’s almost universally praised. However, it’s striking that many of the users recall seeing the movie when it originally aired, and I can’t help but feel that nostalgia may have influenced their opinions. (No judgement: nostalgia was the primary motivation for this entire site)! Despite my dissatisfaction with the action elements, I found myself really engaged during Mako’s scenes and I enjoyed Richard Lynch’s scenery chewing, because the man chews the fuck out of scenery. That said, these are decidedly non-ninja reasons to enjoy this particular film, which makes it a bit of an outlier: the unspectacular character study dressed up in ninja’s clothing.

VERDICT
The Last Ninja offers none of the harebrained plot points we’re accustomed to seeing in most American ninja films. Instead, it features a compelling character study with a well-written father-and-son relationship at its core. The action, while infrequent, emphasizes realism and illusion over the more fantastical visual tropes that would come to epitomize the 1980s ninja film (lasers, decapitated limbs, unexplainable flying). While not without its issues, this is a decent standalone “origin” story that also portended an entertaining TV series. It’s a bit of a shame it didn’t get an actual run, but I feel the same way about Poochinski, so I may not be the best evaluator of failed TV pilots.

AVAILABILITY
As an early 80s TV film, it never had an official home video release on VHS or DVD. There may be gray market copies out there, but YouTube is your friend. Go forth and plunder.

3.5 / 7

Angel Town (1990)

PLOT: Gangs have taken over the streets of a Los Angeles neighborhood. While the bullets fly and the blood flows, residents are paralyzed by fear. Their best chance to survive the violence? An engineering grad student from France.

Director: Eric Karson
Writer: S. Warren
Cast: Olivier Gruner, Peter Kwong, Tony Valentino, Theresa Saldana, Frank Aragon, Gregory Cruz, Mark Dacascos



PLOT THICKENER
Cinema has demonstrated time and time again that it’s tough being the new kid in town. From Yojimbo to Mean Girls, the appearance of a new personality can throw the existing social order into chaos. Allegiances are disrupted, new lines are drawn, and all manner of conflict can arise. If director Eric Karson’s 1990 film Angel Town shows us anything, it’s that being the new kid is a lot easier if you’re a kickboxer.

French fighter and Jalal Merhi favorite Olivier Gruner stars as Jacques, an Olympic athlete, martial artist, and engineering brainiac who moves to Los Angeles to enroll in a graduate-level engineering program at a prestigious school situated near a rough part of the city. Jacques takes a bit too long getting his butt overseas ahead of the semester start -- delaying his departure to visit his dad’s grave site, and apparently have sex with his girlfriend on top of it -- because by the time he arrives in the States, all the grad student housing has filled up.

His search for room and board in the surrounding neighborhood leads him to the home of a single widow, Maria (Saldana), who lives with her teenage son, Martin (Aragon) and elderly mother. It doesn’t take Jacques long to learn of their daily struggles. Gangs go to war with each other in broad daylight. Two “cholo” gang members living in a bus near the house regularly harrass Jacques and Maria. Worse yet, the same gang, run by the villainous Angel (Valentino), is attempting to recruit Martin to join their ranks. Will Jacques be able to save Martin from the clutches of L.A. gang life? Can he work with the allies in the neighborhood -- especially the military vet in the wheelchair who’s always on his front porch staring into the void of urban decay -- to push them out for good? Most important, can he do all of this while maintaining a grade point average sufficient to remain in his master’s degree program? Man, grad school is tough! (AUTHOR’S NOTE: I attended grad school and lived in an overpriced building on a tree-lined street about an eight-minute walk from the subway -- my next-door neighbors were in an all-female bluegrass band).

Alleged Mark Dacascos appearance where....shit, is that Steven Tyler in the backseat?

While Karson had done “bigger” b-movies such as The Octagon previously, I think this was an interesting evidential artifact given that L.A. gang films were still very much in their infancy as a cinematic setting (oddly, East L.A. Warriors beat them to the punch about a year earlier). The plot point to transport a French kickboxer to Los Angeles via grad school feels shoehorned, but to his credit, Karson uses this to demonstrate the gentrifying effect that a college campus can have on the surrounding area with some pretty violent set-pieces between gangs and students. It’s not explored with any real depth, but it’s still an idea that I probably should have never had while watching a film like this.

There were at least two huge nostalgic elements that really resonated for me and helped to elevate the film. The first was seeing Big Trouble in Little China veteran Peter Kwong as Henry, Jacques’s friend and local martial arts master. It wasn’t a huge role, but he gets a good amount of dialogue and shows his martial arts skills in a few select scenes, including a fairly good climax. Henry also presides over a dojo that, by all indications, is the same filming location that Corey Yuen used for No Retreat, No Surrender! Usually, I’ll pause a film to take an arbitrary screenshot or look at an usual background player. In this case, I was comparing the aesthetic qualities of two dojo screenshots from two separate films because that’s the kind of obsessive, dedicated, insane, cinematic loser that I am.

While not quite a pre-requisite, real-life badassery was something of a premium feature of direct-to-video martial arts stars of the 1980s and 90s. Few movies featuring Don “The Dragon” Wilson made it through the first eight seconds of the opening credits without mentioning his WKO, ISKA, or WKA kickboxing championships. The same could be said of Jerry Trimble and his PKA and PKC accolades. (Kickboxing affiliations are to Roger Corman movie stars what post-nominal abbreviations are to career academics).

Look around the landscape from that era, and you won’t find many actors better suited to a life in action movies than Olivier Gruner. A former member of the French Marine Nationale with training in scuba diving, skydiving, and climbing, he would go onto various roughneck positions (e.g. bouncer, ski patroller) that paved the way for eventual professional kickboxing glory. “OG,” as he would come to be known, apparently grew tired of these tawdry skills, and added surfer and professionally-licensed helicopter pilot to his credentials later on. By all indications, this was a guy who could do it all, so why didn’t he get bigger?

Similar to fellow European Daniel Bernhardt, who took up the mantle for the Bloodsport franchise, Gruner suffered from a fairly obvious Jean Claude Van Damme problem. His films certainly never aped Van Damme’s output outright, but it’s still hard to look at his leading vehicles without thinking of his mainstream Belgian counterpart. Is there a spot for Gruner in the annals of DTV action cinema without JCVD? I would say yes, but his career arc might look a lot different had the Muscles from Brussels not happened first. Both were French-speaking Shokotan karate and kickboxing practitioners who happened to be born in 1960, both worked with Albert Pyun on dystopian action films, and both displayed a fondness for genre-hopping (though Gruner’s filmography indicates a stronger predilection for science fiction and military themes).

VERDICT
In just his first time out, Gruner is solid. He has an easygoing demeanor and despite his reputation as stiff, his dialogue never felt all that forced; I daresay he comes off as somewhat charming. Karson directs with a steady hand, but the “take back the neighborhood” elements are a bit meandering and the lack of a strong and physical villain detracted from the story a bit. The action scenes are generally pretty good and it’s a logical jump-off point for Gruner first-timers and completists alike.

AVAILABILITY
Used VHS copies on Amazon or good ol' YouTube.

3.5 / 7

Trained to Kill (1989)

PLOT: Following the murder of their father, two brothers must combine their skills and train together to fight his killers. Aided only by dirtbikes, denim, and a single spiked fingerless glove, they must "prepare," "prevail," and "survive," as dictated by the rock song that plays during their training montage.

Director: H. Kaye Dyal
Writers: H. Kaye Dyal, Arthur Webb
Cast: Frank Zagarino, Glen Eaton, Robert Z’Dar, Marshall Teague, Harold Diamond, Henry Silva, Ron O’Neal, Lisa Aliff, Chuck Connors, Kane Hodder


PLOT THICKENER
About eight years ago, I went on vacation in the Caribbean and found myself toweling off on a beach in St. Thomas. It would have been easy enough to drip-dry, because there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and it was at least 90 degrees. I observed a heavy-set man jogging back and forth along the shoreline for at least 45 minutes straight. He was sweating harder than Kobayashi speed-eating ghost peppers. Why exercise so rigorously out here? The lack of shade and the uneven ground of the sand seemed like a surefire recipe for ankle sprains and heat stroke.

Beach training has been a fixture in action cinema ever since Balboa and Creed sprinted and splashed and bro-hugged their way into our hearts back in Rocky III. We’ve actually seen it here at least once before and I have no doubt we’ll see it again, but 1989’s Trained to Kill beach training montage may have shattered the mold with a four-minute sequence focused on the film’s two half-brother heroes. It’s an exceptional mix of varied exercises like abdominal leg throws and push-ups, blatant shirtlessness, an upbeat 1980s rock song, and gripping dramatic heft. Director H. Kaye Dyal uses the song’s bridge not to show his heroes meditating, but rather to show one of the brothers sucking face with his girlfriend.

The brothers find themselves on said beach following their father’s death. Ed Cooper (Connors), fresh off covertly rescuing his twenty-something Cambodian-born son, Sam (Eaton) from the jungles of Southeast Asia, had brought his boy home to sunny California. The escape doesn’t go unnoticed, however, and enemies from Cooper’s past reconvene. Following a coordinated jailbreak from a prison van, drug traffickers Walter Majyk (Z’Dar) and Felix Brenner (Teague) are reunited with cohort Loc Syn (Diamond) and gang leader Ace Duran (Silva). Old military buddies with a shared interest in smuggling heroin back to the U.S. during the Vietnam War, they want to get revenge on the man who dropped a dime on them and got Majyk and Brenner imprisoned over a decade ago: Cooper. Their other objective is to steal a small statue believed to be in Sam’s possession -- Duran has it on good authority that it contains diamonds with a black market value of $5 million.

Sam is initially guarded due to his upbringing in a war-torn hellhole, and is just getting to know his new family members, including a brother named Matt (Zagarino). This process lasts all of about six hours before his parents are gunned down (Mrs. Cooper) and set ablaze (Mr. Cooper) during a night-time home invasion by a masked and heavily armed Duran gang. While Matt was busy necking with his girlfriend Jessie (Aliff) off in some dingy back-seat, Sam is knocked unconscious by Loc Syn, but not before revealing the location of the mysterious box he brought to the States.

An emotional funeral at sea finds the brothers at odds. Sam reveals that he vaguely remembers who assaulted the Cooper home, and Matt is pissed that he didn’t divulge this to the authorities. He believes the brothers should tell the cops what they know, let the system work and justice will prevail. Sam, however, convinces Matt that the only way to eliminate trained killers is to go on the attack and fight them like animals. The brothers enlist the help of their father’s alcoholic military buddy, George Shorter (O'Neal) and he promises to train them as quickly as he can, with no assurances of sobriety. Will the brothers be up to snuff the next time they tangle with Duran and his death squad?

The span of film genres represented by this cast is nothing short of incredible. In no particular order, we’re gifted with The Rifleman (American Western TV), Super Fly (blaxploitation), Johnny Cool (crime), Maniac Cop (horror), Jimmy from Road House (action), and even Jason Voorhees (musical romantic comedy). Everyone plays their part to perfection. The brothers are convincing as fiery upstarts hell-bent on vengeance, and Eaton in particular is a lot of fun as Sam. While older brother Matt opts for denim and Hawaiian shirts or no shirt at all, Sam is fond of what appears to be a Members Only jacket and a single, spiked fingerless glove. Homeboy won’t even take it off when he’s prepping root veggies for dinner!

The action in this film is diverse and well-executed with a romping brand of energy. We get stalking night-time action, a Japanese-influenced sword fight, wild shoot-outs, rocket launcher attacks, dirtbike chases, dirtbike crashes into cardboard, carsplosions, hand-to-hand fights, throat rips, and shark tooth slashes. During a scene in a Las Vegas casino, Loc Syn gets so lathered up by the appearance of the brothers that he pushes a waitress, knocks out two security guards, and then throws himself off a balcony and goes crashing through a poker table just because it’s more fun than taking the stairs. The climax finds the brothers baited into a complex where Jessie is adorned in ragged clothing, chained to a post-apocalyptic jungle gym, and surrounded by flames. It’s epic on a budget, but epic nonetheless.

It’s impossible to discuss this film without highlighting Loc Syn, played by former Floridian kickboxing champion and Andy Sidaris favorite, Harold Diamond. A former military man by the name of Andrew Wilson, he went insane during his service, fell under the tutelage of Duran, and started calling himself Loc Syn for no reason other than it sounded cool and provided a 50% savings in syllables over his birth name. According to George, Syn’s mind “went south” and he started killing for the pure fun of it. He’ll fill both hands with wakizashis while grinning madly, but would rather rip out your larynx barehanded or clench a shark tooth in his front teeth and slash your throat up close. To his credit, Loc Syn refuses to let his sociopathic tendencies dictate his sartorial choices. He wears an array of threads -- fedoras, steel-tipped cowboy boots, dark shades, and tank tops with designer blazers -- in letting his fashionable freak flag fly. That he has virtually no lines in the movie makes him all the more intimidating; he’s seated between diabetes and high-blood pressure at the table of silent killers.

The rest of the villains are up to the task of providing both comic relief and teeming mounds of exposition. As military major and gang leader Ace Duran, Henry Silva showed up for probably no more than two days of shooting, but spouts enjoyable lines and appears to be having fun with the material. Other than a climactic scene where he rides the skies in a helicopter and rains shotgun blasts down on our heroes, he tends not to get his hands dirty, leaving that work to the aforementioned Loc Syn, and Brenner and Majyk. The latter pair have fantastic chemistry on screen, cracking jokes when they’re not talking shop in the goofiest terms possible. While hatching their plan to take out the Cooper brothers, Majyk strokes his machine gun and coos, “I love this piece, this baby’s real hard,” to which Brenner replies, “All right, let’s rock.” Did I mention that Majyk is stroking said firearm at a strip club in the middle of the day? That the onstage stripper is dancing like she’s at a family member’s wedding and “Don’t Stop Believin’” just came on? And that Kane fucking Hodder is working the door as a mulleted bodyguard?

VERDICT
I can’t say it any more plainly: if you love weird and wild action cinema of the 1980s, you owe it to yourself to find a copy of this film. It falls into that elusive category of “films that must be rewatched dozens of times until your eyes fall out” to gain an appreciation for all the weird character ticks, imperfectly hilarious action scenes, and preposterous situations it has to offer. The cast alone might be the genre movie fan’s wet dream but the movie overall delivers in spades. Highly recommended.

AVAILABILITY
Difficult but not impossible. The film never made the leap to DVD, but VHS copies (and rips, certainly) are out there.

6 / 7

Deadbeat at Dawn (1988)

PLOT: A gang leader tries to give up the thug life to be with his woman, only to have his rivals kill her. Desperate and vengeful, he has two options: kill the gang that killed his girl, or go to community college to get an associate’s degree in nursing.

Director: Jim Van Bebber
Writer: Jim Van Bebber
Cast: Jim Van Bebber, Paul Harper, Marc Pittman, Ric Walker, Megan Murphy, Bill Stover



PLOT THICKENER
Plenty of folks will see this title pop up in their feeds and say, “why the hell is my favorite 1980s cult-psych-gang war-druggie-based-in-Ohio-gore fest getting play on Fist of B-List?” On its face, Deadbeat at Dawn is not the kind of movie that jumps out as a logical candidate for inclusion on a site focused on golden-age DTV martial arts films. There are no martial arts actors in the cast. Woo-Sang Park didn’t direct it. Art Camacho didn’t do the fight choreography. There’s no Zubaz whatsoever and not a stunt mat in sight. What this film does have, however, is the kind of zany, independent fighting-and-filmmaking spirit that we dig around these parts.

In the interview featurette on the movie’s Dark Sky release, director Jim Van Bebber concludes by saying that it "never aspired to be Kafka or Shakepeare -- it's a simple revenge kung fu movie." I’m not sure many folks will watch the movie and immediately think “kung fu” in the same way they’d watch Chinese Connection and think “kung fu,” but it’s a definite nod to the genre with some unique flourishes informed by a young-and-hungry cinematic vision. It also has the greatest goddamn nunchucks-training-in-a-cemetery-scene ever filmed.

New York City’s roughneck landscape in the 1970s nor Detroit's post-boom dystopia can hold a candle to the urban decay of Dayton, Ohio in the 1980s. Crumbling tenements separate seedy adult video stores, and in the alleys between buildings, itchy drug dealers sling crank, the local drug of choice. Elderly women pack heat in their car consoles, and if the police force is even visible, it's totally impotent. The economy is in the tank and gangs of masked maniacs run wild in the streets.

Well, two gangs, anyways. The Ravens are led by Goose (Van Bebber) a fearsome punk whose love of martial arts and knife-fights is equaled only by his love for his girlfriend, Christy (Murphy). Goose’s exploits as a gang leader have given the couple a degree of independence -- they share a decent apartment with a kitchenette! -- but Christy wants her guy to make a clean break from gang life so the couple can join the Peace Corps and assist African villages with access to clean drinking water. (Kidding, I think they wanted to move to Chicago or something).

The Ravens’ rival gang is a collection of misfits and speed freaks known as the Spiders. Their murderous ways and sartorial choices -- leather, flimsy masks, tighty-whities worn OVER their jeans -- are a clear signal that these guys give no fucks. Main muscle Bonecrusher (Pittman) captures the gang’s credo during an amazing drug-induced rant, screaming “I just fucking hate people.” That brand of hatred is on full display in every frame of shared screentime between Goose and the Spiders’ leader, Danny (Harper). Cinematic heroes are only as good as their villains, and Danny is as dickish and devious as they come. He’s the overlap portion of the Venn Diagram between moustaches and the products of fatherless homes. He attempts rape, screws over allies, and orders a hit on Goose that leads to Christy’s horrible death. As a tearful Goose lowers the bloody corpse of his love into a trash compactor during a de facto funeral scene, the audience will be clamoring for payback. Vengeance is sure to come, but at what cost to Goose? To the Ravens? To the good people of Dayton, Ohio?

What a film. The fight scenes lack a certain technical sophistication -- Van Bebber practiced martial arts and I have no idea if he would self-identify as a martial artist -- but the ebbs and flows to the fight scenes have a rompy tone to them. The filmmaker also performs a number of impressive and dangerous stunts. He jumps into reservoirs, lowers himself down the side of a multi-story parking garage, and hangs out of a moving car by his arm as it speeds through a tight alley. Did I mention the robbery scene where he tosses the most comically-sized throwing star in the history of cinema? It’s the size of a damn Frisbee.

Some of the final blows are brutal and lively (think loud thwacks and crimson gushers) and Van Bebber uses the one-versus-many convention with aplomb. The circumstances surrounding Goose’s exit from gang life and new lone wolf status are hammered home in the dynamics of the fight themselves. In the climax especially, we buy the hopelessness of his situation, and his desperate antics -- from his near-decapitation of a thug with nunchuks, to ripping out an enemy’s throat with his bare hand -- seem an appropriate response to his dead end.

The film might also seem an odd choice for the month of October given that the prior review of Night Hunter was an intentional attempt at being seasonally spooky. Though it wields some of the aesthetics and budgetary marks common to exploitation film in a general sense, Deadbeat at Dawn is not a horror film in the traditional sense of the word. However, the creative vision of this menacing industrial gangland where trash compactors comprise funerial proceedings and drug-fueled nihilism reigns is indeed a nightmarish proposition.

DANNY! (SUBMITTED WITHOUT COMMENT)

VERDICT
With films like this and Fighting Spirit, I have some trouble articulating why I love them so much. Both bear a grimy, gritty, violent, and slightly shoddy quality, yet far surpass martial arts b-movies that tried to create a slick technical sheen only to fall flat on the enjoyment factor. Deadbeat at Dawn knows what it is: an indie exploitation fight film fueled by vengeance, leather, narcotics, mesh, and nunchucks. Recommended.

AVAILABILITY
Wide. Amazon, Netflix, EBay, YouTube.

5 / 7

American Samurai (1992)

PLOT: Years after learning the ways of the samurai as an orphan in Japan, an American journalist travels to Turkey to investigate a murder. To add to the international intrigue, he occasionally wears a Canadian tuxedo and his favorite snack food is Swedish fish.

Director: Sam Firstenberg
Writer: John Corcoran
Starring: David Bradley, Mark Dacascos, Valarie Trapp, Rex Ryon, Melissa Hellman, John Fujioka, Douvi Cohen



PLOT THICKENER:
Charlie and Donald Kaufman. Michael and Fredo Corleone. Alex and Chad Wagner. No, these aren’t the names of recently married couples in Maine and Maryland. They’re a few examples of cinematic sibling rivalries arranged in ascending order of fight scene quantity. And what better example of this convention than a film where the brothers in conflict share a pittance of screen time and aren’t even biologically related? Nearly 20 years before Warrior made “brother vs. brother” cool again, director Sam Firstenberg made it tepid and really bloody with 1992’s American Samurai.

Following the success of the American Ninja franchise, Firstenberg focused on another combative member of feudal Japanese society to Americanize without shame. He narrowed it down to two choices: the samurai warrior class ("bushi") and belligerent street merchants yelling at passerbys about tea. Fortunately for star David Bradley, Firstenberg went with the first idea. The duo would go on to make three more films together -- Cyborg Cop, Cyborg Cop 2, and Blood Warriors -- and Bradley starred in three American Ninja sequels after Firstenberg handed over the keys to director Cedric Sundstrom. If Firstenberg was Scorcese, one might say that Bradley was his De Niro.

The film begins as most critical masterpieces do: with a violent plane crash in the Japanese countryside. There's only one survivor, and wouldn't you know it, it's the most physically fragile and adorably squishy thing on the plane: a baby named Andrew. The unbreakable boy is raised and trained by a Japanese man (Fujioka) skilled in both the ways of the samurai and speaking impeccable English. Over time, the samurai master's own son, Kenjiro, grows envious of the skill of his adopted step-brother, who eventually achieves the elusive "sixth sense." In the world of the samurai, this means being able to cut air-born apples in half with a sword while blindfolded. It's great at parties too. When his father passes down the family sword to Andrew, Kenjiro loses his shit and reveals his awesome Yakuza tattoo before vowing vengeance and leaving home for good.

Only five years later, older Andrew (Bradley) is working as a successful journalist in Los Angeles. Not so successful that he's able to afford an adequate home security system though, because burglars break into his apartment in the middle of the night, steal his sword, shoot him in the stomach, and leave him for dead. Having the "sixth sense" also includes the ability to extract bullets with your fingers and just sleeping it off, because Andrew is feeling fine the next day. Who knew gunshot wounds to the abdomen were so treatable? If Mr. Orange had trained as a samurai, Reservoir Dogs would have been 20 minutes long.

After his boss assigns him to investigate a murder in Turkey, fast-healing Andrew and a sassy photographer named Janet (Trapp) are on a plane. If you guessed that their relationship goes from frosty and contentious to naked and sexual at some point during the film, give yourself an oversized plush pink gorilla. If you also guessed that Andrew’s investigation pulls him into an underground death match tournament that eventually leads to a confrontation with a key figure from his past, give the oversized plush pink gorilla back. There are no winners in the carnival game that is poorly conceived tournament subplots.

American Samurai is a film marked by odd choices. What could have been an interesting intersection of investigative journalism and martial arts action -- something like The Mean Season by way of  American Ninja -- instead devolves into a tired exercise in cliches and genre conventions. To his credit, Firstenberg tries to color the tournament participants with unique strokes -- one competitor has a blade hidden in his ponytail, another dresses like a goddamn viking -- but it all comes off as gimmicky artifice and only serves as a distraction from what the film’s characters probably should be doing. Andrew could have followed clues and chased leads and fought his way out of run-ins, while Kenjiro, as the villain, might have had more than 20 total minutes of screen time.

Firstenberg uses some trippy dream sequences to periodically illustrate Andrew's anxiety about his step-brother, which, for the sake of convenience, leads to Janet inviting him to sleep with her. You know where it goes from there, but it was interesting to note that the filmmakers used a noticeably doughier and hairy-legged double to pair with Valarie Trapp during the love scene. If this was by her request, we are left to conclude that Bradley hit the catering line a bit too hard while filming in Turkey and loaded up on extra garlic sauce with his manti and lamb kebab.

Despite the meager screen time, Mark Dacascos is enjoyable in his first major film role. His martial arts skills are muted substantially by the fight choreography, but he has the wild-eyed samurai face down cold. It could be described as either Toshiro Mifune by way of Carrie, or Zoolander's Blue Steel on cocaine and Kurosawa movies. It's steely and over-the-top, indicative of an actor still feeling out the dramatic ground beneath him, but it's a memorable element of performance for a sadly underwritten villain. It took a while to finally touch ground on a Dacascos joint, and it should be mentioned that this isn’t the best place to start with his filmography. Seeing as though the non-Gosling Drive is in the top three American martial arts films of all-time, we’ll certainly be returning to his work in the future.

The film's fight scenes are passable, and made slightly more memorable by liberal amounts of blood and gore. We get arm dismemberment, cheek biting, knife throwing, ponytail cutting, and at least one decapitation. There are apparently several versions of the movie floating around, one of which was heavily edited to remove this type of fun, so be mindful of what you're acquiring. Unfortunately, what should have been the best fight scene in the film was one of the worst; the climax is marred by poor choices in camera angles and rough editing. If you see a few cuts from completely different fights during this stretch, your eyes have not deceived you. Either Firstenberg failed to get the proper shot coverage for transitions, or the editor was lazy, drunk, or an unpaid intern. Possibly all three.


VERDICT:
Dropping American orphans into martial arts training in the Far East was all the rage back in the 1980s and early 1990s, and American Samurai is yet another example of what was, by this point, a tired trope. Maybe Firstenberg thought lightning would strike twice after the success of the American Ninja franchise, but Americanizing this particular archetype failed to stir audiences in quite the same way. The rivalry between Bradley and Dacascos is underwritten, the fight scenes aren't shot particularly well, and the tournament set-up felt like a diversion from what could have been a really entertaining film. Still, it offers a nice cinematic touchpoint for fans of Mark Dacascos and David Bradley and will please those who like their fight scenes gory.

AVAILABILITY:
Wide! Amazon, Netflix, EBay.

4 / 7