There is a special kind of people that make good movies shine and bad movies fun and they routinely get little or no appreciation from the movie viewing public – the henchmen. Long haired, muscular and more often than not foreign people whose sole reason for existence in the movie world is to look cool and die making the hero even cooler in the process.
This is a tribute to greatest that ever was, is and ever will be, the grand- master of all henchmen- Albert “Al” Leong aka Al ‘Ka Bong’. With his receding but long hair, killer Fu- Manchu mustache and deadly martial art skills he embodied (but ultimately outgrow) Asian henchmen stereotype and went head on and all out with the stars caliber of Kurt Russel, Mel Gibson, Jean Claude Van Damme, Brandon Lee and Bruce Willis and has been brutally killed by most of them.
Now I will let Al’s hand and feet do the talking…
During his storied career Al has broken all his ribs at least twice, cracked his sternum twice and broken his arms… none of that stopped him of course, ’cause he’s the freakin’ Al Leong. His popularity was so enormous that he even outgrew henchmen position and also stared in roles of dangerous Sensei figures and even had memorable and frankly quite brilliant performance in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure playing Genghis Khan (it was also one of the few films Al doesn’t die in!)
His most impressive performance, when he was paired with the late great Brandon Lee who was good enough martial artist to keep up with him and make it incredibly engaging screen fight in the process and also because simply somebody finally let him do his stuff instead of opting to kill him too soon.
The main selling point of this film is Robert Z’Dar, star of a cult feature The Maniac Cop (and it’s two sequels) but for some reason he stars here as Japanese (!!!) Yakuza enforcer Yamashita. On the contrary the lead here is stone faced, one- time Stallone’s bodyguard of the name Matt Hannon.He was so dedicated to this film, his first (and last) feature that he decided to cut off his long hair during the filming of the movie and was forced to wear ridiculous female wig for more than half of the filming!
There’s something terribly wrong with this picture!
Movie starts with Frank Washington, epitome of 80es black police-man who gets a new partner from San Diego incredible Joe “Samurai” Marshall, long haired California dude, supposedly fantastic martial artist and even better cop. He joins Frank to take down L.A. based Yakuza organization with incredibly retarded name- Katana Gang.Also more that 2/3 of gangsters are not even Japanese (although Z’Darr pretends to be one). After … chase scene and Marshall yelling “s-shot them” Frank succeeds and the van explodes (two times). The driver escapes, unfortunately in flames but Marshall and Frank pull out the security blanket (?) and fire extinguisher and save his life.
Also after completing their mission Marshall points to the female cop piloting a helicopter and says “see you tonight” With a trick of rushed editing it’s already tonight and we are treated with soft- soft- soft core sex scene of Marshall and a blond cop lady. Strangely none of the two feels any need to remove their pants during the whole scene which unfortunately seems to last ages.
Cop Lady, proficient in riding a helicopter… and Matt Hannon!
Meanwhile in the headquarters of the Katana Gang the mullet wearing boss (of crime) Mr. Fujiyama is giving orders.Like any true Japanese traditionalist he wants the head of the driver- so he can place in on top of his piano? Z’Darr, I mean Yamashita doesn’t question that strange request because he is the true Samurai*
*interesting because the status of samurai was abolished in Japan with the Meiji reforms in the late 19th century
Here we can see the effect “Samurai” Marshall has on ladies
Yamashita succeeds in his mission aided by his hot red- headed partner (porn actress Krista Lane- Deep Troath II). In fact she gets him in hospital acting as a janitor (dressed as a nurse) pushing the cloth- cover cart which hides Yamashita inside of it. He demonstrates his knowledge of sword veilding by using probably the sharpest blade ever made as butcher knife! They almost escape without a trace but an idiot cop finally notices that their witness is missing and he sounds the alarm. That complicates things a bit but Yamashita just destroys everyone on his path and they run away.
Samurai and Frank feel the anger of their boss (see bellow) but black partner cheers him up by kissing his bold head. He chase them away but smiles when he’s finally alone. Some old cop got a tip on the location of the gang leader so he informs “The Samurai” He surprises Mr. Fuyita and his underlings in a restaurant delivering a heartfelt speech.*
“…a heartfelt speech”
Also he hits on blond “all- American” girl, the owner of the restaurant because that’s just something that he does. After that Dynamic Duo of Frank and Marshall is faced with tons of goons, none of them match for their skill. Marshall shows his martial art knowledge by swinging a sword wildly with imbecilic face expression. Also he cut off an arm of one of the assailants and the said assailant died from bleeding 10 seconds afterwords. Yamashita is outraged by incompetence of his henchmen so he does what any real samurai would do- takes out an uzi and starts shooting like there’s no tomorrow. Cops survive the bullets somehow but the criminals don’t. After that Yamashita runs away and detectives go too. They don’t try to do reasonable thing like try to arrest him for attacking the officers- NO! That’s not how they do business- they just pretend they have no evidence to book him (lots of bullet holes in their car and a bunch of dead criminals can be ignored it seems).
Dynamic Duo succeeds in finding the locations of only non- mullet wearing villain aka Elvis Fu (see Day of the Warrior by Andy Sidaris) and after a mismatched Kung Fu fight which little man truly tries to make entertaining (even thou he is pared with incompetent loser like Marshall) he ends up dead and they get nowhere.
Why they keep trying to figure out where is the mysterious headquarter of Katana Gang they decide to take the first step. They start torturing and killing police officers who work with “Samurai” trying to get a location of his house. Because the movie is set in 80es they probably should have just dialed information or maybe find an adressbook- everybody was listed in those days. Maybe there’s something in BUSHIDO that forbids them address-books, who knows? They kill the old cop and his wife, then they start torturing whore cop aka blond who drives helicopter (who mysteriously gained something like 20 pounds since we last saw her). The black cop is also on the target list but he somehow survives.
At the same time Marshall is seducing the “all- American” girl by preparing her a fried chicken (which he caught himself, I mean stole from his neighbor), then taking her to a beach which mysteriously morphed into a pool just a few seconds later. Finally he gets into her pants and then does nothing but kiss her while slow jazz music goes on and on in the background…
When mafia finally reaches his house he is prepared. He start offing the one at a time and after his incredible partner joins him (he needs a sidekicks in the background to make funny faces while he is doing all the work or he feels sad) Yamashita yells “you can never run away from me” but 5 seconds later they did just that. Next thing you know Dynamic Duo are in office of police chief and he advices them to kill everyone and then give up on the whole cop thing and they take it to heart.After somehow realizing the location that they were they were not able to find the whole movie they head for final confrontation with Mr. Fujiama and his evil samurai Yamashita!
Unfortunately Fujiama is one step in fron of them- he now has Marshall’s girl and he’s holding her at gunpoint. After stand off he menages to shoot not the girl but the black partner… thankfully he has the west so he quickly recovers and guns him down. He then raves about being the smartest person alive ’cause he remembered to wear a west. After some default kissing and hugging “Samurai” and his black partner start gunning down the rest of the henchmen including the only freakin’ person who could knew how to swing a sword.
Then inevitable happens… and we are treated with the most amazing thing ever, the duel of samurais!!!They stare at echother and suddenly they are transported from the backyard in some kind of desert where we can enjoy western- like cool framing as they approach one another. Then the fighting starts. First thing you notice is that there is aposlutely nothing samurai about this fight- neither of one bothered to take couple kendo lessons and make it at lest little bit believable- they just swing wildly then both lose they swords and start fist fighting- then Z’Dar ends up blind from the eye- chops, then he regains his vision and they somehow end up with swords in their hands- again! Oh, man- terrible editing FTW!Marshall finally stop him by catching his arm and then elbowing his back about million times- and for some reason that seems to hurt him very much.Then he does this strange thing with his neck and it snaps like a twig.
And then Z’Dar is in the dirt and his neck seems fine. After declaring ” You lost… you lost face” Hannon tries to chop of his head but his partner (who was there just watching the whole time) yells “no, you’re a cop” and he has change of heart.Disgraced Yamashita kills himself with a knife, but Marshall lets him do that and forbids Frank from interfering. We see a zoom of Yamashita’s bloodied up face, some Sega music and the movie ends and we are left wondering what the hell did we just saw.
“Let’s see how good you are with the sword samurai supercop!”
Verdict: If some alien civilization received the signals from Earth (including some movies) and then one of the aliens tried to explain concept of “Movies” to another one, and then that one decided to make a film of his own- without actually seeing how they look like- he would probably wind up with the end result not unlike Samurai Cop!
One of our most reviewed directors on our blog is by far Mr. Albert Pyun (Cyborg, Nemesis, Sword and the Sorcerer…), so naturally we wanted to have a few words with him, find out a thing or two about the classics and also see what’s he been up to these days. So, here we go!
01. I understand that you started your career working with the great Toshiro Mifune and legendary Akira Kurosawa.
What was the whole Japanese experience like and what is the most important thing you learned while working there?
I learned the value of having a hardcore work ethic and preparation. The thing I loved most was watching such a high level of talent and artistry and how they applied their skills to the smallest detail. I also enjoyed the dedication everyone, including Mr. Mifune, had to doing their best no matter the challenges.
02. It can be said that you were slightly ahead of the curve with your Sword and the Sorcerer which came out almost simultaneously with Conan The Barbarian and started a trend of Barbarian movies which lasted some years. I would love to hear about your main inspirations for The Sword and Sorcerer?
My main inspirations for The Sword and the Sorcerer were Richard Lester’s The Three Musketeers, John Milius’ The Wind and the Lion and The Baby Cart samurai series.
03. One of the of the signatures of your involvement with the film is often a combination of kickboxing and hybrid martial arts with a post- apocalyptic backdrop. I am interested to hear how you developed that unique approach to action/adventure movies.
I know, but what’s odd is I didn’t being with great interest in martial arts or with post apocalyptic stories. I was drawn to martial arts as a lower cost replacement of firearms in my films. I was drawn to Post apocalyptic settings because they were easier to create on a limited budget. And there were no rules on how it had to look. I actually feel my current film “ROAD TO HELL” is one of the first films where I got the setting I was after without compromising for budget.
04. I find that most of your movies have a kinda comic-book quality (of course you also you directed one of the early Marvel adaptations). Did you grow up as a comic- book aficionado and if so what were/are some of your favorites?
Yes, I grew up on all the DC and Marvel comics along with the Japanese Manga books and Tintin as well because I lived i foreign countries as a child so I was exposed to many different types of comics and books.
05.What is the favorite actor/actors that you worked with and why? And is there some actor whose work you greatly admire but you haven’t gotten the chance of working with?
I’ve really enjoyed working with all the actors for the most part. I never really had any problems there. My favorites were likely Scott Paulin and Norbert Weisser. Both understand my sensibilities. Sasha Mitchell, Michael Pare’ and Christopher Lambert were great as well. I liked them as people immensely. The most colorful was probably Burt Reynolds and Dennis Hopper. Loved both and Ice-T as well. Jean-Claude and Steven Seagal were interesting because they aren’t actors so much as archetypes. So that was a challenge. I really liked them all as they always brought great ideas and all were very easy to work with.
06. You worked on films of many, many different genres (SF, Fantasy, Horror, Contemporary Action even Western), do you have a favorite movie genre that you enjoy more than the others?
I love musicals most of all and sort of experimental films where I can play with form and structure.
07. I understand that you spent some time here in the Balkans. That was when you filmed Captain America, right? Can you tell us about some of your experiences here and do you plan to visit us again in near future? Especially considering the fact that a great number of foreign music videos and movies are being filmed in Serbia in the last couple of years (District B13: Ultimatum, Raven and Lockout).
Yes, I shoot a good deal of Captain America in Dubrovnik (*Croatia) and some of Adrenalin in Mostar (*Bosnia and Herzegovina). I’d love to shoot more in Serbia.
08. I believe that you are hard at work at a Cyborg sequel/ prequel so it would be interesting to hear something about the basic plot, actors involved and of course about general tone and the esthetics of the film.
I’m just trying to make something different. Something a little experimental and surreal. And, yes, like an opera. A very pessimistic film.
Film starts with music from Halloween mixed up with a dance beat. Very disturbing. We see one hot chick preparing for getting a color in solarium. She puts her clothes off, lays inside the device and starts working her tan. Suddenly, device gets closed like a clam trapping her inside! Big fire starts inside the chamber (?!) and solarium becomes a crematorium!!! Result of that is one really HOT chick!!! Next scene is instantly switching us to the “Rhonda’s workout”. That’s the name of the place where accident had happened. Actually, it was “Second Sun” tanning salon and fried chick named Valerie was it’s owner. Rhonda turned out to be her twin sister (that’s a surprise) who took over a place 5 years later in order to make fitness salon.
A lot of good looking girls (and one fat guy) are inside doing something that looks like erotic aerobic (or some retarded MTV video for that matter). But the main girl (Jaimy) is late. She is fitness instructor. We see her leaving her car in a hurry on a parking lot. In haste she drops her purse, having spilled enough condoms for entire army which clearly shows us that she is a slut. She went straight to Rhonda passing by some big-muscles-small-brain guy (Tom) who was trying to hit on her. Rhonda was really pissed off by the fact that she had to hold Jaimy’s class instead of doing her business books.
Moment after, we are under showers where handsome black chick (Rachael) is washing herself. But someone is sneaking around. Who could it be? Horny Tom who is hitting on every girl that passes by? Who knows? One thing is for sure – she is going to die!!!The very same moment she turned her face away from the wall she got stroked by very large safety pin!!! Yeah, you heard it well – SAFETY PIN!!!Killer must be the surgeon or something since he managed to hit same neck vein with every fucking swing of safety pin. Rachael bleeds to death and that’s the end of her workout. Couple of minutes later Jaimy is coming to locker room. She hears knocking in one of the lockers. She opens it and false severed arm pops out. Someone tried to make a prank. Angered Jaimy shot a locker doors hard. Now nearby locker gets opened and inside it there is one big black naked corpse. Yeah, that’s the girl from the showers. Jaimy starts screaming and that’s the end of the first chapter.
The murder weapon
Now it’s a time to meet Lt. Morgan, clumsy detective who works on this case. Morgan is sniffing around locker room while paramedics are putting corpse in big white plastic bag (I thought that black one is more traditional, but never-mind that now). It seems that he had found some clue. On the way out he falls on false severed arm prank too. Lt Morgan enters Rhonda’s office to ask her and Jaimy couple of questions. During that time he presented us his sick sense of humor by making a remark that Rachael ain’t pretty no more.
If you see this arm then you are about to discover a corpse
Despite the murder gym is still full of girls who are working out like nothing had ever happened. Jaimy is with them this time . She isn’t late today but that doesn’t matter to Rhonda who gives her a lesson during the class. What a bitch!!! But Rhonda is not without her worries too. She finds another big-muscles-small-brain guy sniffing around her office. That guy is no one else than Ted Prior (Chuck) himself!!! He was sent by Rhonda’s senior partner from San Diego to make sure everything is fine. Rhonda doesn’t look too happy about that. Now back to Chuck. Leaving Rhonda to cool off he went to take out the trash while wearing a tight shorts (Trash dumping in tight pants seems to be some kind of Ted Prior’s trademark) and almost got run over by third big-muscles-no-brain dude named Jimmy. After brief conversation and Jimmy’s warnings to stay away from Rhonda they decided to engage a pretty gay fight. Two guys with big muscles slapping each other like two school-girls is something both funny and disgusting in same time, especially when more mutated disco runs in background. Entire fight was watched by Debbie, a really hot chick who decided to bring the winner home with her. Winner happened to be Chuck and he enjoyed plowing her in the later scene.
Meanwhile, at Rhonda’s workout is a real party. Still not bothered by recent murders, chicks are working out and having fun. Jimmy watches them with while they are sweating and rocking even more sexual poses. Eventually, the ugliest one of them approaches and starts flirting with him. Of course, Jimmy rejects her in a very cool way, leaving her on edge of crying out loud (I am sure she has a name but I didn’t bother remembering it). Later that night, we are in her apartment. Maybe Jimmy changed his mind so we are about to see some action? But no, large safety pin strikes again!!! Only one poke was enough for ugly chick to die with the most ridiculous expression on her face. On the other side, Lt. Morgan was bashing her door (I absolutely have no idea how detective deduced that ugly chick is going to be the next victim). During that bashing, killer escaped through the window on the second floor without even a scratch!!! After getting job done, killer went back to his hideout to wash his safety pin like any other sane person would do. If you think that’s the end of the night you are wrong. DEADLY WRONG!!! Probably finding that death is funny thing, two chicks and some random guy (all 3 members of Rhonda’s workout) sprayed front glass of the gym with words “Aerobicide” and “Death Spa”. Killer must have been pissed off by such vandalism (most probably because he hates crime) and decided to teach them some manners. First one to die was Curtis (the random guy) and he got slaughtered while he was going home with clean large safety pin. Blood was everywhere. For next two victims the killer had decided to upgrade his weapon. Now he is using a knife!!! First girl got her throat slitted while she was standing alone in dark alley, for no apparent reason. Second girl (and 3rd member of vandals) discovered Curtis’s body, started screaming and even reached her car. Like it always happens in such cases car wouldn’t start and killer got her too.
Vandalism is punishable by death!
Following day we see full gym of chicks cheerfully dancing while paramedics are taking off more corpses in background. At male side of gym we see another random guy lifting weights. He gets knocked out by pipe he was lifting. While he lays knocked out killer came in and killed him with one of weights.Couple of minutes later his body has been discovered by his friend who got his brain impaled with killer’s trusty old large safety pin.Death is imminent!!! And all this massacre in broad daylight, with full gym and Ted Prior washing locker room just a couple of meters away!!! And no one noticed anything. At least until the moment when Jaimy came in and started screaming. Chuck heard screams and entered the room with haste. There he found two bodies and Tom (who appeared from nowhere) standing over them. For no apparent reason Ted Prior started with beating Tom!!! Couple of moments later cop had arrived with Lt Morgan leading them. Tom is now in locker room. Suddenly, Jaimy approaches him and soon after we get sex scene. But no ordinary sex scene!!! You see, while Jaimy was on top of him, Tom saw another Tom approaching from behind her and slitting her throat. Then Tom the Killer raised Tom the Plower in order to slaughter him too. A second before that happened Tom got awaken by Lt Morgan. They had brief conversation and detective goes out. 5 seconds after we see close scene of safety pin killing rather large Tom after only one hit???!!! That got to be very special safety pin. Someone called for paramedics again and more bodies had been put into white plastic bags. They are quite busy these days. Girls still aren’t bothered by massive death toll of their fellow gym members nor by often presence of paramedics and their plastic bags.
… and they never seem to stop
After dozen of kills Chuck finally starts to suspect something. Later that night he tries to sneak into Rhonda’s house. There he encounters her trusty watchdog Jimmy and we got ourselves another gay fight. Only this time they use weapons. Jimmy got himself a nice rakes and guess which weapon Ted Prior used? That’s right, a trash can!!!That thing marked his acting career. Hilarious fight ended up with Chuck diving into pool located in the Rhonda’s backyard. Next scene takes us to Rhonda’s house, where we can see beaten up Chuck on couch, Rhonda, Jimmy and Lt. Morgan who had just come by for no reason at all. It turns out that Chuck was sent by Rhonda’s partner to spy on her. In the light of new facts, detective orders Chuck to leave town and return to San Diego. Same night, but we are back to Rhonda’s workout. Some blond was walking through crime scene in the middle of night like many sane people would do. Suddenly she discovers body of Jaimy, hanging on a rope with her neck slitted. Why would anyone bothered to hang a person who’s neck was previously slitted or vice versa is beyond me. Anyway, a young cop came by and discovered now both Jamiy’s and blonde’s bodies. They haven’t even shown us how blond had died!!!
Paramedics now don’t even bother to leave a place. They just put corpses into bags and throw them onto pile, while waiting for more victims to come. Chicks are now dancing with the “Working out till you die – Aerobicide” song. Right song for right moment it seems. Chuck decided that he had it enough and starts going back to San Diego by foot!!! But Jimmy runs him over with a car and that’s the end of Ted Prior!!! We are thrilled by that fact!!!
Now we are near closing scene. We clearly see detective’s hand ringing the bell of some house. In house there is one bald head with burned up skin in front of mirror. That person takes the wig and puts it onto head. The ring is heard again and person shows us face. It’s Rhonda!!! What a turnover, isn’t it? Lt. Morgan finally realized everything despite the lack of evidences or clues. It turned out that Rhonda and Valerie are same persons. Valerie got her name legally changed. That still doesn’t mean she is killer but Lt. Morgan doesn’t have problems with that. He decides to arrest her despite the fact that he got nothing, He only assumed that Valerie was killing girls because she were jealous on their good looks and bodies. And the fact they can have sex with men unlike her. Detective puts her handcuffs. While taking her to car he got a call in which he has been informed that Jimmy had killed Chuck. He immediately frees Rhonda. After some chasing on construction Jimmy manages to kill detective using only one uppercut and one kick to face.
During one of his night walks through gym, Jimmy enters the locker room and sees Rhonda completely naked, as well as her burned up head, tits and back. The moment she noticed him, she takes revolver from one of the lockers and shoots him. Now she got rid of all possible links to her.
But she only thinks that. Lt. Morgan is still alive!!! Tough old dog!!! We see them next day in a forest. It seems that he forced Rhonda to come with him. He has shovel with him too. After telling her sad story about how his father (also a cop) had died he announced that he know that she is a real killer and that she has to be punished for her crimes. But moment of Morgan’s lack of concentration Rhonda used to hit him with a shovel. Now he is definitely dead!!!
Rhonda regained back her customers after murders were over (not that customers have ever left). All the murders have been pined up (hm “pined up”…that’s a funny word) to unlucky Jimmy. As new girls comes and fill her gym, she looks at her safety pin with a devilish smile.
Verdict: If you think that we are done with Prior brothers then you are badly mistaken. This is just the beginning. Experience we had while watching this movie taught us that there aren’t many things which are more funny than when someone, who probably have never seen real movie, fails even at making a lo-fi slasher.But I’ll admit one thing to David A Prior: for ’80-es he had managed to find several quite hot and good looking chicks. As we all know, ’80-es chicks were disaster at best.
90es were the golden age of Martial Arts/ Action film and sheer number of genre films produced guaranteed some classics that are staples of Action Cinematography ’till this day but of course there is also the other side- every hack producer/ director andevery half- assed martial artist thought they had a HIT in their hands!
One of the perfect examples of this is Jeff Speakman’s awkward love letter to Kempo Karate in the form of nonsensical, unwatchable mess that also goes by the name- THE PERFECT WEAPON!
“No gun. No knife. No equal.”
(One of these three thing is actually correct)
Jeff Sanders (Speakman) is a humble construction worker by day and deadly Kempo Karate master by night! We learn the second one by watching him do what he does best… rocking out a Kata ( Karate Form) to SNAP’s super-hit “I’ve got the power” He looks surprisingly like a buffed up, oiled up, slowed- down version of one of the Boldvin brothers… but from the acting standing point I guess that is a grave insult to Boldvins, because even William Baldwin is an exceptional actor when compared to Jeff here!
I mean… he’s got the powah!
For some reason he decides to returns to his old neighborhood and visits him old mentor, played by non other
than veteran actor Mako.While he rides his car we are treated with a dozen of flashback each one more pointless than the last one. First we have his traumatic childhood, father hating him because he didn’t act normal after his mother died?! He wanted to send him to military school just to torture him but he dodged that one thanks to Mako- Mako enrolled him in a Martial Arts School instead ( his extensive karate training involved everything but sparing for some reason) And finally him knocking out an irritating jock to defend his little brother (who is also a little jerk). His Cop father finally can not take it any more- apparently he just hates his firstborn to much to let him do much of anything and he trows him into the street despite the fact that young Jeff is only 16!
Interesting fact- Mako calls Jeff’s karate style a 2000 years old martial art despite the fact that a style is obviously Ed Parker’s American Kempo that was founded in 1940es.
Ed Parker with his favorite student!
We quickly found out that Mako has problems with Korean mafia (all Asian people are Koreans in this film despite the fact that most of them are Japanese, Chinese or even Vietnamese) not wanting to let them use his Antique shop for stashing drugs. They decide to show their power (common theme in this movie) by thrashing the place but that Jeff jumps trough the window (Batman fan perhaps?) with the immortal phrase “Is there a problem here?” and start laying the smack down on their asses. There’s also a irritating Asian boy who think he’s black
here for some reason. After reminiscing the old times Mako goes to bed and Jeff decides to take a walk.
Then a giant Asian fellow (ex- wrestler Dr. Tanaka) breaks in a strangles the poor Mako. Jeff finds the corpse but it’s already too late. Or is it? Jeff reaches inhuman speed of approximately 70 km/h and almost catches the car but his body betrays him and he remains on the street sorely disappointed. Then couple of idiotic criminals appear out of nowhere and “they get what the want” if what they wanted was an ass- kicking.
Behold the Speakman!
Soon bunch of police officers is in the scene (for once) the detectives must be Ned Flanders’s cousin cause I never heard a person in a live- action movie use “diddly” in the sentence before. We also have a supposedly emotive reunion of brothers (his younger brother being cop now, like their evil father) but the scene abruptly cut before we get to see anything happening.
On Mako’s funeral we get Asian people wearing white (their traditional colour of mourning) and Caucasian people wearing black suits and Speakman wearing his usual brown leather jacket and jeans for some reason. Did he consciously decide to disrespect his mentor of is he really than much of a bum, not having anything else to wear? Anyway irritating kid shows up, Jeff tries to catch him and interrogate him but he fails miserably and the kid gets away. Then he menages to get in a argument and a fight with his brother and younger Sanders is tempted to shoot him… that would make all our lives easier but we’re just not that lucky.
He than procides to take justice into his own hands, start beating people up- including but not limited to people in night club of unusual kind, place is called Croc- Pit and their gimmick is they have live alligators in their club!!! After achieving nothing “humble” Chinese fellow Yung (also playing a Korean) ofers his assistance. He reveals he is one of the four bosses of crime in Korea Town but that Mako was his friend and he wants to help Jeff get his revenge. Jeff, being the sucker that he is accepts the help and information just to find out he was double crossed afterwards. After disposing of approximately half of his man mafia boss sam explains that it was in fact Yung who is responsible for Mako’s death and that he used Jeff mearly as a weapon against his rival bosses. Irritating Asian kid confirms that.
Jeff now gets his sights into killing Yung but there is just one problem, a big, big problem- Yung is always protected by his bodyguard Tanaka (aka ex- wrestler Dr. Tanaka) and as we are about to learn Tanaka is unstoppable. In fact if we had The Incredible Hulk going against Dr. Tanaka I would bet my money on the vicious Asian Dr.
Knowing that even perfect weapon that is himself is powerless against Tanaka Jeff devises a plan, gets irritating
Asian kid to testify that Tanaka was a killer (not a bad thing because he really is the killer) and then uses a
mess that surrounds the arrest to personally destroy unguarded Yung. A rare glimpse of intelligence from Speakman, bravo!
Unfortunately it doesn’t really work out Sounders Jr gets destroyed by Tanaka (he can obviously survive a
car crash (and even throw away the wrecked car with his bare hands) and sustain being tasered by 1000 volts without even fliching twice). Cops get mauled by Dr and even Jeff ends up empty handed because Yung wasn’t even in the said car. Jeff almost got his brother killed for nothing but knowing that they are not in the best of terms anyhow- who cares.
Tanakareveling in his indestructibility!
Irritating kid somehow overhears that Yung is planing to escape county by boat (how original) and informs Jeff. Jeff fueled by vengeance equips himself with some knives and sticks (he doesn’t use firearms for some reason- maybe they remind him of his asshole father) and after destroying a perfectly fine bed to display his weaponry he gets going. He breaks into factory on the dock and starts causing a ruckus incapacitating one henchman at a time including the ones with guns. He distract them and then slays them with his mighty trowing knives.
After easily reaching Yung and almost killing him Dr. Tanaka joins the fun and starts trowing Jeff around like a ragged doll. Jeff puts all his Kempo mastery on display but it just isn’t enough but at the last moment he figures out Tanaka’s only weakness EXPLOSIONS! After blowing up a propane tank mighty Mr. Tanaka finally meets his doom and Jeff gets Yung but for some reason doesn’t kill him- the fact that he just killed the man before that seem not to disturb his notion of honor.
Vengeance! Vengeance!
Film ends with Jeff finally back in his old Kempo Dojo, exchanging glances with a possible love interest that was for
some reason left unexplored- and bows to his master .Than we have credits that dedicate this film to the late and great Ed Parker, and even though he endorsed Speakman you have to wonder did the film live up to his expectations… I would be surprised if it did.
Vedict: Even though the story is nonexistent and large chunks of choreography are just pure nonsense (moves are neither effective, nor look good on camera) Speakman is- truth be told- a better martial artist than most of his comrades in action movie industry but his acting ability is so atociously bad that there’s just no punching/kicking combo in existence, hell in a whole Multiverse that can possibly redeem it!
The one can not claim to be bad movies expert without being familiar with wannabe-action-hero Bud Spencer. His movies were cheering up (and making them cry) generations of our fathers and I dare to say even older ancestors. Here, I am going to talk you about one of his highest rated (by this blog standards) sensation – Go for it!
The movie starts with Terence Hill (Rosco Frazer) traveling across the country in roller skates (?!) followed by cheerful ’70s music. From time to time he manages to hitchhike someone, but only if driver is a woman so he can plow her (and plow he did). Instead showing us that gruesome act of love we get switched to close scene of Bud Spencer (Dough) being released from a prison. Why he has been held up in a prison remains mystery to me. Maybe because of public disturbance or possibly because of attempt of taking over world’s hamburgers industry. Either way, he got free and now he can do what he likes the most – eating himself to death at the gas station. That’s where his future companion Rosco meets him. After some small talk between those two guys and somewhere between Dough’s 7th and 8th hamburger, some rednecks decided to mess up with wrong guys. Naturally, every one of those rednecks ended up biting the dust, all thanks to Dough’s mighty open-palm cleave. Someone called a police and new-found partners decide to steal one of the rednecks trucks (i guess Rosco hadn’t registered his roller skates for two persons). To top of that they got mistaken for robbers and cops started chasing them. That’s the end of the first act. Promises a lot, don’t you agree?
Traditional way of traveling
After a long driving and cop chasing they had arrived to their destination – Miami, where now they got mistaken for secret agents. There is a choice to be made: Revealing their true identity or accepting offer from inspector-Cloesauish commander. Offer is a simple: they are supposed to go undercover as a rich Texans in order to defeat evil gang of super-villains known as K1. The luxury that task bears with it made their decision easier. After getting a room in 5-stars hotel real comedy is about to start. Next one hour are filled with Dough’s attempts to order 12 hamburgers, Rosco attempts to plow some more, japaneses, retarded ninjas, secret agents working as hot-dog vendors, clumsy cops, combinations of Rosco’s “martial arts” and Dough’s short tempered street fight and many, many more ridiculous things.
One-man army
The final scene is on yacht of K1 boss himself. He is not an ordinary super-villain. He is not even big bad boss of crime (tho he is fat). No, he is super-duper-mastermind-villain!!! His goal: Getting world domination by destroying all numbers on Earth!!! That plan even made some sense after K1 had explained it to our heroes. How is he going to do that I hear you asking? Very simple… By launching earth-to-space missile named K-bomb! Now we are doomed!!! The only ones who can put an end to it are our two brave super agents. But first they have to face another challenge: 50 retarded ninjas and some really bad ass chick. Two minutes later and they are all beaten up. With haste Dough and Rosco had infiltrated to launching chamber in order to stop missile from it’s evil trip. Unfortunately, they learned that launching is imminent since K1 (the fat one) himself was there. He calculated every detail of his devious plan (I guess he wasn’t aware of irony of using numbers in order to destroy numbers). K-bomb is ought to be launched and hit it’s target in specified time. Dough came to brilliant idea how to stop it!!! By confusing scientist while this one was counting down last 10 seconds. Missile missed it’s target, numbers are saved, and many school-kids started raging because they’ll still have to learn math in future.
Big bad super-duper-mastermind-villain of crime
P.S. Reviewing this was very hard for me. Tho, there is no doubt that this movie is complete garbage by all standards, I can’t say that I haven’t had fun watching this. I have nothing but a respect for Bud Spencer and Terence Hill. Surely, they had marked one era in cinema history.
In the old days when you wanted to see Rambo(1982) you had to go to your local video-store, and if they didn’t have RamboVHS then you had to settle for the popular Italian rip-off Navajo Thunder (1983), and if you’re really out of luck and somebody already rented Navajo Thunder, well then you’re only choice was The Deadly Prey. This is what happens when you ignore the common sense and take home a 10th rate copy of a film you originally wanted.
…HE STILL IS
Movie starts with Colonel Hogan, ruthless ex- military officer trains a large group of would be mercenaries by having them hunt down and kill random people they abduct from the streets of L.A.? In need of new victims they kidnap the blond bodybuilder dude who’s taking out the trash in front of his own house (for some reason) wearing nothing but pair of Daisy Dukes . They easily overcome him and take him to their exercise camp…
Then, whole Hell breaks loose. Ridiculous blond dude is none other than Mike Danton, super- soldier who served in Vietnam. They let him run, but when they star hunting him he suddenly appears out of nowhere* and kills them one at a time, sometimes using a primitive weapon (tree branch or a rock) and sometimes using nothing but his bare hands.
Hogan’s first in command Thorton (and the most dangerous mercenary- signaled by a black bodybuilding shirt and aviator glasses) gets frustrated with his men’s performance and kills one of them as a result, then another one. As the movie continues you start to wander are Denton and Thorton competing in number of kills or what?
In the meantime Danton’s idiotic, also blond wife is devastated and instead of calling police like any sane ( or even insane) person on the face of the planet would do she calls her daddy, crazy ex- cop first ( played by a veteran Cameron Mitchell, the only at least little bit capable actor in this- I dare not say- movie). She barely gives any information to her father even though she partially saw license plates of the kidnappers.
*Let’s just take couple of minutes off and enjoy the killing…
After offing something like a dozen mercenaries in such creative ways as crashing them with a tree, killing them with a sharp stick, appearing Ala Jason Voorhees from the lake and impaling them on the knife (all the while experiencing some kind of unholy ecstasy ) he is finally stopped by only capable man in the group Thorton (beware the glasses) and Mike Dentons kryptonite is revealed!!! As it was often in the 80es his only weakness is leg kicks to the head, he just has no defense against their pure awesomeness…and soon enough is THE END OF A STORY for Denton… or is ti?
THE END OF A STORY?
Denton of course finds a way to escape. That includes slapping a female soldier unconscious, in fact a female soldier is the main squeeze for evil Colonel Hogan (but not enough to satisfy his appetites as we’ll find out later). After that he’s making glorious escape, BY THROWING A BOMB IN ONE SOLDIER’S PANTS- curiously after explosion nothing remains – no blood, meat or bone, just his boots, in perfect mint collection state!!! He also destroys a tank right after that, even though it was not on his way.
Then he disappears again…
Faced with no choice, Hogan and co decide to raise up the stakes. They kidnap Denton’s idiotic wife and instead of using her as a leverage to flush out Denton right away Hogan decides to RAPE HER FIRST!!! WTF? I knew the dude is a messed up war veteran and a mercenary but an all around maniac like that- didn’t see this one coming!
Anyway her father somehow finds a way into the camp and starts causing a ruckus (even killing a main financier of the operation while lecturing him on social justice and his hard life as a cop) but they capture him and take him to his daughter just in time for the epic dialogue that consists of flat “What did they do to you hunnie” and uncontrollable childish – I lost my favorite doll- tone response “They raped me Daddy”. I had to take a minute after this scene not being able to process what I witnessed right away. After that they even shoot the father!!!
Denton than breaks into armory I guess (?) and has a little confrontation with the lady mercenary. That confrontation ended up being their last. Updated on his wife’s presence he armors up and backed by his old friend from ‘Nam Cooper (who abruptly decided to switch sides, seeing what he did to other mercenaries) starts rescue mission that consists mostly of destroying everything on his way.
Do not engage in dialogue with Mike Denton, he might bitch-slap you into unconsciousness and shoot you couple of times!
So buddies Denton and Cooper free the poor, poor wife, Denton sadistically blows up a dude a the calls it “his calling card” with a smile from ear to ear.Those two seem more like a couple than Danton and his wife but who am I to judge. They hide the girl and start going all gun- ho on the last couple surviving mercenaries. Unfortunately while they were busy playing Thorton (again proving to be superior to every other villain in this movie) captures Jaimy aka Mrs. Denton.
Things soon get wild as the Hogan ends up wounded, Cooper dead… and Thorton decides to off the girl just for the heck of it. Danton looses his shit, throws the gun away and starts slashing with a machete! Thorton misses five time straight from point blank range (?), looses an arm- do to machete and then gets K.O.-ed with that same arm by Danton! Damn!*
Then Danton start acting so crazy that Nick Cage would be afraid of him… He scalps Thorton (while concentration on the sky?) screams like a wounded animal and goes after Hogan. He quickly finds him, the dude is old and wounded- and then yells “Take of your shirt”. At this point I was ready to believe that he wanted to return a favor for raping his wife but he has another idea… he lets him run and prepares to come after him- and closes the circle of completely unnecessary violence with that.
Danton takes revenge for his wife’s death by cutting dude’s arm off with the machete and then knocks him out with that same arm?! Damn!
Verdict: What is truly fascinating about this movie is it’s unique ability to completely bypass regular action movie or any kind of movie dramatic structure. There is no three- acts which offer setup, the confrontation and the resolution.Instead they just throw us head first into the ActII (and we have no idea what is going on), after half an hour they make a brief interlude (which explains some things but mostly leaves you confused) , then it’s Act II- Part II with more senseless violence followed by itsy- tiny Interlude and then Grand Finale that lives you wandering what the hell just happened. I never experienced anything like this and probably won’t ever again- except if I decide to re-watch the damn thing- and there’s not much chance of that EVER happening.
I think we all learned a valuable lesson here. JUST WATCH RAMBO.
This movie was originally to be a third sequel in the horrible, horrible Karate Movie franchise No Retreat, No Surrender aka Karate Tiger. The fact that they changed their minds didn’t make this movie a whole lot better anyway.
As with any action film of the 90es era this one is a rip- off of Van Damme’s Kickboxer and Bloodsport with boosted levels of craziness and sheer idiocy.It is also a combination of Chinese production, horrible American actors and cheap sets on Thailand- and with a combo like that you know you’re doomed from a start!
The movie starts with Jake Donahue and his older brother in Thailand. Jake’s brother is fighting for the Kickboxing title of Thailand and wins his bout defeating a former champion, Manny Pacquiao- looking fellow. Then they leave the areana in some silly car wearing a championship belt but– soon enough they are ambushed by evil Khan and his henchmen. Khan is none other but mighty Billy Blanks. Yeah, the idiotic inventor of Thai Bo exercise program* (Blanks didn’t learn to read or write ’till he was 40 years old and it shows.) He looks like some kind of steroided up, rag-top wearing Orc more than he resembles a normal human being. Apparently angry with Sean for taking Thai title- don’t know why, he doesn’t look Thai to me, Khan kills him with some silly kick combinations despite holding a machine gun the whole time!!! When a younger brother Jake tries to save him he gets schooled, but left alive despite suffering practically the same hits like his now deceased brother.
Ten years later, Jake is now a undercover police officer, doesn’t look anything like he did when he was young but he’s got a scar from the fight with Khan so it must be him. He is a notorious lone wolf stooping crime by fighting criminals with kickboxing skills, defeating one mullet wearing baddie at the time. His commanding officer Captain O’Day tells him that there are filmmakers in Thailand who really kill the actors on the sets of their films (???) and that Jake has to travel to Thailand to stop them. Why would an American cop travel to Thailand to do some Interpol stuff is beyond me. In one of his rare moments of sanity Jake refuses but he unfortunately takes the VHS tapes with him anyway. After casually watching them (he had nothing better to do I guess) he notices the guy “who’s kinda good” and then the dude turns and he sees- The Khan. He calls his boss and accepts the assignment with crying voice and then screams his lungs out so we could all know what kind of pussy he really is.
Avedon and Blanks having a moment.
The he travels to Thailand. Decides to beat up some Muay Thai dudes for no reason but to feel good I guess but one of the students from that camp fallows him and kicks his ass to even the score. Humiliated Jack admits he is no match for Khan but a fighter tells him about Prang, a man who is now a drunken recluse living in the wild but was evenly match with Khan in the past. Jake finds Prang who at first rejects his offer but changes his mind when Jack tries to save him from some punks. In the middle of all that Prang’s monkey steals Jack’s passport ,maybe hoping he can use it to get out of the country?
If that wasn’t enough Jack succeeds in befriending ( and soon enough bedding ) idiotic trailer thrash blond Molly who was coincidentally almost raped by Khan only hours ago. I personally believe that there is no audience for love scenes between such ugly individuals but I could be wrong, it’s a strange world we live in after all.
Anyway we are treated with the most imbecilic training montage in history of training montages (which are not the most intelligent dramatic tools as it is) where we see Avedon being stretched, beaten and stretched some more and the mere glance at a skinny dude blocking three stomps with his elbows will make you laugh until you cry.
After reaching mastery in something that should be Muay Thai Jack challenges a bunch of dudes in the illegal fight circuit, and beats every one of them while at the same time wearing a female shirt? One of the evil producers sees a potential in him and invites him to the set. Now his wish is granted and he can finally face the Khan and have his revenge!
HO- MO- SEXUAL!
Obviously there is not a chance in hell he could beat Khan. Even if we presume that their technique is equal (and it’s not) Khan is far bigger and stronger fighter and would naturally tear him apart. Movie doesn’t concert itself with thing like that, you know common sense and runs into a climactic final fight between Avedon- dressed like a court jester and Billy Blanks- who’s just being himself. The moment in which Khan deduces the identity of Jack aka “you are… the BROTHER” after Jack throws him the old photograph is pure cinematic gold. And then as if that wasn’t enough he threatens to kill him and make him join his brother in hell- at that moment Jack loses it, yells “I’ve already been there… for 10 years” and then unleashes a girlish scream that would leave many of the ladies from horror movies envious.
The proper way to evade a punch.
The fight itself is incredible mish- mash of American kickboxing, pro- wrestling, Chinese wire-fu with some Muay Thai thrown in for good measure and yeah, they succeeded to take all the worst elements of them all and combine them in such God-awful way that the end result (which was indeed physically demanding and hard to accomplish) ends up being nothing short of absurd and laughable.
Cops -as the cliche goes- arrive late and do the only thing they can- START DESTROYING THE CRIME SCENE WITH FREAKIN’ BAZOOKAS! FOR CHRIST’S SAKE, WTF?!
Verdict: If you like kickboxing, Thailand, Ninjas, Blonds with pathetic boobs, training montages, Billy Blanks, random Zen riddles, Savages and monkeys- this is your movie!
PS For additional footage of Billy Blanks embarrassing himself find any Tai- Bo instructional DVD.
As conventional wisdom tells us a Chuck Norris film will always be unwatchable mess and must be avoided at all costs. On the other hand there are couple exceptions to that rule, obvious ones being The Way of the Dragon (that has one of the best one on one fight sequences in the history of cinema, legendary Chuck Norris vs Bruce Lee duel in Colosseum) and Expendables 2 (which uses Norris cameo to the fullest extend even poking fun at “Chuck Norris Facts” phenomena). Then there is the other kind of movies- the hilariously bad ones, and as you can guess we will concentrate on the later- one of those being the “Slaughter in San Francisco” aka Yellow Faced Tiger aka Karate Cop aka Karate Cop vs Chuck Norris (no, we haven’t made up any of those!).
The fact is, Lo Wei, a famed Chinese director (Big Boss, Fist of Fury) wanted to film this movie with Bruce Lee who kept refusing until he unfortunately died. So instead of a real thing they picked up a kinda look- alike and labeled him a “Next Action Sensation”. To the best of my knowledge Don Wong (aka Wong Tao) didn’t make another movie (as a lead) in his life.
*all scenes featuring Chuck Norris are covered it this trailer
Young police officer Wong and his black partner John arrest to men for attempt of rape of a young girl, of course using their martial arts expertise (who needs guns anyway). Little while later in the police station young girl, named Sylvia denies all charges and explains “it was all fun”. Confusing start and it just gets weirder. One of the would be rapists kidnaps John in broad daylight just to take him to the beach where he is confronted with numerous adversaries. Let the Kung Fu begin! Johns wife calls Wong and our hippie Bruce Lee– wannabe is momentarily on the way. He makes it in time but unfortunatelykills one of the assailants and is almost immediately kicked off the force by his Captain Newman and even incarcerated for a year (?) , obviously if you’re Chinese self- defense doesn’t exist as an excuse.
Next thing we know Wong is now a free man and works as a waiter in a Chinese Restaurant. Unexpectedly a Big Bad Boss of Crime (during the whole movie it is never revealed what kind of crime… it’s just crime) Chuck Norris aka Chuck Slaughter as he’s known here drops by with his goons obviously hungry for some Chinese… Then after some usual “lets torture the waiter” routine he blatantly offers a job in his empire of crime to Wong. Wong is dumbfounded and he naturally refuses, and of course something like that can only end in tears. Soon enough Chuck threatens to kill Wong, obviously not able to cope with rejection too good.
After being obliterated by alcohol with Wong one evening his now ex-partner John head home in predictably slow pace and somewhere in the way witnesses some men running away from a bank robbery. He pursues the robbers and soon confronts them. They seem confused, and seem content to fight with him bare- handed until one of them suddenly remembers he’s got a gun. What proceeds is the worst scene of shooting in a cinematic history.There is no recoil, gun is obviously a toy and a black dude’s reaction is telling me that a mosquito accidentally bit him at the same moment we hear the gunshot. Chinese man doesn’t shoot again, he decides to forget their original plan (escape as far as you can) and decides to pursue John. They eventually catch him in some random backyard and beat him till death (with bare hand of course).
Next morning the body is found and Newman being a racist that he is throws Mr. Chu and his wive to jail, their only crime being that 01. The murder took place on their property 02. they are Chinese. Wongs swears a vengeance and then randomly beats a lot of people until he finally finds out the horrible truth- Captain Newman is working for Chuck Slaughter!!!! (Que in the dramatic music) Wong kills Newman in the ferocious and somewhat ridiculous fight and then tries to warn Chu’s lawyer but alas it is already too late.
In all that confusion Chu’s only daughter Sylvia (probably the same girl that was not- raped in the beginning- never explained) menages to run of with Slaughter Jr. aka Chuck Norris’s not so evil brother. Well, Chuck “plays the parts he plays- for real” as the trailer said and tries to force his brothers girl to have sex with him. She narrowly escapes, menages to contacts Wong and he bravely marches into Slaughter residence and confronts Big Bad Boss of Crime himself. Why did he have to wait so much to do that -beats me!
Chow demonstrates his strength and determination by offing some goons and then breaking a shovel- part by part and then Chuck and Chow fight in a obviously non- choreographed or rushedly choreographed scene (typical for Hong Kong movies at the time) and in the middle of usual punching/kicking combinations they succeed to end up in the fountain, completely wet and already funny fight becomes completely hilarious! Finally Chow beats Chuck and tries to finish him but fashionably late police force stops him (he probably still has them on the payroll) and the movie abruptly ends.
Can new action sensation Don Wong beat the Big Bad Boss of Crime, Chuck Norris?
Also, there is an important part of this movie that deserves the whole section just for itself and that’s the incredible and tragic destiny of Mr. Chu.
You see, Mr. Chu is very old man whose suffering starts right after Chuck Norris’s thugs tossed away a dead body into his backyard. Mr. Chu found a body and called a police. Corrupted cop came in and started interrogation. It looked like the old Mr. Chu was gonna get away (he didn’t do anything anyway, for that matter) but suddenly, without any solid explanation, he went to the backroom with his wife. Following her advice (this was the biggest mistake; never follow woman’s advice) he tried to bribe a cop (?!) with 1000 dollars despite the fact that he is completely innocent.That’s when real hell broke lose. Cop became suspicious and gave him several slaps. After full contact argue with his host, cop placed him under arrest.After coming to jail Mr. Chu had been constantly beaten, insulted, beaten, tortured, beaten, brutally interrogated, discriminated, beaten, deprived of any human rights and beaten some more. One of more ridiculous (and hilarious) moments in the film is scene where Mr. Chu is taken to his cell. When he asked for a phone call cop yelled to him “You are making trouble here!” following with many many many brutal hits into the old man’s belly. With expression of complete confusion on his face Mr Chu threatened with court. With pure hatred in his eyes cop replied with a stone called face “You won’t live enough to see a court”. We failed to see exact reason for such hate towards poor old man who even tried to bribe a cop despite a fact that he didn’t have to. Movie ends before revealing the final destiny of Mr. Chu so we can only presume that he is still in jail cell being tortured over and over again…
Various examples of suffering of poor Mr. Chu
Verdict: this movie is extremely hard to find but it’s absolutely worth the effort! Chuck Norris should have been a deranged villain in every movie he ever made!
Worsemovies 
