Rating: D+
Dir: Godfrey Ho
Star: John Miller, Donna Jason, Cynthia Rothrock, Chuck Jeffreys
I was initially thinking this one would end up being reviewed on GirlsWithGuns.org. I’d seen, and at least somewhat enjoyed, the insanity of another Rothrock film made with Godfrey Ho, Undefeatable, and figured this one, made the previous year, would be worth a look too. My mistake. It is so staggeringly bland as to be almost offensive. Despite her presence front and centre on the poster, Cynthia is very much in a supporting role.She plays FBI agent Tracey Pride, who returns from Hong Kong to meet up with her sister, TV reporter Joyce (Jason), look for a missing nuclear detonator, and deal with their mutual daddy issues. Tracey is investigating sleazy banker Jason Slade (Miller) and – hey, what are the odds! – he’s got the nuke trigger.
Not that anybody particularly cares about this, for far too long into proceedings. There’s a lot of irrelevant stuff to get through, such as Tracey return to her old sifu, which exists purely so she can spar with a couple of people. Slightly more significant is Slade’s bodyguard, part-time Eddie Murphy impersonator Jake Armstrong (Jeffreys), who gradually comes to realize his boss is a scumbag, as Joyce has been reporting in the media for a while. It’s the closest this offers to a genuine character arc for anyone, albeit only after he, too, visits his old trainer for sparring purposes. Mind you, I’m not sure why Slade needs protection, since he’s clearly a lot better at martial arts than just about anyone in his circle.
For this is a world in which everyone – bank execs, television correspondents or senator’s daughters – knows kung-fu. What they do not know, however, is how to act. Which is fine, because writer “Herb Borkland” has no fucking clue either. Given his complete lack of other credits, I suspect he never existed. I did laugh when Slade orders his minions not to use guns due to a petrol-soaked environment, then immediately lights up a fat cigar. I’m just glad the vintage era Q-bert arcade machine made it through the climax of the film unscathed. This is not to be confused with Rage and Honor, another Rothrock vehicle from the same year – though I suspect Ho was hoping for exactly that end result.
In typical Ho-style, he got two movies out of this. There’s a Hong Kong edit, Angel The Kickboxer, which has a lot of different footage and characters who don’t appear in the US version at all, including Yukari Oshima. Some committed fan (well, they probably should be committed, hohoho) put them together into a 127-minute chonker, to which all I can say is, “Thanks, but no thanks.” The 86 minutes of the American version is perfectly fine. Truth be told, it’s still a good hour too long for my tastes, though no film which includes the line, “Do you know a nuclear trigger from a Bulgarian dildo? Because I don’t,” can be said to be entirely without merit.