Showdown In Little Tokyo (1991)

Showdown In Little Tokyo (1991)-* * * *

Directed by: Mark L. Lester

Starring: Dolph Lundgren, Brandon Lee, Tia Carrere, Renee Allman, Simon Rhee, and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa

Kenner (Lundgren) is a cool L.A. cop working the Little Tokyo district of town. He grew up in Japan and is familiar with its culture. When he was a kid, his parents were killed by a member of the Iron Claw gang, Yoshida (Tagawa). Now that the Iron Claw is in America and ready to step up their criminal empire using a brewery as a front to distribute the drug Ice (more deadly than “Rock”, so we’re told), it’s up to Kenner and his enthusiastic new partner Johnny Murata (Lee) to stop them. Also Tia Carrere is on hand as  Minako, a performer in an Iron Claw-controlled club that Kenner wins over, as is Death Match’s (1994) Renee Allman in a small role as Minako’s friend.

What we have here is classic Dolph from start to finish. Which, incidentally, doesn’t take very long, as the movie is 78 fast-paced minutes, and that includes the opening and closing credits, so it’s probably closer to 70 minutes or so. But in that brief time, we’re treated to nonstop action and all the other trademarks of movies like this - constant wisecracks and one-liners, the obligatory torture and training sequences, flashbacks, fight scenes, nudity, blow-ups and the like. It distills the action movie down to its barest elements and is incredibly entertaining and fun for doing so. This is a film that knows its audience.

Showdown in Little Tokyo is incredibly juvenile, but in the best possible way. It seems like the movie was written by a team of middle school-aged boys who simply wanted to get their adolescent fantasies on the screen. Just bring on the action and girls and let subtleties, complexities or consequences be damned. You gotta love it. We should all be glad the parents never came home while they were making this movie. It would be far less of a gem. 

Dolph has a great entrance too. He swoops in on a rope and interrupts a punchfighting match! As he and  Johnny are members of the “Asian Task Force”, they are able to bond through that. They start off as “the original odd couple” - Kenner speaks fluent Japanese, lives in a Japanese-style house he “built himself” and knows everything about their culture, and he’s the whitest thing on the planet since Wonder Bread. Johnny Murata is supposed to be Japanese, but was raised in America and knows nothing about his own culture. As you can tell, I’m reaching to find some subtext here (!) But it is interesting how the Yakuza gangs all love big, classic American cars. Oh, and Tagawa plays yet another heavy, and he and Dolph would square off again eight years later for Bridge of Dragons (1999).

It’s silly, it has humor, most of the characters wear big, loud, colorful suits, and it’s all supported by a rockin’ electric guitar score. It’s hard to imagine another movie that asks so little of you and your time, yet delivers so much. Everyone should own a copy of Showdown in Little Tokyo, and the world would be a better place if action movie makers followed its example.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Death Match (1994)

Death Match (1994)-* * *

Directed by: Joe Coppoletta

Starring: Matthias Hues, Martin Kove, Richard Lynch, Ian Jacklin, Jorge Rivero, Renee Allman (AKA: Ammann), Eric Lee, Nick Hill, Benny "The Jet" Urquidez and Steven Vincent Leigh




***400th Review***





 

For our 400th review celebration, we thought we'd invite a few friends over - namely, Matthias Hues, Richard Lynch, Jorge Rivero, Ian Jacklin, Renee Ammann, Martin Kove, Benny The Jet, Eric Lee and the rest of the large cast of Death Match. A special effort seems to have been made to get as many of the DTV actors of the time as possible in this production. Casting-wise, it truly was The Expendables (2010) of its day, and, inevitably it means that some cast members can only receive small roles. Due to time restrictions of course. Unless you think Death Match should be a four-hour-plus epic.

John Larson (Jacklin) and Nick Wallace (Hill) are just two blue-collar dock workers trying to make their living the old-fashioned way - by working hard. Their longshoreman jobs take them all around the country, and they end up in L.A. where Nick tries to make some extra bucks fighting in...wait for it...illegal, underground punch/kickfighting cage matches to the death! Did you think it would be some sort of computer game contest? Anyway, Nick starts fighting for the evil, unscrupulous fight promoter/gangster/gunrunner/lover of geodes and Twizzlers Paul Landis (Kove) and his associate/main fighter Mark Vanik (Hues). Unbeknownst to Nick, these guys are, well, evil and unscrupulous, and they expect the winners of their fights to kill, and the losers of their fights to die. Seeing as Nick is a nice guy and doesn't have that killer instinct, he refuses to kill his opponent in the ring. So naturally, after a brutal punch to the face by Vanik, they imprison him on their personal boat.

Seeing as how Larson and Wallace are best friends to the end, when Larson gets word that his buddy hooked up with Landis' organization and is now missing, he goes on the hunt for him. Of course this means that he has to join Landis' group and fight in order to get closer to the truth. Luckily, he was a former kickboxing champion that gave it up years ago. With help from reporter/love interest/eye candy Danielle Richardson (Ammann), scrappy street kid Tommy (Michele Krasnoo), and of course his Cosmo Kramer-like manager Lionel P. Bigman AKA "Big Man" (Bob Wyatt), will Larson find and rescue his friend?

Death Match is one of the better punchfighters out there, and has a little more substance than most. Thanks to the sprawling cast - there are even more B-movie names we didn't mention - Lisa London, John Sjogren, Brick Bronsky, Marcus Aurelius, Sheila Redgate and more - as well as the fast pace of the film, things never get boring. Also in the good news department, this is by far Ian Jacklin's best role we've seen. He actually does a good job carrying the movie, and as the lead role must have the usual barfights and torture scenes, and you care about him and his friend. Despite all we've seen before, we really liked Jacklin here.

But the real "Big Man" in this production isn't Lionel, it's the great Matthias Hues. He turns on his typical charm and wears a gigantic suit with a bolo tie. If he starts to take off his shirt/bolo tie - watch out. You are in trouble. Also, whatever you do, don't call him "goldilocks". Lynch steals the one scene he's in as the gangster Jimmy. Benny The Jet appears as himself, in one of his own gyms, as Larson's trainer. His advice comes in handy. Interestingly, in the female reporter wanting a story/hero teaming up with an L.A. street kid angle, Death Match resembles Streets of Rage (1994) of all things. Weird.

We really can't go through all the many characters and their ups and downs due to space restrictions, and there are some of the prerequisite silly moments, such as the "Chicanos with nunchuks" scene, but honestly this is an action B-movie fan's dream come true - and one of the better killfighting movies we've seen to date.

Note: Death Match is available in the U.K. on a two-for-one DVD with, strangely, The Robert Chapin classic Ring Of Steel (1994)! Go Figure.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty