City Cops (1989) Movie Review

City Cops (also known as Fight to win, Beyond the Law and Free Fighter) is a 1989 action comedy film direct by Chia-Yung Liu (credited as Lau Kar-Wing), who was a very prolific stuntman and choreographer in the Kong Kong film industry, working in a variety of martial arts classics. His directorial output mostly consisted of action mixed with goofy humor, something very palpable in this flick. 

The film starts Rothrock in her usual character of Cindy, but we also have another female action star, Michiko Nishiwaki, a martial artist and bodybuilder seen in films like Charlie's Angels (2000), My Lucky Stars (1985), In the Line of Duty 3 (1988), Angel Terminators (1992), Outlaw Brothers (1990), Princess Madam (1989) and several more in the genre. She plays Michiko, a henchwoman who mostly appears near the end of the film but her role is very memorable.

FBI agent Cindy (Rothrock) is sent to Hong Kong in order to find a mafia boss and bring him to justice. However, she has to team up with a pair of questionable Hong Kong officers. Together they face the yakuza and the mafia.

Right out of the gate one has to mention the effective and well done fight choreographies, they are lively and fun. Actually, the fights and the rest of the movie inhabit the same zone, everything has the same tone and rhythm. The action is so casual and blends so much with it´s comedy that it's hard to figure out what's supposed to be a set-piece or a throwaway joke that involves fighting (the bar scene is a good example). This is sometimes the case with Hong Kong films, as they incorporate the stunts to the stories in such an organic manner.

The comedy is hit or miss, but the main flaw is that when it misses it tends to drag for a bit too much (even when it hits sometimes as well), so if you don't have the stomach for a lot of the silly humor in these Hong Kong flicks then I suggest you watch only the fight scenes because this one overdoes it a few times.

Visually, I think City Cops stands out slightly more than the average outing. There's some good cinematography, inventive use of color, shadows and light that give the movie a pretty look but this is only noticeable occasionally as the rest isn't very special in that department.

Rothrock shines here once more, with a lot of amusing moves, and her dialogue scenes are just as entertaining thanks to a relatively decent script by Barry Wong (Yes, Madam!, Righting Wrongs, She Shoots Straight), a script that unfortunately (and despite its better moments) falls into cliche territory when Rothrock isn't present. She isnt in a lot of the movie, so don't expect her to carry the overall film like in Lady Reporter (1989), although, we can still consider her one of the main leads.

Cynthia's final fight with Nishiwaki is probably the best part, the entire climax (as expected) is a great peak and pretty much makes every flaw worthwhile. I think it's a pretty unmissable moment in action women cinema, if anything just because it puts two icons together in a fantastic fight. 

I recommend it mostly for the final stretch, but the rest of the film (while a bit trite) isn't awful, there´s enough creativity and funny moments to say that it's a decent picture overall.

No Retreat, No Surrender 2 (1987) Movie Review

In 1986 Hong Kong film director Corey Yuen made a breakthrough martial arts movie titled No Retreat, No Surrender, which became highly successful and introduced Jean-Claude Van Damme to the world. While I dont think the film stands up to Yuen's better pictures like Yes, Madam! (1985) or Righting Wrongs (1986), it had such a big impact that it created a series of films, most of them unofficial or unconnected to the original one.

Today's subject is the second part of the series, that's completely independent and might as well be titled something else because it has zero narrative connection to the first film. In fact it had other titles elsewhere like Raging Thunder and Karate Tiger 2: Raging Thunder.

No Retreat, No Surrender 2 was released in 1987 and starred Loren Avedon, Max Thayer and Cynthia Rothrock. Rothrock does not play a huge part in the movie and her screen time is limited, but she shows off her skills enough for this film to fit into the blog's theme.

The plot follows Scott Wylde (Avedon) visiting Vietnam in order to reunite with his best friend and teacher Mac Jarvis (Thayer) but instead finds Terry (Rothrock), Mac's ex. Scott then meets up with Mac because his girlfriend was kidnapped by Soviets and the two of them go to rescue her. Another Rambo-knock off plot that serves as an excuse to show jungle action and lot's of shootouts.

Cynthia Rothrock's character starts out as a sidelined former lover and eventually joins in on the action later in the picture when she saves the main duo from some bad guys, only to have a small chat with them and share some screen time in the final battle. Nothing too fancy but Yuen found a way to incorporate her, even if it is somewhat shoehorned and she doesnt do a whole lot.

She also falls under the damsel in distress trope for the first time (Perhaps second time, if you even count Fight to Win to fit into that), something Rothrock usually avoided for many pictures. However, this is sort of an excuse to give us some action moments with her kicking bad guys because her hands are tied, this also leads to a pretty well done confrontation with an enemy and a highly powerful big baddie. So the trope isn't played completely straight here and serves to raise the stakes. Take that for what you will.

The biggest problem I have with this picture seems to be the same as with Yuen's direction of the first film, he seems to be adapting to the very straightforward and streamlined way of making movies in Hollywood, as opposed to the slapdash narratives of Hong Kong cinema, always diverging and moving constantly, this movie never allows for the beauty in the action to settle in, nor does it deliver a great and nuanced story, it's trapped somewhere in between the two styles but never achieving either of them successfully.

I actually  enjoyed this one more than the first one, it features more effective comedic bits, the storyline it's slightly more engaging and the actual fights are more fun to watch than in the original one. It doesn't have the abundant dull moments of wooden acting from the first film but it's also far from being a complete improvement as seemingly Yuen was still struggling to bring any worthwhile quality from his older films into these two films in the No Retreat series. I gotta say I enjoy the strictly Hong Kong affairs a lot more.

There's also a very bittersweet ending, in typical Yuen fashion, that would be completely absent if this were to be a regular American action movie.

While Yuen brings his skills and craft to the project I can't help but to feel it's somewhat lacking compared to his previous hits, it's not as free and loose as I would have wanted it too. It's well directed but it's not as interesting as Yes Madam! or Righting Wrongs from a visual and narrative standpoint. It's also possible that this is because the writers were not involved in those earlier Hong Kong movies Yuen did.

It's passable but far from great. We have seen the director do better.

Funny thing is that out of all of these early Cynthia Rothrock pictures, this one might have actually been the most influential and one of the defining projects in her career. I say this because this is her last collaboration with filmmaker Corey Yuen. This was also the film that inspired Ed Boon to create the character of Sonya Blade in Mortal Kombat in 1992, at least according to IMDB, since I have yet to find proof that it was this exact movie, most sources say Cynthia was the inspiration but they never mention specific movies.

Fight to Win (1987) Review

Here we have another Leo Fong picture, an equally messy and schlocktastic picture as the previously reviewed 24 Hours to Midnight (1985), which was hampered by production problems, but Fight to Win (1987) does not have that excuse. Also known as Eyes of the Tiger, Dangerous Passages and Paper Dragons, it stars National TaeKwonDo champion George Chung and features Richard Norton as a villain, Cynthia Rothrock plays a Sensei who trains the main lead and helps him fight the bad guys.  

Ryan (George Chung) has a major fight coming up with a fight manager's best student, however, when Ryan's master has a heart attack he must train with Sensei Lauren (Cynthia Rothrock), not only in order to win the fight but also to defeat the group of criminals who are after three mystical statues. Or something like that. It's really not an incredibly clear storyline, the different cuts of the movie might change the events and the way scenes play out. The normal cut is about 82 minutes and the uncut version runs for 95 minutes (apparently there’s another one that runs 77 minutes).   

Utterly cheap and borderline incomprehensible at times, this disjointed mess is a craptacular oddity that has to be seen to be believed. The editing is all over the place, no matter which cut you watch you find some continuity mistakes and a notable discordance in shots. Not to mention the clunky narrative the bad editing creates, always shifting between characters and horribly distracting jump-cuts, there's no sense of rhythm and is barely understandable, it could be dizzying at times. 

The sound fares no better, it's crude and sometimes not very audible. The direction itself is somewhat lazy, Fong shows off some curious camera movements and focus shifts here and there, but for the most part everything is stiff and static without any rhyme or reason other than to show the group of people present in the frame in one long master shot that's easier to edit and to shoot. 

Cynthia is a decent actress, and so is Chung for that matter, they aren't seasoned actors but their performances manage to be simple, humble, natural and charming without relying in exaggerated gestures or extravagant line deliveries, their comedy bits sort of shine because of the low key and mundane reactions and comments from the characters. The rest of the cast is actually just inept and trying too hard to be funny, like wannabe Eddie Murphy.

Rothrock has some good fight scenes and plays a very cool headed and likable master, she's sort of put into generic “female character in a martial arts movie” type of scenarios but these are over quickly. There's nothing truly spectacular about the fights, there's no sense of grandiosity like in the Hong Kong films we previously spotlighted, but there´s more inventive choreographies here than in 24 Hours to Midnight, and while the direction is just as stale, the battles can be appreciated fairly well because of the long shots. 

It's a trashy and low budget affair but not one without merit or at least things to like about it. I was prepared to dislike it because of its highly questionable quality but looking beyond that there's some lightheartedness to it and some small chuckles to be had with it. Not an obligatory one (well, if you like trash movies maybe it is) but one that could be enjoyable under the right state of mind.