BLOODFIGHT

A tale of intrigue. And murder.
And love. And drama. And lust.
And tragedy. And bloodfighting.

Stats
FOUND AT: Big Lots
PRICE: $3.99
DIRECTOR: Shuji Goto
SCREENPLAY: Yoshiaki Kashigawa
STARRING: Yam Tat Wah, Yasuaki Kurata, Lam Keng Ming ,Cristina Lawson, Bolo Yeung, and Shinya Ono.
RATING: Not Rated. But would probably be R for bouncing man breasts and surprisingly unrelated homoeroticism.
YEAR: 1989
AVAILABILITY: You can find it if you look hard enough. Front Row Entertainment releases it on VHS and DVD.
IMDB FUN FACT!: The alternate English title is Final Fight
HILARIOUS REVIEW:
(from IMDB)

"jarmlar ([email protected])
Kongsberg, Norway

Date: 6 May 2002
Summary: Bad, bad, bad

I say it again, why waist time making these films? Bad quality, actors, story and things like these. Bolo Yeung is the best known actor here, but why can't he even do it better. It's dubbed, yes, (No, it isn't. - Disco)but it is possible to use a bit longer time to make a film like this. It's a Hong Kong film, and it's boring. What else could I say about a boring film? :) I rate it 1/10.

The movie starts out by immediately informing us of the title, the title being quite possibly the least important part of a martial arts movie. Usually the title just tells us what to expect in the movie. "Uh-oh! Sounds like Van Damme is going to be a HARD TARGET to kill in this one!" In this case, we're informed of the presence of blood AND fighting, possibly at the same time. Looking back on the opening sequence, I've realized it makes little sense and has no bearing on the movie. We find out the setting "1989 Hong Kong," coincidentally when the movie was made. We're shown a bald Asian guy in a red shirt with sunglasses walking around, accompanied by shots of the city and music that screams "It's the 80s!" synthesizer and all. As far as I can tell, this bald sunglasses-clad fellow is fixin' to fight in the tournament that we're about to be shown. Yep, I just gave away the surprise. I'm sorry.


Mr. Clean makes his acting debut.

Cut to a martial artist smashing an apple in his hand (Hey! There are starving children in Africa!) and another breaking cement bricks (Hey! There are unemployed construction workers in Africa!). I suppose they're preparing for the big tournament that I spoiled everyone about. Now cut to a tournament. I once again apologize spoiling the surprise about a tournament being held in the movie. If it's any consolation, it's "The World Championship of Free Fighting." I hope you're as surprised as I am, for I have no idea what "Free Fighting" is.

Anyway, we're shown extreme close up shots of all the fighters before the fight. Once the fight starts, we realize that this isn't your average World Championship of Free Fighting tournament. These people are severely aggressive. For example, the fighter taking on the token sumo is suffocated on purpose by the sumo's gigantic gut. Not to worry. It's as funny as it sounds. Then we have a tiny Asian fellow vs. a very tall man of ambiguous racial origin in a in a giant baby blue swim cap and equally baby blue parachute pants. He also growls like the Hulk, making me wonder how legal it is to enter the mentally retarded into fighting tournaments, especially Free Fighting tournaments. He wins by tossing the little guy into the crowd. As we're shown the fights, we're also treated to the obligatory shot of the tournament brackets, and it appears that Masahiko Kai winning a lot. Who is Masahiko Kai? Regardless of how much you care, you're going to find out anyway.


Summary of the movie, taken from
the back of the video box. But that's
no excuse to not read the rest of my review.

Next we have the Sumo guy vs. Chung Lee (not the Street Fighter character, unfortunately), played by Bolo Yeung, misspelled as "Bolo Yueng" on the video box. On second thought, it's probably better that Bolo Yueng doesn't play Chun-Li. Bolo Yueng is "famous" for playing a character named Bolo in the classic Bruce Lee film Enter the Dragon. For some reason after the movie, he changed his name to Bolo. Now his career sucks, only appearing in shitty martial arts flicks, such as this one and Breathing Fire, a movie that will be reviewed by me at a later date. To add insult to injury, he hasn't made a movie since 1997. Anyway, back to the fight. Sumo does the usual preparation to fight by stomping his feet, which, for some reason, causes the entire stadium to shake. Bolo emulates this action. Did he actually expect the stadium to shake? Maybe this really is the Retard Fighting Championship, especially considering that Bolo then tries to pick up Sumo. Because of the angle of the shot, being a worm's eye view shot from behind Sumo, it looks more like Bolo is thrusting into Sumo's massive crotch. Bolo seems to do that a lot in this movie, establishing Chung Lee's ambiguous sexuality. Bolo's sexuality is confirmed when he undoes Sumo's underwear and strangles him with it. That sick fuck.


"What smells like has-been?"

After that travesty of a fight, it's Baby Blue Swim Cap vs. Bolo. One of them (it's a shame I didn't specify in my notes) gets kicked in the chest, leaving a big red foot mark there. This is an obvious homage to Bruce Lee's unfinished (at least by him) film The Game of Death, in which Kareem Abdul Jabbar (I used to think it was Wilt Chamberlain, but then it would be a different kind of movie) kicks Bruce Lee in the chest with his gigantic feet, leaving an equally gigantic black footprint on Bruce Lee's gay yellow jogging suit. We don't get to see the outcome of the fight until near the end of the movie. That's too bad.

Instead of finding out who wins the fight, we cut to a shot of a guy's eyes in a dark locker room, and immediately flashback to two years ago, in an apartment. Not counting the shot of his eyes in the locker room, we first meet Masahiko Kai as he nostalgically watches a video of two guys fighting, one of them probably being himself. His wife walks up, Scotch in hand, and complains in heavily accented English (or drunken English, I can't tell) about how much she is sick of him being a mopey deadbeat, finally giving us the first line of dialogue 10 minutes into the movie, just like 2001: A Space Odyssey. Of course the only thing I'm thinking is "C'mon, sex scene..." Needless to say, I was disappointed.


You know your husband might be gay when...

Before we get to see Masahiko's wang (or even an indication that, had the scene continued, we were going to see Masahiko's wang) we cut to the streets of Hong Kong, where a bunch of young punks are driving around in a car that has "fuck you" painted on the door in big bright green letters. These are obviously insecure young punks, since they overcompensate for it by screaming "WHOO!" really loud over and over. That's how you know they're dangerous young punks. They say "Whoo." This is where we meet one of the only white guys in the movie: the leader of the gang, whose name may or may not be John. My notes seem to be unsure of themselves. Hey, I started watching a month ago and finished very recently. So frickin sue me. Anyway, the punks steal some fruit, causing the vendor to chase after their car while screaming a dubbed voice-sounding "MONEY!? MONEY?! You stupid punks!" while making seal-like hand motions. I found it hilarious, the funniest moment of the movie. It should have caught on as a household phrase, much like "Show me the money," heard in Risky Business (or is it Cocktail?)


"Dem Duke boys been at it
again..."

If I recall correctly, the gang is then in an alley (possibly after brutally beating an innocent man to death. What is this, A Clockwork Orange?) for some reason when Masahiko, everyone's favorite neglective husband, arrives, applauding John's fighting ability. Masahiko was so impressed he brings John home, much to the disdain of Masahiko's wife, who I guess just assumed Masa found a new lover. "What's up her ass?" John eloquently ponders while David Carradine sits on a hill, playing a flute (supposedly a silent one).


"Wow! I'm in a moovee!"

After Masahiko reads a "Dear John" (or is it "John Deere?") letter from his wife, he takes John to a ramen noodles stand, which I would consider the Eastern equivalent of a bar, if Masahiko wasn't such an alcoholic. Anyway, John rejects the food, stating "I wouldn't feed this shit to a dog!" Chances are he probably wouldn't feed a dog to begin with, but it still prompts the proprietor of the stand to reply in broken English with "What you say?!" Before John can smash the guy's face in for no apparent reason, a balding guy comes along and talks to Masahiko. I'm not sure who he is, other than a friend of Masa. This movie doesn't exactly like to name people for the audience. I think he represents the audience, because he's also aware of how much John the Aryan Asskicker sucks.

Then we see John training the next day. He beats the crap out of his trainer. And Masahiko approves. Weird thing about people in love... they'll stick by their partner, even if they are asscocks that hit people for no reason other than overcompensating for latent homosexuality. Anyway, we then get to watch John's old gang of mental hospital escapees taking part in more harmful shenanigans when they steal dumplings and get their asses kicked by the daughter of the dumpling stand proprietor ("proprietor" seems to be the word of the day). It is at this point that I notice the punk with no hair seems to have a big hole where the ass of his jeans is supposed to be. Make of that what you will. Then John arrives, completely devoid of humanity, much like the T-1000. "You're pretty good... for a girl," John stereotypically says and then he beats up the girl. Wouldn't it have been better if she beat him up and Masahiko took her under his wing as his new trainee? Maybe I'm just far too ambitious...


"I'll be bahck."

Then the gang heads over to a restaurant and does more deplorable acts. This is the second time we hear "MONEY?! MONEY?!" much to my enjoyment. Once they get outside, they beat up on this young man while his girlfriend attempts to run away, but trips on wooden cages containing chickens. Masahiko watches as the young man, Ryu, beats up the punks. Jeez, can everyone do martial arts? No wonder ignorant people ask Asians if they know kung fu. This is when Masahiko completely jettisons John for Ryu. Finally! But wait! Ryu isn't that easily persuaded. It's going to take much stalking to get that done.

Masahiko approaches Ryu while he is playing basketball. Masahiko insists that he join him, inciting Ryu to throw the basketball at him. Hard. "I'm not giving up!" Masahiko declares, as he becomes even more persistent. But we don't get to see him try again, for, while on a promenade in the park with his girlfriend, those crazy punks attack him, bearing weapons, such as a switchblade, bat, wrench (?!) chain, and knife.


This is a section of my notes. Not the poor handwriting. It took five minutes to
identify the last phrase as "another knife."

Cut to Ryu visiting Masahiko, wounds all over his body. "I can ease your pain," Masahiko says seductively as he begins to caress Ryu's... ah, wait, wrong movie. So NOW Ryu wants to train under the famous Mashiko... so now Masa declines him! Ha! Take that, sucka. This is when Ryu becomes the stalker. What I'm wondering is how Ryu knows where he lives to begin with.

Eventually, since Masahiko actually WANTS someone to train, he allows Ryu to join him. He trains Ryu the classical way of talking about spiritual energy, making him hop up stone steps in those wooden Japanese shoes (rumored to be a precursor to the roller blade), and having him punch wooden boards until his bloody fists finally manage to break them without having his bones jut of his hand. Then, Ryu's girlfriend, the Adrian to his Rocky, begs Masahiko (or Burgess Meredith "You're a bum, Ryu!") to stop training Ryu. I'm not sure why. Maybe she read the script and knows what's going to happen to him. Then we're shown Bolo, with a mullet (!!!!!!!) and a single stupid-looking beaded braid in his hair, killing people as he fights them. Cut back to Ryu training vigorously, then weeping like a schoolgirl. After Ryu regales Masahiko with a story of some sort, Masa ties a bandana around Ryu's head. Then they consummated their relationship. For those of you with little mental capacity, that means they had sex.

After some more training, the Championship tournament occurs. Before all the fighting, the audience is treated to female body builders posing while girls dance and one pudgy girl follows with a camera, taking pictures of them. I think this is very representative of Japanese humor. Or it was meant to confuse everyone. Anyway, the fighting starts. Ryu's girlfriend watches on, still the wary girlfriend. This movie is a lot like Rocky, if in it Rocky Balboa died in the big fight and Burgess Meredith (to hell with researching his character's name!) came out of retirement to fight Apollo Creed (whom I used to think was played by Billy Dee Williams) for revenge.


Interpretive dance, or sickening collection of traveling circus refugees? U-DECIDE!

It is during the fight montage that we see how much of an even badder ass Bolo is than we were supposed to think. He kicks people in the head, leaving dents, much like one would see in the anime/manga Fist of the Northstar, the live action adaptation of which will one day be seen on this website. To pique your interest, it has Clint Howard and Downtown Julie Brown in it. Anyway, before the big fight between Bolo and Ryu, the girlfriend looks behind her, which I interpreted as her wondering where the hell this bad 80s synthesizer music came from.


Tiger Woods' first golf trainer.

Then the fight starts. Bolo's fighting style is incredibly silly, but somehow he manages to beat Ryu and then snap his neck, remove his bandana, and put it on, despite Masahiko throwing in the towel. Cut to a morgue, where the late Ryu's girlfriend finds Masa and Ryu's corpse. Insert necrophilia joke here. As Ryu's girlfriend (I think by now it's obvious that I don't know her name) and Masa probably exchange dramatic dialogue, Ryu seems to be moving under the sheet covering his body. Oops!


Keanu: "Whoa."
Who fights in a t-shirt and jeans, anyway? Maybe
this was immediately after he finished training... idiot.

Later, we see a drunken Masahiko eating at the ramen stand from before. Those good ol' young punks arrive and pour booze on him. Masa stumbles around a little, and then fights them like a sober man. Bottle in hand, he walks past their unconscious twitching bodies. When he returns home, he screams unintelligibly, falls down then stumbles around some more.

The next day, he is (surprise!) drunkenly stumbling down the sidewalk when a fancy car pulls up next to him. The window opens to reveal his ex-wife, who is now remarried. Masahiko's only reply is "Bye-bye," as he stumbles away and continues on his silly bender. Then he is spotted by the gang again (why doesn't somebody shoot them?), who try to run him over. The movie's definition of "run him over" is the car braking before hitting him, and Masa pretending to be really hurt by having a car stop in front of him.


"I'm the token white guy!"

Later, at Ryu's grave, where Ryu's girlfriend and Ryu's co-worker that I neglected to mention, for I thought he was an unimportant character (and still is, despite what transpires next), two things are revealed. More importantly, is Ryu's last name, as seen on his headstone in Japanese kanji: Ryu Tenmei, which translates (by syllable) to Dragon Heaven Bright, which probably means "Dragon composed of the light exhuming from the Heaven location." Some dragon. The less important revelation is that Ryu's co-worker is actually Masahiko's son. Holy shit! That has little bearing on the movie.

Next, we're given pointless footage of ships at sea, then a long shot of people walking through a puddle on a sidewalk. Then there's more hilarious Masahiko drunken stumbling. Ryu's girlfriend confronts Masa and gives him the obligatory end of the 2nd act uplifting speech that motivates the main character to get his/her act together and lead us into the 3rd act, where he/she ultimately saves the day, usually by some preposterous gimmick, such as an even better Batman costume and even better Bat-vehicles that he just now bothers to use. Unfortunately, Masa seems to have passed out before she could finish, so she breaks Masa's bottle, which only serves to hurt her.

It is at this point that we're finally given the part we've been waiting for: the training montage. While Masa trains the old fashioned way of almost self-mutilation, Bolo uses exercise machines and similar modern ways of training, except Bolo looks more like he is having sex on top of them, that cocky bastard. Masa's methods are very rigorous while Bolo's are very lame. Masa ties his foot to a pulley and the bald guy from earlier pulls it as Masa kicks, causing him to fall down as Bolo uses a cycling machine. Masa hits himself with a bucket in front of a giant vat of molten metal while Bolo lifts weights. More stuff happens while Bolo is hanging out with hookers and talking to news reporters, though I can't understand what the hell he is saying. As Masahiko makes an oblique reference to Rocky by running up a hill, Bolo goes for a nice swim in his pool.


Ryu prepares to fight, BROADWAY STYLE!
(Note: this image is out of sequece due to the long string of
paragraphs that would be without an image to break it up)

To inform us that today is the day of the World Championship, the movie has a shot of a calendar that says "World Championship" on it, with the date circled. We're finally shown the outcome of the Bolo vs. Baby Blue Swim Cap match from earlier: Baby Blue Swimcap loses. How shocking. As this occurs, Masahiko is meditating, and for once by "meditating" I don't mean "drinking." Then there's a shot of the title of the competition, "World Street Fighting Championship." I thought it was "Free fighting." If it's street fighting, why is it in a ring?

Before the match begins, Bolo is asking the audience questions in what can only be an unintelligible language that Bolo made up himself. Of course, they shout back and cheer for the murderer (why hasn't he been arrested?!) while Bolo nods and smiles. What is this, Pro Wrestling? Then Masahiko comes. It is then that we see the preposterousness of this match: the big muscular guy versus the smaller, older, less muscular guy.


What kind of prick tattoos his own forehead?

Every character (except the gang members... lets hope they were shot to death by police) introduced in the movie watches on as Bolo immediately knocks Masa out of the ring. The audience cheers. I myself am mesmerized by Bolo's man-breasts, jiggling like so much Jello® as he fights. "Hee! Ho!" he shouts as he wails on the old man. When hit in the face, Masahiko sprays MILK out of his mouth for some reason. What is this, Evil Dead? Also, Masa flies onto the other side of the ring when he is hit. Remembering Ryu's girlfriend's speech, he gets up and fights better, which doesn't really say much.

When Bolo is finally knocked down, he reaches outside of the ring and buries his gloved fists in the glass shards from a beer bottle he crushed and left by the ring earlier. Upon hitting Masahiko, he leaves scratch marks, giving us yet another Bruce Lee homage. Mashiko gets hit in the face again, except this time he sprays water instead of milk. What the hell? Eventually Masa bounces back and beats Bolo. Masahiko then proceeds to remove Ryu's old bandana off of Bolo's apparently dead body and puts it on. Everyone is happy. Then we have a slow motion shot of a victorious Masahiko, except that it's not in slow motion. He's just pretending to move very slowly and giving out a long, painful scream. I can imagine the director's orders: "Ok, pretend you're in slow motion and scream."


Bolo punches the camera guy for no apparent reason.


Then the credits roll as the love theme of the movie plays, which is church organ music with a woman singing. During the credits, we're given a denouement of sorts: Masahiko skipping town, suitcase in hand. Then there's a shot of a city and a fade to black. Boy, that ending sucked.

Despite being a stupendously crappy movie, it was actually kind of enjoyable. I can't say this is one of the regretful purchases, but I can say I will probably never watch this again. Except maybe for the "MONEY!? MONEY?!" scenes. In my opinion, those scenes alone makes the entire movie worth watching. In fact, they should have made a spin off of this movie featuring the fruit stand proprietor.

NORMAL MOVIE GRADE:
CRAP MOVIE GRADE:

So crappy, you'll wish you were Bruce Lee. And then Brandon Lee. And then Chris Farley.

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