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Review
by
Brian Lindsey
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5
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4 |
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10
= Highest Rating |
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By
1986, Japanese martial artist-turned-actor Sho Kosugi had starred
in a number of low budget ninja films tailor-made for brief
theatrical runs followed by a more lucrative shelf-life on cable
and home video. Rage of Honor,
directed by Gordon Hessler (The
Oblong Box, The Golden
Voyage of Sinbad), looks like an attempt to sell Kosugi
as a James Bond-Meets-Rambo action hero. He resorts to guns
and gadgets nearly as often as he does feet, fists and shurikens,
and even does so while dressed in a tuxedo at one point. It
really doesn't work. A tad deficient in the charisma department,
possessing only a limited command of English, Kosugi is saddled
with a clichéd, strictly by-the-numbers plot that Hessler
can't do much to enliven, even with a bigger budget. In the
TV/film veteran's hands the movie is competently made yet still
enjoyable as unintentionally funny cheese, like 1983's Revenge
of the Ninja. "Sho" 'nuff, as an invincible, indestructible
One Man Army, Kosugi can be fun to watch.
An agent for the fictitious U.S. Drug Investigation
Bureau, Japanese-born Shiro Tanaka (Kosugi) and his two partners
are marked for death by a Buenos Aires crime syndicate.
In Phoenix, Arizona, Tanaka's buddy Ray Jones (Richard Wiley)
is captured when investigating a warehouse owned by an Argentinean
company. The syndicate's ruthless American enforcer, Havlock
(Lewis Van Bergen), tortures Jones to death before a tuxedo-clad
Tanaka shows up — a bit late — to waste a number of his henchman.
(Including gunning down two thugs simultaneously, in midair,
while doing a somersault. Hi-KEEBA!) Havlock thinks Tanaka is
dead when he blows the place up, but of course our hero survives
and vows to avenge his murdered pal.
Tanaka suspects there
must be a turncoat inside the D.I.B., an informant working for
the syndicate. Ray was set up. His superior, Sterling (a Brit
actor whose American accent comes and goes from scene to scene),
won't authorize a mission to Argentina so Tanaka resigns from
the service. He heads to Buenos Aires with his girlfriend Jennifer
(Robin Evans) for a "vacation", where he meets Bureau
buddy Dick Coleman (Gerry Gibson)
to get info on Havlock and his employers. Havlock's ahead of
the game, though, placing the trio under surveillance. They've
barely checked in to their hotel when Jennifer is almost murdered
by one of Havlock's men. For safety, she and Coleman take a
charter flight to Rio from where they later intend to travel
on to the States. (Sorry
for the short holiday, Jen.) Tanaka, in the meantime, stays
behind to pursue his personal vendetta. He
kills a bunch of the syndicate's hired muscle (including some
ninjas — it just wouldn't be a Sho Kosugi flick without ninjas!),
then learns that Coleman and Jennifer's plane was hijacked and
landed in a remote jungle location. They escaped their captors
but now Havlock is hot on their heels. Coleman is carrying an
important computer disk with him containing files which could
bring down the syndicate. Tanaka's former boss asks him to mount
a one-man commando/rescue operation...
Rage of Honor is
a mediocre time-waster at best, the kind of brainless, contrived
and formulaic action flick often
seen on cable TV while prostate on the couch at 3 AM in the
morning. From the badass monosyllabic hero out to avenge his
murdered partner to the kidnapped girlfriend in danger, it's
all been done to death a zillion times. The
villains are generic and uninteresting. Fortunately there's
not a whole lot of plot to get in the way of the action, which
is guaranteed to bust a move, like clockwork, every 10 minutes
or so. Varying from decent to cheesy, it'll at least keep you
awake, which isn't always a bad thing. (Even at 3 AM.)
Kosugi must kill at least a hundred or
more henchmen in the course of the movie (including more ninjas,
this time in spiffy jungle camouflage), and even battles savage,
spear-chucking natives who figure in the plot only as yet another
obstacle our hero must overcome. No problem for Sho, though.
He produces shurikens, nun-chaku and other fighting weapons
seemingly out of nowhere (his ass, maybe?) just when he needs
them. Naturally there's a big mano a mano showdown between Tanaka
and Havlock, who's a martial arts master, too.
Now
to be honest, I'd rate this flick a notch lower if not for Sho
Kosugi. For some reason I like the guy. His English isn't too
good and his acting consists of
maybe three facial expressions, but with the exception of the
most dangerous stunts — like dangling over a gorge — that's
definitely him in the action sequences, not a stunt double.
(Kosugi also choreographed the fights in this and a number of
his other films.) To my mind, it's what makes him one of the
better screen heroes of the big action/martial arts movie explosion
of the 1980s... even though, just like Roger Moore, his hair
stays perfect no matter how many fireballs he dodges or bad
guys he beats up.
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For
a relatively low budget film nearly 20 years old, Rage
of Honor looks and sounds okay on MGM's bargain-priced
DVD. Visually, it's grainy in some scenes but clarity
is otherwise sharp and colors bright. Audio isn't spectacular
but is more than adequate to the task — do we really need faux
Miami Vice music in DTS? (The thick accents of Kosugi and
the Argentine actor
who plays the mob boss can be a problem at times but that's
their fault, not the disc's. You might have to occasionally flick
on the English subtitles to catch everything they're saying.)
The film's trailer is tossed in as an extra.
At
under $14 this would ordinarily seem like an acceptable deal.
But the DVD loses a rating point for presenting Rage
of Honor fullframe. This film was clearly intended for
release in theaters, at the 1.85 aspect ratio; thus some of Hessler's
shots are compromised. The open matte transfer doesn't reveal
any boom mikes or electrical gear but information is clearly missing
on both sides. Shame on MGM for 'formatting' it to 'fit' my TV...
Why buy the disc when you can see it the same way on the STARZ
Action Channel?
7/27/04 |
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