Showdown in Little Tokyo
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Movie Reviews of Showdown in Little Tokyo
Movie Review: Nice action/martial arts movie to add to your collection
Summary: 4 Stars
The keys to a great action/martial arts movie is you need a great villain and believable heros. This movie did it right. Unfortunately it isn't widescreen format.Movie Review: Some Memories Need to Stay Memories
Summary: 3 Stars
I remember seeing this when it was first released on VHS and I remember liking it quite a bit. It popped up on my radar again and I noticed all the positive user reviews. I figured" why not revisit this little gem." What was I thinking!? What a dumb flick.
Now yes. I realize this is made for the martial arts fight scenes and the action in general. But jeezo peezo Batman shouldn't you at least try to write a script that makes some sense? This is barely a sketch of a plot. Dolph plays an L.A. cop who grew up in Japan and witnessed the murder of his parents at the hands of a Yakuza. Said Yakuza ends up in L.A. to build an empire on a new street drug, and who does he run into...Dolph Lundgren (go figure). Lundgren now has his umpteenth partner, Brandon Lee, and they are going to do the bad guys in.
Mark Lester will never be accused of being a great director. He is strictly a meat and potatoes kind of guy and he proves it here. Very little in this movie makes any sense. There is no cleverness in their tracking down the bad guys. No "by the book" police procedure. (Don't you need to fill out some reports when you kill a crap-load of people)? It just gets dumber and dumber as you plod toward the end.
Even the technical stuff is kind of sucky. Bad sound mixing and editing. The continuity isn't.....continuous. The editing in general is lousy. I don't remember much of the music so I guess that wasn't as sucky as the rest of the stuff.
As is usual in these movies, the bad guys can't shoot worth a darn but the good guys can put your eye out at 50 yards. And, get this, at one point, when Dolph is being shot at, he holds up his hand to block the bullets. Yup. I can stop all kinds of bullets with my hands.
The two leads do an OK job (I'm grading Dolph on the curve) and Tia Carrere is always easy on the eyes, but this movie is a mess. I should have kept it in my memories. It looked much better there.
Movie Review: expected more
Summary: 3 Stars
Dolph Lundgren and Brandon Lee star as a cop duo in this action flick that attempts humor with some decent martial arts. In the end, Showdown is ok, an average movie with nothing too exciting that will make you want to watch it again anytime soon.
The coolest thing about the movie are the two stars. The late Brandon Lee (The Crow, Rapid Fire) displays a few scenes of some great martial arts skills, while Dolph Lundgren (Rocky IV, Universal Soldier) is his usual physically overwhelming self, kicking butt wherever he goes. Unfortunately, these two guys have done better in some of their other films, but it is cool to see them together in one movie. Their chemistry, though, is a bit lacking, as is the cheesy humor that fails to be humurous. Maybe back in the good old day it might have been. The villain is played by Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (Kickboxer 2, Mortal Kombat) who is just downright dirty in this film. A sick villain, to say the least, as mentioned by another review here, that disturbing scene with the beheading of the blonde. In the end, Lundgren gets a swordfight against the Hiroyuki character, but unfortunately the scene is about over before it begins, and then the credits soon roll.
Showdown has very little story or plot. Most of the movie consists of pure action scenes and then some. The 2 cops chase the bad guys, and they chase them. Back and forth it goes. Acting, of course, is below par, as is with most action movies. I emphasive the R rating on this film as well, for there is scene after scene of naked women, cursing, and some gruesome events. Some of it just becomes annoying.
If you like Brandon Lee, Dolph Lundgren, and ok martial arts action, Showdown should be worth renting. Buying may not be necessary, its not as good as I had hoped.
Movie Review: Lee, Lundgren Team Up For Ultimate Showdown
Summary: 3 Stars
Brandon Lee and Dolph Lundgren team up as renegade cops with extensive martial arts portfolios in Showdown in Little Tokyo. The catch here is that the blonde-headed Lundgren has more of a connection with traditional martial arts and Japanese culture than his American-ized counterpart, Lee. The mismatch works well for laughs and for action as both Lee and Lundgren get to display their talents on a number of bad guys.For Lee, this is a traditional stroll down memory lane - a film vehicle his father, Bruce, may have taken on and the typical sort of flick he turned out before his tragic death on the set of the Crowe in 1994. For Lundgren, he displays martial arts skills never-before-seen in his previous pictures. Donning the boxing trunks in Rocky IV, he kept his powerhouse kick boxing skills under wraps in the ring. The rest of his films opt for graphic gore via armed weapons. Needless to say, seeing a six-foot-seven man executing sweeping kicks and unparalleled agility is a sight.
Of course, in buddy cop films, chemistry is always the deciding factor in whether or not the film works (and in some cases, if a sequel is made). Thanks to a humor-filled script, both stars excel at the cheap shots, even if Lundgren's delivery is somewhat wooded in places. The film doesn't misfire. While it certainly didn't receive any honors as an artistic piece, Showdown delivers the goods: Awe-inspiring delivery of martial arts and a more than adequate story line that keeps the action going at a modest pace.
The DVD version is a decent capture of the film. The colors are crisp and the picture is mostly flawless. The down side is that there are no extra features on this disc. Still, most action fans aren't in the hunt for too many extras. Definitely a good addition to your DVD collection.
Movie Review: Unintentionally hilarious...
Summary: 3 Stars
This is the best bad movie I think I can remember seeing. It's so silly, so predictable, and yet it's somehow holds interest. Maybe that's because we want to see if it gets any worse. Lundgren stars as the cop equivalent of Superman. He can jump over cars, defeat sumo wrestlers in hand-to-hand comment, woo Tia Carerre, lift a car on its side and then blow it up with one shot, and he can also build a house by himself. He is partnered with Brandon Lee, who is actually quite funny and entertaining, despite somewhat limited screen time. The two join together and bring down the Yakuza in a part of LA called Little Tokyo. This movie is filled with cheesy moments so bad you'll die laughing. I enjoyed this film's badness because it seemed so serious in what it was trying to produce. My favorite part was when Lundgren jumps over the convertible. He must be about eight feet in the air! Michael Jordon couldn't do such a stunt without scraping his feet on the car. "Showdown in Little Tokyo" needs to be seen to be believed. Is it tons of fun? You bet. Is is also very ridiculous? Of course.