The Octagon
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Movie Reviews of The Octagon
Movie Review: "What is your real name?" Norris answers "Do you really need to know?" The man says "No"
Summary: 3 Stars
You have to love b movies. Now I have to be honest this flick does not deserve a full 3 stars. It is more like a 2 and a half but chuck norris's super sweet moves definitely gives it the full 3. So if you can stick with this thing just dragging along for 5-10 minutes at a time, you will be pleased with the last 30 minutes or so. Can Norris storm this evil ninja camp and save his friend? Can he kill his ninja brother. You will just have to watch and find out.
The piture quality is good but not perfect by any means. The special featuresd are very interesting too giving you a behind teh scens of teh movie and a ton of info on the film company that made this movie and other good Chuck Norris flicks.
Movie Review: NASTY NINJAS
Summary: 3 Stars
A typical Chuck Norris vehicle that relies on its karate scenes to salvage it. Norris in an early role demonstrates his limited acting range, but makes up for it with some effective fight scenes. While the plot is convoluted and never makes total sense, it takes the back seat to Norris' attempts to get revenge on his "brother" who has gone bad. The supporting cast goes from mediocre (Art Hindle, Lee van Cleef, Carol Bagdasarian) to worse (Karen Carlson, Larry D. Mann, Kurt Grayson). There are annoying narrative voice overs of Norris' conscience that are more annoying with the use of some kind of reverberatory effect. THE OCTAGON is not the best of the Norris library, but you could do worse.Movie Review: One of Chuck's Best
Summary: 3 Stars
The Octagon is one of Chuck's best movie highlighting his karate skills. This is a good one to have in your colloction.Movie Review: A traffic sign or martial arts thriller
Summary: 2 Stars
I am conflicted and truly felt cognitive dissonance when I reviewed this movie. Anyone who knows me is aware that I am huge Chuck Norris fan. However, this movie is so totally ludicrous and for the most part moot. So this review was hard for me to write. Nevertheless, I still love Chuck Norris and this movie is entertaining but perhaps for all the wrong reasons.
This movie released in 1980 (more than likely shot in 1979) has this total retro feel to it, which as far as I am concerned is a good thing. However, this movie had so many loop holes in it the Millennium Falcon would have no problem flying through them in order to jump into hyper-drive.
I would try to explain the story of this film, yet I didn't understand it myself. What I will say is that Chuck Norris is tormented by flashbacks of his childhood and of ninjas (evil). He discovers that his adopted brother (can we say Lego hair) is the leader of an underground ninja crime movement. These ninjas are training in an octagon, hence the title of the movie. The former is really the best description of the movie I can provide. The movie should have been dubbed in French it might have made more sense to me despite the fact I cannot speak French. As for the fighting, it wasn't bad, usually Chuck Norris fair.
Another strange thing in this movie was Chuck Norris' intern-monologue; it has this whispering echo thing going on. For the most part, I didn't understand any of Chuck's thoughts. Then there was the character of A.J.: was he Chuck's friend, business partner, brother, an X-File, I don't know. Then there was this older man played by Lee Van Cleef. He was always accompanied by two other men and they always were able to aid Chuck. Again, I don't know who he was, why he was there and how he knew Chuck. All I knew is that he hated ninjas. I have never met a ninja so I can't share this aversion. Oh you will also see a very young Ernie Hudson in this movie.
Chuck also has three different "encounters" or "relationships" with women in this movie. The first woman is sort of ditzy and is accosted by ninjas. The second woman Chuck calls a whore. Finally, the third looks like a girl I use to date. I am not sure if any of this information means anything.
In retrospect I look at "The Octagon" in two perspectives. The first perspective is a movie that is so bad it makes one wonder why it was made and what events in one's life resulted in viewing this film. The second perspective is a movie that is just random scenes and the only continuity being the characters and location. Under the assumption the viewer surrenders to the latter, they might really enjoy this movie. Sadly this movie seems very thrown together and didn't know what it wanted to do with itself.
The only reason I gave this movie two stars is because after about forty minutes I just started laughing. Once this transpired, I started to lose the oxygen going to my brain and began enjoying the nonsense that is "The Octagon". This behavior continued up forty-eight hours after the movie ended. I will never look at a "stop sign" the same way again.
Movie Review: UH, NOT
Summary: 2 Stars
Apparently, there are those who have little experience in martial arts cinema. How this would ever rate 5 stars is beyond me. Granted, it is better than most of the Cannon Ninja films of the 80's, but this is honestly one of two films that, in my lifetime, actually gave me a migraine headache. The other was the over long, barely watchable CONTACT with Jodie Foster. I had high hopes for this when it was released, but suffered through it at a local drive in. I liked the sets, the costumes, the whole ninja mystique, but seriously: the last fight scene is a total let down for what the first three acts were building us up for. Norris defeats the head ninja with one bold move? Come on now! Give us a fight to talk about! Nope. Just a silhouette against a sunrise with Norris stabbing the bad guy. THE END. Uh, nope. Unsatisfactory for the two hours of my life I invested in this. Maybe hard core Norris fans will enjoy this, but to those who have a background in real ninja cinema from Asia, this film is far from exemplary.