Born to Fight

When your film opens on shots of 80s New York playing to the tune of not quite Crockett's Theme by Jan Hammer, you know the filmmakers were cooking.

Blonde Fury aka Lady Reporter has the unique distinction of being the first and only time a Western actress has ever had lead billing in a Hong Kong film, with Cynthia Rothrock turning in a fun and charismatic performance to boot. Blending the hard-hitting style of Corey Yuen and the graceful acrobatic choreography of Mang Hoi into a movie that's tremendous fun but sloppily put together. The story is way too convoluted for its own good supported by way too many characters, although the performances from its cast are deliciously hammy in particular Roy Chiao and Ronny Yu, they just lobbied with some pretty awful dialogue. Despite its issues, Blonde Fury hits that sweet spot of the 80s and 90s Hong Kong cinema, taking the very rough with the very smooth, not all the comedic beats land but the punches certainly do.

Cynthia Rothrock is Cindy, an FBI agent sent undercover in Hong Kong to crack a counterfeiting ring. She pretends to be a reporter to bag the bad guy, but runs afoul of a mousy rival reporter (Mang Hoi), a cop disguised as an insurance agent (Chin Siu-Ho), and various kung-fu baddies (including Billy Chow). She also incurs the ire of the local cops, and even her pal Yu (Elizabeth Lee), who thought she was just a buddy and not an undercover law enforcer. However, all manufactured conflicts are derailed when Yu's dad (Roy Chiao), the prosecuting lawyer in the counterfeiting case, gets kidnapped. Fighting and mayhem ensues.

A couple of entertaining action sequences, such as on some bamboo scaffolding, as well as a short brawl between Rothrock and Billy Chow, are the main attraction in this fairly decent HK entry, though the pace can meander halfway and it is steeped with too much talk. This is a rare moment where Cynthia Rothrock has a starring role in a HK production and she pulls it off with ease. She has some charm, a presence and a sense of energy but it's her fighting that is really a highlight. Not remarkable, but passable.

A sequel to Above The Law (Righting Wrongs) by name only, and mainly for the Western market, this insane movie is a completely different kind of film that trades the serious action, thriller, for the non-stop action, comedy.

And that's not a bad thing.

Unfortunately though, this sequel tends to lack the production values, and directorial efforts of the first – going through a collection of directors, and hairstyles (which is slightly entertaining) but keeping the same hard-knock fight scenes which we all know and love.

In fact, Rothrock claims to this day that her favourite movie that shows her fighting best, is Blonde Fury (Above The Law 2). And, that's possibly quite true!

Whereas Righting Wrongs was Yuen Biao's time to shine, Blonde Fury is all about the Roth! She actually looks like she is having a great time, which comes across quite well in her character.

Cynthia is aided by ex-boyfriend Meng Hoi, and the fantastic Chin Sui Hoi (brother to the amazing Chin Kar Lok), who both get to show their own skills throughout the show, battling bad guy superstars Billy Chow and Chung Fat, along with a host of other (very hurt looking) stunt-men.

Definitely crazy, often hilarious, and continuously action packed, this gem of a mess is pure entertainment from start to finish!

Enjoy!

(1989) The Blonde Fury (Chinese with no English subtitles) ACTION/ COMEDY

The weakest one Cynthia had ever done out of the five films she had been in Hong Kong but it is still better than the martial art films she did do coming out of the United States. Saw this film from a recorded Japanese Laserdisc onto VHS that had no English subtitles at all making it even more harder to understand, but do know this was real life kick boxer champion Cynthia Rothrock's final film of five Hong Kong films she had done before trying out for Hollywood produced, crappy martial art movies. Some of the martial arts is still phenomenal to look at and they're others that're not memorable at all particularly the ending. Anyways, some of the more memorable fights also included the same factory Samo Hung used at the end of "Dragons Forever" and the bamboo stick fight against the baddie using a long copper pipe! And the fights are still hard hitting despite the plot being non-existent.

I can't say that I was harboring much of any grand expectations to the 1989 action movie "Shi Jie Da Shai" (aka "Lady Reporter" or "Female Reporter"), as I stumbled upon it by random chance here in 2023. I had, in fact, never actually heard about the movie prior to sitting down to watch it. But then again, I never been a fan of Cynthia Rothrock.

Writers Sai-Shing Shum and Michael Swift put together a very stereotypical late 1980s action script. But hey, if you enjoy that kind of cheese, then you're in for a treat, because "Shi Jie Da Shai" is full of 1980s cheese, for better or worse. I found the movie to be semi-watchable, but it was not an outstanding movie experience. Nor is is a movie that I will ever return to watch a second time.

And something I don't understand about the 1980s movie's that were made in Hong Kong and then released worldwide got such terrible dubbing work done, every single time. And "Shi Jie Da Shai" was no different. The dubbing in the movie was just toe-curling bad.

There were some fair enough action and martial arts scenes throughout the course of the 90 minutes that the movie ran for. But it was overshadowed by a rather inferior script, and the movie was ultimately suffering from that fact.

I am sure that there is a fan base out there for a movie such as "Shi Jie Da Shai", especially if you enjoy the work of Cynthia Rothrock. I just happen not to be a part of that particular club.

My rating of director Hoi Mang's 1989 movie lands on a four out of ten stars.