Eine perfekte Waffe

As Steve Segal's career began to decline, Jeff Speakman's was on the rise. Of the various martial arts movies Speakman did,l this is by the far the best, although Lord knows it is no masterpiece. There is very little plot other than revenge, but the fight scenes are well done and plentiful. Many familiar faces (Mako, James Hong, Toru Tanaka) are on hand to support Speakman, who is about as good an actor as Segal, which is to say not particularly good. But he looks great in the fight scenes. A young and delectable Mariska Hargitay, later of L&O: SVU, is along for the ride. Speakman was one of several actors that Hollywood briefly employed to capitalize on Segal's success. None lasted all that long. It took the arrival of Jet Li to spark new interest in martial arts flicks.

Jeff Speakman really shines in this early 90's beat em' up. He has a lot of charisma, good screen presence and great fighting skills. Directed by Mark DiSalle who made JCVD classics Bloodsport and Kickboxer previous to this. When his family friend Kim is harassed then murdered by the Korean crime syndicate, Jeff Speakman beats up many bad guys on his mission for justice. The pace is quick with much well choreographed martial arts action. The support cast is great with Mako, James Hong, Professor Toru Tanaka, James Lew as well as many Asian Hollywood regulars that worked during this period.If you like the Van Damme and Segal movies of the late 80's/early 90's you will most likely dig The Perfect Weapon. It is too bad Jeff Speakman did'nt make many films with a decent budget. If he had the chance to do more projects of the same caliber and quality as TPW, he would be a household name in the action genre.

Where can I learn to fight like that? This movie is fantastic. The fight scenes are choreographed perfectly and make Speakman out to be a good fighter, but not invincible(he does get hit a few times, quite nastily I might add). This is much better than a Steven Seagal film where he never suffers one blow from the bad guys. The way Speakman moves is breathtaking. Its almost hard to believe that what he's doing is actually a martial art. But it is. And he does it so well.

The plot in this movie is simple: its just another revenge flick. This makes the movie easier to watch because you don't have to really watch the plot, just the action. Its rather disappointing that after this and Street Knight, speakman was reduced to doing low-budget films. He deserves another big budget movie like this. Fantastic action, fantastic martial arts choreography make this a 10/10 movie. If you haven't seen it yet you must WATCH IT NOW.

This is one of my all time favorite martial arts flicks. Is the acting going to win any awards? No. But what makes it great is that Speakman takes hits when he is fighting, a lot of hits and sometimes he goes down and other times he uses incorporates the hit into his attack but he isn't Superman and he does take a beating. This gives the fight scenes a realism missing from so many movies of this kind. Unfortunately in his small catalog of movies Speakman never had another of this level. As much as I want to like LWM (and part of me still loves the movie) I hate Chuck Norris too much to separate his nonsense from his characters. I know this statement will win me no love for this review but Jeff Speakman should have had that long, successful run over crazy old Chuck Norris.

..But that's not to say the movie is all-around great. It's a very typical low-budget action flick. The story is pretty cookie-cutter as far as action movies go. It isn't Shakespeare believe me. And the acting is substandard at best. But Jeff Speakman to his enormous credit is a very accomplished martial artist. And having studied Kenpo for many years I can safely say that it's one of the most faithful films to capture the art. And what is even more impressive is the way the film portrays how Kenpo works when compared to different styles (like Tae Kwon Do).

So despite some minor inadequacies it's pretty awesome in many other respects. So for that I give it major credit. And to be honest it's a fun, feel good flick. I would recommend it to any martial arts fan. It's a good time.