Bloodfist

First starring role for Light Heavyweight Kickboxing Champion Don "The Dragon" Wilson, 'Bloodfist' is worth every penny of the $4.95 I spent on the bargain DVD.

Forget the critics. This is one of Roger Corman's earliest ventures into the martial arts genre, and, like much of the Corman library, there's lots of respectable bang for the few bucks spent on the production.

First, let's get past the name thing. Wilson has taken some smirks in the media for adding "The Dragon" to his name. But the man was just being pragmatic. I mean, do you remember the other Don Wilson? The paunchy, bulldog-jowled, middle-aged announcer on the old Jack Benny Show? Prior to 'Bloodfist', he was the only Don Wilson anyone had ever heard of in showbiz.

Would you have lined up at the box office for a martial arts movie starring that guy?

The Set-up: Wilson's half-brother is a prizefighter in a shady Manila fight club who ends up dead after winning a fixed fight.

Cut to Wilson back in sunny Southern Cal, who promptly explains to a bunch of grade school field trippers that he runs a gym, but does not box professionally because HE ONLY HAS ONE KIDNEY. He donated the other to his (late) half-brother. This begs the question: Why was the brother fighting? One assumes that he also had one kidney (the donated one), unless Wilson generously gave one of his away because he felt his brother should have two ...?

As in the best Corman films, the action takes over fast, and the field trip isn't even out of the building before Don gets the call that his brother's dead.

The Dragon hops the next thing smokin' to the Philippines, officially to claim the body, but I can't help thinking that in the back of his mind, Don didn't wonder just a little about getting that kidney back. Imagine his disappointment when the Manila officials open a green file cabinet and hand him an urn. Full of his brother's ashes. Including at least one powdered kidney. Nothing left but revenge, since we're already here.

Wilson promptly picks up a painter-slash-kickboxing trainer, a party animal-slash-kickboxer roommate, and a translator-slash-exotic dancer love interest. Which brings us to actress Riley Bowman, who plays the love interest. Where did this woman go? 'Bloodfist' was not only her first, but also her last movie. And Riley exhibited ... ample ... uh ... skills. Exactly the type of open-minded, halfway-talented actress that Corman employed again and again and again in his New Horizon and Concorde flicks. What a loss.

Oh, well. Back to the action. You get a great selection of tournament adversaries for Wilson, who also double as suspects in his brother's murder.

There's a little twist to the ending, tantamount to Burgess Meredith whupping the daylights out of Rocky Balboa.

Better than 'Swamp Women'. Close to the pleasures of 'Attack of the Giant Leeches' or the first remake of 'Not of This Earth' (the Traci Lords one). No self-respecting Corman fanatic should be without a copy of this. 'Bloodfist' is worth a B-movie 5 out of 10.

Bloodfist (1989)

** (out of 4)

THE KARATE KID meets KICKBOXER Roger Corman style in this 80's cult favorite. Don 'The Dragon' Wilson plays Jake Raye, a retired fighter who travels to the Philipeans to get his brothers ashes and seek vengeance against his killer. He ends up getting involved in a kickboxer tournament and ends up falling for a big-breasted blonde. If you're looking for an uplifting story or a heart felt drama then it's best you go somewhere else. BLOODFIST, the first of (so far) nine films, is 100% exploitation and you get pretty much what you'd expect from a film like this. It's fast, cheap, questionably made but the most important thing is that it's at least fun. I thought Wilson was pretty good in the lead role and while he really wasn't required to give a "performance," I thought his skill as an athlete was on full display. He really makes for a good hero and he managed to be very entertaining during the fight scenes. The supporting players really aren't all that memorable but you Billy Blanks fans should be happy. The fighting scenes are entertaining but at the same time there's no denying that they were all cheaply done and quite often you have to wonder what the editor was doing. Some of the editing is quite sloppy but I'm going to guess this was due to how much footage was shot and him having to try and piece it together the best he could. For the exploitation factor there's some nudity as well but really not as much as you'd expect to find in a Corman-produced film. There's no question that the film was cheaply produced and it's not going to be mistaken for a classic but fans of cheap action films should at least get some mild entertainment from it.

After his brother, Mike, is murdered in Manila, Jake (Don Wilson) travels down there to claim the body and must use his kick-boxing expertise to deal with the local highly-trained hooligans that had to do with his brother's untimely demise. He meets and stays with Baby and his sister Nancy (Riley Bowman)

If there's one fatal flaw with the film, I mean aside from the mediocre fight scenes, is the character of Baby, he's awful and brings the otherwise enjoyable , if not particularly good in the conventional sense of the word, don whenever he's on-screen. The writer of this is currently having fairly good fortune with hit TV show "The Good Wife", so the dues he paid were worth it, I kind of doubt he keeps this one on his resume though. Furthermore, 'The Dragon' would thankfully grow as an actor later in his career. I still hold a (unexplainable) soft spot for this film though.

Eye Candy: Riley Bowman and an extra get topless

Roger Corman had an eye of what kind of movies the audience wanted to see....in the 80's and 90's there was a huge boom in the martial arts genre, Corman produced many martial arts movies starring kickboxing champion Don "The Dragon" Wilson.

The movie itself is stuff that you already saw: martial arts tournament, revenge and some twists (if you have seen Bloodsport and some other movie like that you know of what i am talking about), but is not so bad to get a 3.8 rating and it's not even the worst martial arts movie ever (trust me, i have seen crappier MA movies) My favorite scene in Bloodfist is the fight scene between Don Wilson and Billy Blanks, the slow-motion sound effects are just worth the whole scene.

The sequels are FAR better than this one.

Don "The Dragon" Wilson plays a kickboxer named Jake Raye. He receives news from Manila that his brother, Michael, was found murdered. So he goes to the Philippines, to try and find his brother's killer. He meets a man named Kwong (Joe Mari Avellana), who trains him to compete in a martial-arts tournament called "Ta Chang" -- because he suspects that one of the fighters there was Michael's killer.

Some of the actors (excepting Wilson and Joe Mari Avellana) are quite bad, and the fight scenes aren't choreographed very well (you can make out that the fighters aren't really hitting each other). Still, this is an entertaining movie.

"Bloodfist" was remade twice (at least as far as I know), as "Full Contact (1992)" and "Dragon Fire (1993)". I've seen both, and they're better than this one. "Full Contact" is the best of the lot (and it would have been even better had Don "The Dragon" Wilson been in it instead of Jerry Trimble).

Seven sequels (to date) have followed "Bloodfist" -- most of them have nothing to do with the first one. They're all better than this movie (especially parts 6 and 7).

If you like low budget action movies, and if you are a fan of Don "The Dragon" Wilson, you might want to see this early movie of his. Others will probably not like this movie.