Combate a muerte

When his friend (Nick Hill) goes missing, former combat fighter John Larson (Ian Jacklin) heads into - get this - an underworld where promoter Landis (Martin Kove) and his top fighter Mark (Matthias Hues) hold "to the death" fights to amuse the bloodthirsty rich. This by-the- numbers martial arts flick came at the end of the "underground death match" cycle. The stale script should have "Do not produce after 1990" stamped on it and features some baffling choices (would a guy hosting death matches really do up contracts for them?). Jacklin, who looks like Craig Sheffer with more Cro-Magnon features, is a former professional kickboxer and supported Don "The Dragon" Wilson in several features (RING OF FIRE 1 & 2, BLACK BELT). He is actually decent in his first leading role and, naturally, his fights are well done. Female lead Renee Ammann is really lousy as the tough female reporter looking for her big break. The real surprises are Kove and Hues as the baddies, with Kove's character having an eccentric love of crystals. Richard Lynch and Jorge Rivero each have one scene as rival bosses who get killed. Lynch's bit - where he tells the story of his Italian mob grandfather "Pretty Boy" O'Brien - is actually really well done and could be in a Tarantino flick.

Don't get me wrong. I really love the "arena-martial arts genre", and I get more and more surprised over how many films like this there are out there. This one is one of those, and it's not even close to be one of the best. With Mathias Hues in it, I thought it would be good. He can't save this movie though, and to be honest, he wasn't very good either. Just don't pay attention to what other people say; The fighting scenes in this movie are NOT good at all. I really know what I'm talking about, since I have seen so many movies like this. There are also a bunch of scenes that have absolutely nothing to do with the plot whatsoever. I guess they added these only to make the movie last a little bit longer, in addition to manifest the bad guy as,uuuuuuh.......bad (like we didn't know that already).

I laughed so much when I saw this film I nearly soiled myself !. Awful acting, laughable effects (super imposed explosions), and dodgy slow motion fighting.

One of the worst films I've ever seen !.

This is a decent effort for a B-Movie Martial Arts actioner. Ian Jacklin, a former North American cruiser weight Kickboxing champion, is the lead and acquits himself well in the action scenes. The muscular Matthias Hues gets a chance to add more to his Martial Arts bad guy persona in this film than in all of his many others and if you are a fan of The Teutonic Titan, rent this movie now!

Renee Griffin is also noteworthy as the romantic interest in this film. She starts off with attitude but soon warms up to the hero and they make "The beast with two backs" in a very stylish fashion.

The fight scenes are good in the American tradition (NO Hong Kong acrobatics here!) with added realism from having Benny "The Jet" Urquidez playing himself as John Larson's (Jacklin) trainer.

All in all this film seems to have more sub plots than most in its genre so you get MORE of a story.