Kickboxer 3: The Art of War

KICKBOXER 3: THE ART OF WAR sees Sasha Mitchell and Dennis Chan teaming up to battle some Brazilian thugs in this South American adventure. It's very much a cookie-cutter production, with the actual kickboxing tournament sidelined in favour of some distinctly B-movie style shenanigans and high energy bouts. That said, it's a film not without a certain early 1990s charm, in that acting and plot are sidelined in favour of plentiful, hard-hitting action.

The storyline is basic to say the least and involves a nefarious bad guy who has a habit of kidnapping innocent girls to use in his brothel. Inevitable, our hero and his sidekick end up getting involved with said villain, and plenty of fisticuffs and shoot-outs ensue. The best thing about the movie is the action; it will never win prizes for originality, but it certainly proves to be satisfying. The choreography is basic but the style is pleasingly violent and packed to the brim with mayhem.

Mitchell himself is a wooden, stilted actor and yet he proves himself a powerhouse in the fight scenes; certainly a guy you wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of. Dennis Chan, however, is the best person in this, bringing plenty of that trademark mentor charm from the original. The rest of the cast, both good guys and bad, are distinctly undistinguished, but as sequels go this straightforward B-movie isn't without charm.

Sasha Mitchell reprises his role as David Sloan who has since # 2 become a bona-fide kickboxing champion who flies to Rio to compete to defend his championship however along the way he decides to take down a prostitution racket and does so without hardly breaking a sweat. Did I give away too much by the last sentence? Well let's just say that this predictable sequel is a marginal improvement over # 2. This time there is more attractive scenery, more action and more plot than # 2, which was irritatingly straight forward.) That being said the movie is still hugely flawed. The main problem dealing with the fact that K3 has little kickboxing. Indeed the fight sequence at the end as well as the opponent could've easily been written out and it wouldn't have changed a thing. Mitchell and Chan rely on more guns and while this element works for action fans, the lack of training montage and fights make this a tepid effort.

* * out of 4-(Fair)

David Sloan and his trainer Xian arrives in Buenos Aires for a kickboxing tournament. Once there they befriend a young boy and his sister living on the streets. When the promoter of David's championship rival turns out to be a pimp the boy's sister is stolen away due to the value of virgins. David is held captive by the pimp, Lane and is forced to do heavy work weakening his body. Can David stay focused in order to free the girl and win his fight? This should be called "Kickboxer 3 - so very lame". It should never be a series anyway! Clue to a poor series of films - if Jean Claude Van Damme bails after the first one! The plot here is lazy - it paints it's bad guys big and tries to set up a fight every so often to make it interesting. There's no characters and it's even hard to care about the children. You don't believe that any of the good guys could get hurt, so you don't care what they get into.

The performances are pretty bad, the street boy is good but Sasha Mitchell acts like a spoilt kid from LA. With his clothes and tattoos he looks a bit like a clean-cut Eminem. Dennis Chan is supposed to give comic relief as Xian, however he misses the mark most of the time and comes off looking like a low-rent Mr Miyagi from the Karate Kid series. Comar is a terrible bad guy - unbelievable and unsympathetic to the end, while Sloan's championship challenger is your standard mad, bad guy fare.

The fights are ok I guess - standard kickboxing stuff, but they are what the film is all about, and as such they should be great! They not - which I guess means the film fails on the most basic level. Overall a pretty poor film that doesn't even reach the low standard it set for itself.

For reasons explained in my review of "Kickboxer 2: The Road Back", I STILL had not seen the first one when I wrote a review that included a plot summary. I have since found out there is another way to include a detailed plot summary.

This film is more of a comedy than the second one, and that's fine with me. Most of the scenes with David and Xian are funny, as are many scenes with Marcos. Even the villains give us some funny lines.

In the first film, Sasha Mitchell didn't seem that much like Cody. But he either hadn't played the character yet or hadn't played him very long. In this film, the Cody personality is there from his first line. That's not to say he is always there. Sometimes Mitchell is quite serious and tough. But either playing Cody all those years reduced his IQ or David has been getting hit in the head too much. Since I liked Cody, it was okay with me.

Dennis Chan isn't quite as good as in the second movie, in terms of quality, but he is a lot funnier.

Noah Verduzco does a very good job as young Marcos, and unlike Joey from the first movie, a similar character, he gets to stay around for the entire movie.

One of the villains is in charge of some kind of holiday celebration involving dancing by the locals. They're quite talented.

A woman selling some kind of merchandise has only a couple of lines but is very convincing as a real Brazilian.

There is nice music in Frank Lane's restaurant, where it appears wealthy men are being set up with hookers. Later in Frank's restaurant, there is more good music, this time with a female vocalist, and dancing.

And there's a great fall out of a window. To which David responds, "Now THAT's number seven!"

The fighting is good, if you like that sort of thing. It's not nearly as bloody as in the second movie, and in fact this one had a TV-PG rating when I saw it while the other was TV-14. But don't be fooled: this still isn't family fare.

It's entertaining enough.

My review was written in January 1993 after watching the film on Live video cassette.

Third entry in the series that four years ago helped make Jean-Claude Van Damme a star is a routine martial arts pic that benefits from attractive Brazilian location photography. Briefly released theatrically lat fall, the film has better-than-average chances for a video following.

Repeating from part two, Sasha Mitchell plays the uppity hero, a kickboxing champ headed to Rio de Janeiro for a tournament. Once arrived, Mitchell is befriended by street urchin Noah Verduzco and saves his young sister (Althea Miranda) from the clutches of brothel owner Richard Comar.

Coincidentally, Comar also manages evil kickboxer Ian Jaklin. Predictably Miranda is kidnapped and Mithcell is ordered to throw the big match against Jacklin to protect her. A corny happy ending sets the stage for yet another sequel.

Mitchell, unlike most of the protagonists in this genre an actor first and martial artist second, is a very personable lead and acquits himself well in the action scenes. Supporting cast is nondescript.