Xin long zhong hu dou

KICKBOXER'S TEARS is essentially the Hong Kong version of the Van Damme vehicle, and a hoot it is too. It begins off with Jackie's favourite bodyguard Ken Lo playing a kickboxer who tackles the awesome Billy Chow in the ring, except that dirty tactics end in tragedy. The focus then shifts to Moon Lee who goes on a mission of revenge. The budget is low but the action plentiful, particularly in the second half which wows with a series of energetic spectacles. Yukashi Oshima is a consistently welcome presence in such films and she wows in her brief fight scenes here, and the climax in particular is delightfully over the top.

Moon Lee as Li Feng, a budding fighter who witnessed her brother being killed in a rigged kickboxing tournament. Swearing revenge, Li Feng decides to train herself to be stronger, better, and avenge her brother's defeat, only to bring the ire of Madam Wong (Oshima), wife of the champion, who wants Li to be dead as well.

Loosely inspired by Van Damme's Kickboxer movie, Moon Lee is out to get even with those who had her brother killed in the ring. What follows is some drama, light comedy, and unrelenting enraged flurries of lightning kicks, blistering fists, and pulverizing impacts, as painful as they are awesomely choreographed. I liked the comedic moments here, sort of balances out the grimmer and violent parts. The ending is quite intense and bloody. Moon Lee and her friends take a lot of punishment. This is a solid film.

The script of this movie is terrible and exists only to link the fight scenes together, so let's focus on those instead: we begin with a long male vs. male in-ring kickboxing match. Well done, but not what many of us were looking for in a film starring Moon Lee and Yukari Oshima. Then we have one more match like that, only of lesser quality and I barely paid attention to it. Then Moon Lee gets her first chance to shine in a playground fight against some random thugs. Then she challenges Billy Chow to a fight - and by challenging, I mean she attacks him to prove that she's capable enough. Then she has two underground matches (with spectators) against Chow and Yukari Oshima. And finally she and the other good guys take on the No. 1 villain and his hired thugs in an abandoned house. Strangely enough, her out-of-the-ring fights are more satisfying than the ring ones. Her first fight with Billy Chow easily outshines the second (which also suffers from poor audio synching), and the one with Yukari is too short (barely over 2 minutes). Her best move - which she does twice - is the way she flips over an armed opponent and then disarms him. She is very quick and flexible. **1/2 out of 4.

At first I thought this one was going to suck but as soon as I saw the fight scenes I quickly change my tune. The fight choreography was beautiful and the best part about it was that the film had a decent story. The wardrobe was great in this one and the setting cinematography was awesome. That woman can really fight and I personally would not want to tango with her!!!

All in All I gave this movie a 9/10 and the only reason I did not give it a 10 was because of the way the main villain was killed. I mean really, how many times have we seen the old chain hanging bit!

I had purchased the dubbed version of this movie through Suncoast and at first, I thought it was gonna be terrible because I didn't know anything about Moon Lee or Yurari Oshima. Needless to say, this movie was well worth the money! Moon Lee plays a visiting young woman, in town in Hong Kong to see her older brother (Ken Lo) who is a kickboxing champion and owner of his own school. He has two other disciples (Mark Cheng and Gabriel Wong) who are his assist him in the ring. However, a dirty trick from Billy Chow's character puts Ken into an early grave and Moon vows revenge in an attempt to keep her brother's school from being closed down because he had amassed a serious debt with the bank. What follows are some excellent stunts, acrobatic moves from Moon and some hard-hitting one on one battles with Chow and Oshima. The fights scenes are amazing and will definitely leave your jaw open.

This movie is what helped me become a fan of Moon Lee, Yukari Oshima and many other actresses in the girls-with-guns genre. I rate this movie an 8 because the dubbing was a little off track, but nothing to serious.

Rent or buy this movie today and I guarantee you won't be disappointed.