Life After Fighting

Was EYE ever surprised by this movie...i had another one ready for when i would delete THIS one, after watching for, i thought, fifteen or twenty minutes. TOPS. But by that time i already knew that this was not just some shallow storytelling bolstered by the martial arts angle...no. There was a good story, as well... but the martial arts scenes were, in my opinion, very well done, as well...and, since a lot of the other reviewers are saying the same, i'm not hesitating to say it, as well... but, again, there's another story going on that's very worthwhile... i'm thinking that this guy...main character...director...has a future in the business...i can't imagine that this movie had a high budget... and i HOPE that if he DOES get his hands on some money beCAUSE of how well this movie does(and it SHOULD do well...kind of a Rocky, in its own right), that he will not lose perspective and keep it from going over the top... but he HAS to have discipline to get to where he is NOW...so i'm not all that worried that this would happen... so someone throw some money at this guy and let's see what ELSE he can do... by the way...just so you don't wonder...i live in the Netherlands and am in no WAY affiliated with him/the production...except, now, as a fan...i really WAS surprised... oh. And it WASn't 'flawless'...i thought the last scene...well...it COULD've been shorter if he'd done what EYE would've done in that situation...but i won't say anything else because i don't do spoilers...but i understand why he chose to do it the way he did... i still enjoyed it, otherwise... i came back to edit this...a six point TWO rating? How did THAT happen...a SEVEN i could tolerate but most of the review are at LEAST a seven...so what's up with THIS??? Do NOT be discouraged from seeing this movie if the subject seems interesting...it's got the moves and THEN some...

With a tiny budget of 350 000 Australian dollars Bren Foster managed to create one of the best (if not the best) fight sequences in movie history! A criminally underrated screen fighter, fight choreographer, athlete and martial arts master that holds black belts in 5 disciplines (taekwondo, hapkido, brazilian jiu-jitsu, haidong gumdo, hwarangdo) and world champion gold medals in taekwondo and karate!

Well, I actually only stumbled upon this little gem because the guy in the poster from a far looked like a beefed up Clive Owen. Alas the guy is Bren Foster, who wrote and directed the film. Probably a passion project. And it shows.

Let me tell you, this was a surprisingly emotional ride.

Up front I was expecting a very B grade martial arts movie with a acting-wise very limited protagonist. This Bren guy pulled it off though.... There are quite some subtle scenes where you feel the inner turmoil in him.

The story is simple but does not shy away from quite ugly themes. And it kind of even crosses a line in between.

Of course, it revolves pretty much how you expect it, with the main guy virtually having super powers. But that does not detract from the movie.

But the absolute standout quality of this film is the direction of the fight scenes. They are very real, visceral und the physicality of them is conveyed very well. I caught myself twitching with some of the hits.....which is very rare. That is some A grade direction that does stand the comparison with the likes of The Raid 2, Ong Bak or Hong Kong movies.

It also gets surprisingly brutal at the end.

So watch out for this Bren Foster guy! Within martial arts movies, I see a bright future.

A new face in the action circus for me and an extremely likeable one at that. Where has this Bren Foster been all these years?

As a nostalgic caress, there is the cosy fighting school setting, which is the central element in almost every classic Eastern. But here we get more than the 10,000th blockbuster of the same content, and for the astonishing mini-budget of 350,000 Australian dollars. Our leading actor is also the director and attempts the difficult balancing act between martial arts action, thriller and drama. If I now add that this is spread over 125 minutes, most people will wave goodbye. Wait a minute! I don't want to claim that everything is perfectly rounded and that there aren't any long stretches, but overall Life After Fighting works surprisingly well. Potential audiences probably won't need the tragic core story, but it does give the brutal finale in particular a very special emotional depth. Speaking of the finale, wow, 40 minutes of a real martial arts highlight. More films please, Mr Foster!

Melodrama. Action. More melodrama. More action. Rinse and repeat. Truth is, this has been the formulaic approach to this genre of film for the last 20 years or so. To make a fight film stand out, to make it POP, there has to be something unusual, something different. And LIFE AFTER FIGHTING 2024 offers that. The melodrama is still ... melodrama. But the action scenes are on fire. In fact, when the action starts, this reviewer gets a vibe not felt since BILLY JACK 1971, the original, and that is high praise. ((Don't forget to check out WARRIOR 2011 and KISS OF THE DRAGON 2001 on my list of all-time greats, if you have not done so already. Designated "IMDb Top Reviewer." See my list "167+ Nearly-Perfect Movies (with the occasional Anime or TV miniseries) you can/should see again and again (1932 to the present))