Gedo

Everyone says this movie is awful. They rightfully say so. Gary Daniel's previous movies do range from terrible to good cheesy fun. (The fight scenes are the best thing about his "good" films.) I knew this movie wasn't gonna be that great, but I never thought it would actually have a worse script than BLOODMOON and COLD HARVEST. (These two are his best films because of their excelent fight coordination.) The film makers didn't even know what was going on. It's like the whole cast and crew was wandering around not knowing what to do in this film. However, the action is great. Akihiro Noguchi of COLD HARVEST returns to direct the fight scenes, and even has help from Koichi Sakamoto of DRIVE. If there was more action though, and if it was longer, (It's not painfully short.) that would have been better. The scenes just seemed too short for their own good. (Similar to the problem in the FATAL FURY anime series which had awesome but short fight scenes) Gary Daniels even gets to exchange a few blows with veteran stuntman James Lew. But after those few kicks and punches, he's down like a sack of potatoes. Even George Cheung was once again wasted. (He's a great martial artist, but his skills are BARELY used in the MARTIAL ARTS films he's in. What exactly is up with that.) THe sound effects weren't the best either. Punches and kicks seemed too quiet. (And I don't think they were going for the same effect like in CROUCHING TIGER) But whoever this Kiyoshi Nakajo is, who makes his US debut as Domoto, he rocks. He has an awesome screen presense, and handles a sword masterfully. He was the best actor in this whole film, and made it worth watching even more. Another intersting aspect of this film is that A great portion of it is in Japanese too. THat was a very good idea to have a film in English and Japanese, as it gave a good mix. The Japanese scenes were better acted than the English ones. I suggest renting this movie on one dollar day when you have nothing better to do, and just skip to the action scenes. I personally can't get enough of martial arts action, and weather the movie is good or not, as long as it features good fight choreography, it's worth watching.

This movie is poor. Especially the action scenes are very badly performed. The martial arts is one of the worst in recent years: People behave like puppets and as seen in many low budget movies, enemies seem to stand in a queue: only one is attacking the "hero" at once. Talking of the "hero": One of the cops (Gary Daniels) is supposed be the protagonist in this movie. But he such a lamer without any style. I really hated him and really wanted HIM to get killed.

Also, I wonder why this film is rated 18+. There is almost no real explicit violence in this movie. No head shots, no dust of blood from bullet hits, nothing at all. Bullets don't even punch holes into cars. Only the later scene in the grill meets today's standards.

The only reason for an 18+ rating might be the fact that the cop's (imho) ugly wife's breasts are visible in one totally displaced sex scene, which summits a totally lame and boring side story of the cop's private life.

The swordsman himslelf is however great. It's also a nice idea to have the Yakuza guys talking in Japanese (with subtitles)

Gary Daniels has one of the best DTV martial arts movie careers and I think this is one of the highlights ... A half-American and half-Japanese production, shot in a combination of both Japanese and English.

All the action scenes are terrific, Daniels gets to do what he does best but we get the extra element of swordplay. Kiyoshi Nakajoe kind of steals the show with his performance, a super-cool Yakuza character who seems to control the space around him. What I liked about the film was how the dueling narratives of both men intertwined... Cop and criminal that may have more in common than they realise.

I have no idea why this film has bad reviews on IMDB, I think its well worth tracking down and watching if this is your genre. Its very much an above average DTV martial arts film in terms of craft (the often pastel colours give a nice aesthetic feeling) and the action is mostly superb. Would be a good double-feature with White Tiger or one of Gary's PM entertainment flicks.

Ok... I know it's with Gary Daniels, but I didn't know it would be THAT bad. It's basically a traditional east-meet-west yakuza crime action stinker set in the US. Sounds interesting? It's not. Gary Daniels "performance" is actually the best about this crap (and I hate him). Lame plotting, dull action and bad acting. Stay away!!!!

Aussie fight performer Gary Daniels has long lived with some form of mental illness that convinced him he could act. Every time I see one of his films (usually by accident, one of those rental-store boxes with only the title on it), I think to myself, "gosh, this guy couldn't have made any movies before, he's such an amateur." But unfortunately, he's made quite a few, and hasn't learned a dam' thing working in any of them.

This is his best film, exactly because he plays a character somewhat peripheral to the real protagonist, a Japanese hit-man out to clean up a renegade band of Yakusa operating in the US. He's played by Kiyoshi Nakajo who, surprisingly, almost never made a movie before. His performance is superb; precisely, his performance IS the film.

I ask all Gary-Daniels-haters to set aside their (entirely justified) animosity for the Aussie wannabe, long enough to watch the performance by Kiyoshi Nakajo. He makes his character believable, which adds credibility to a sometimes silly - but sometimes surprisingly suspenseful - crime story.

Not only have I enjoyed the movie on that basis alone, but now two or three times. Not a classic, but not your typical Gary Daniels disaster either. Definitely Kiyoshi Nakajo's film - and he earns it.