Street Fighter: A Vingança

In Tony Scott's True Romance, from a screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, Christian Slater's Clare Worley takes his date to the movies to see Sonny Chiba's Streetfighter trilogy. When he is questioned about Chiba's questionable 'heroics', Worley responds that, "he ain't so much a good guy as he is just a bad motherf****r." A long-time fan, Tarantino hits the nail on the head here (he would go on to cast his idol in the Kill Bill films). While Bruce Lee was wowing the world with the speed and agility of the martial arts, Sonny Chiba was demonstrating its brutal, more unforgiving side. In The Streetfighter's Last Revenge, Chiba's anti- hero Takuma Tsurugi is at his most sadistic. He may have punched a guy's eyeballs out of his head in the previous instalment, but here he calmly burns a thug alive in an incinerator.

Much of the appeal of Chiba's movies lies with his sneering approach to the ancient arts, where he is far more comfortable sadistically beating a bad guy to a bloody pulp than he is with finding inner peace. This trilogy-closer has upped his mean streak, and made things a hell of a long weirder. The Streetfighter was excellent, Return of the Streetfighter was passable, and The Streetfighter's Last Revenge comes across as a bunch of scenes discarded from the previous movies for being too bonkers. Not only is Tsurugi a near- unstoppable punch, kick and throw machine, but he now dons Mission: Impossible-esque face masks to disguise his identity, and at one point bears vampire fangs for unexplained reasons. There's also a villain even James Bond would chuckle at: A mafia hit-man who dresses like a mariachi with a giant sombrero and shoots invisible laser beams out of his hands.

The plot itself is incredibly simple. Tsurugi is hired to rescue Go Owada (Akira Shioji) from a police riot in exchange for a hefty payment. When he goes to collect his loot, he is handed a bag of cut-up newspaper and is attacked by the Owada family's men. Furious, he decides to take revenge on the gangsters. There's also a stolen tape and a master foe in Kunagami (Koji Wada). Noticeably less violent than the previous entries, this third feature shares more in common with a spy film than the martial arts genre. As a result, it's less fun, and only manages to pique the interest when at its most idiosyncratic and just plain daft. It's also nice to see exploitation icon Reiko Ike in a supporting role as Chiba's wannabe sidekick. But ultimately, Last Revenge stutters through a threadbare story, failing to deliver the sort of gory chopsocky that made the original so wonderful. Clearly the weakest of the trilogy.

(1979) The Street Fighter's Last Revenge DUBBED MARTIAL ARTS ACTION

Third and final film of "The Street Fighter" movies starring karate actor Sonny Chiba as Terry retrieving a cassette tape involving the formula for heroin. It is then Terry gets double crossed by the people who hired him. He of course becomes motivated to retrieve the tape back from the people who double cross him but have to face obstacles such as a martial artist from Mexico and a corrupt DA who seems to be a better martial artist then him since he learned some of his techniques was derived from Korea. More bone cracklings and nudity than the first two installments as well the fights are slightly better even though it still looks fake in comparison to what we can get these days but it's still better than most Hong Kong chop sockey movies made in the 70's.

Takuma Tsurugi (Sonny Chiba) (AKA: The Street Fighter"), rather like James Bond, is an assassin for hire, a man who is a master of disguise and the martial arts but don't cross or betray him because if you do, you will pay and pay dearly. He, again rather like James Bond, has a weakness for playing with dangerous women, particularly the most ruthless and cutthroat. Here the villains, who have hired Tsurugi to get two tape cassette recordings that when played in unison provide a formula for creating synthetic heroin potentially worth a fortune in the wrong hands, make that most fatal mistake of crossing Tsurugi. And now they will pay!

This moves at a brisk pace, is exciting and action-packed, and feels like a much darker take on a James Bond type of film. It's not really all that much like the previous "Street Fighter" fare at all but it is fun if you're willing to forgive that fact. The only problem I had with the film was all the betrayals and double-dealings became confusing after a time and I was surprised Tsurugi allowed himself to be put into a position where he could be betrayed by the lead villains on more than one occasion. Also Tsurugi is hardly an heroic male lead, in fact he's every bit as ruthless and unrelenting, if not even more so, that this story's villains. Still the good in terms of entertainment value here I feel far outweighs the bad.

This is not a real street fighter movie. There's no way that this is the same character as the first two movies... why does he have some kind of secret hideout, with disguises and spy-gadgets??? Tsurugi (note: NOT SUGURY) is a violent man, who only does good, because in the end it is what is in his best interest. He's not a super-hero spy or any of the campy crap that can be found in this movie, the third installment. He doesn't call himself "THE STREETFIGHTER" in the first two movies, so why all of a sudden does he say: "They call me THE STREETFIGHTER". The only reason to watch this movie is Chiba and Sue Shiomi. But don't go into it expecting Chiba to have his usual Terry Tsurugi KILLPOWER, because he barely has any in this movie... plus the story is weak in comparison to the first two. The dude who can cut stuff with his laser hands??? All I have to say to him is: "NICE HAT!". Not a cool villain at all. It's not a Street Fighter movie without Junjou.

Japan had its Bruce Lee craze just like everywhere else in the early seventies and Sonny Chiba was their answer to Bruce Lee. Along with the vicious action scenes there were some typically Japanese acts of misogyny which seem pretty bizarre to Western audiences when it's the "hero" doing it (When was the last time you saw Chuck Norris or Jackie Chan sell a woman off to a slave ring because she couldn't afford to pay for getting her brother out of jail?). STREET FIGHTER'S LAST REVENGE is somewhat tamer than the first entries into the series. This time around Chiba is more of a James Bond kinda character, donning rubber masks and vampire fangs(!) and is mixed up in a plot involving cassettes with top secret information. There's also some Gong Show-type freak (Who you see a lot of on Japanese TV) who can break chains (He actually uses a laser) who's heard to kill Chiba (Yeah, right!). Along with the awful dubbing there's also the same black and white footage where Chiba, as a kid, sees his father executed to the Chinese which turns up in all the STREET FIGHTER movies.