Savate, Lutador Indomável

This martial arts movie was anything but ordinary. Instead of Asian martial arts, it's French martial arts. Meaning "French boxing", this movie didn't bore me a bit. "Kung Fu" was all about wisdom, "Savate" was more about honor. If you seen "The Quest" with Van Damme, you should be getting a kick out of "Savate". This fighter fought the honor of both countries: France and the U.S. Avenging the dead homesteader was very honorable, and keeping the promise of his comrade was also great. If the pole didn't stop the German, the bullet did! And this movie was definitely great for the martial arts buffs as well. If you're tired of Van Damme. 2.5 out of 5 stars 7 out of 10

Savate is an exciting, over the top B-flick that borrows heavily from Once Upon A Time In The West, Kung Fu, and Bloodsport. It's no brainer action at it's finest!

Olivier Gruner is a French Legionnare wandering the old west tracking a sinister German fighter played by Marc Singer. Gruner comes to the rescue of a group of homesteaders threatened by land baron R. Lee Ermey (another entertaining performance) and agrees to represent them in Ermey's fight tournament.

Marc Singer is entertainingly cartoonish and pretty menacing as well. The final showdown between Gruner and Singer is quite exciting.

The score steals a few ideas from Ennio Morricone and a flashback scene is a blatant knockoff of Once Upon A Time In The West, but there's enough action to satisfy reasonable martial arts and western fans.

I am the first to admit that it sounds a little bit weird to shoot a martial arts movie with a "cowboy scenery", but the movie actually turns out OK.

Olivier Grüner is a former soldier in the french(?) army, who is searching for his long lost enemy... The movie includes the standard good vs bad and good boy gets pretty girl stories, and the movie reaches a climax at a "tough-man" tournament at the end. A tournament in the wild west with capoeira, kung-fu, savate , boxing etc.

Overall the movie is light entertainment with some very good fighting scenes.. (I give it 6/10)

Wasnt expecting much from this film, the dvd was cheap and the cover made it look like a dodgy kickboxing docu-film ... but I was suprised. Grunner delivers a lot of action and shows off his kickboxing skills, which he should do more in his films because his acting isnt what we are watching for! also Ashley Laurence (Hellraiser I/II) co-stars, and still looks fine. ;) The music is good too, coming straight from some of Clints classic Westerns!

"Savate" is the reincarnation of the 1960s /1970s "Spaghetti Western", only this time around Clint Eastwood has been replaced by Oliver Gruner, and gunplay mostly supplanted by kick boxing. This uneasy combination sometimes works, but the script is so predictable that it mostly sputters along to a foregone conclusion. The film borrows heavily from Sergio Leone's masterpieces with fly catching, a death similar to Charles Bronson's Brother in "Once Upon a Time in the West", and a land grab due to the railroad coming through. Perhaps the best "borrowed" element is the score, which is extremely Morricone like, and quite good. I'm sure fans of the kickboxing movies will find plenty to criticize , and the Italian Western devotes will have seen it all before. Nevertheless, "Savate" is totally watchable, and certainly better than a lot of the lesser "Spaghetti Westerns." - MERK