Dynamite Brothers

Al Adamson was one of the first US directors to use a Hong Kong Stunt team in America. He was a trendsetter for once. The Dynamite Brothers is a real low budget film that has a sleazy feel to it. Alan Tang (former 70's Golden Harvest matinee kung-fu star) stars as a F.O.T.B. chinese looking for his long lost brother. But trouble awaits for him as he "leaps" off the boat. A group of martial Artist led by "MR. Vampire" Ching-Ying Lam attack him on the docks. After dispatching his opponents, Alan heads off to find his brother. He eventually crosses pathes with Stud Brown and the two become the Defiant Ones. What keeps this movie from being great is the bad directing by Al Adamson and his lousy cameraman. They obviously don't know how to film or correctally frame a fight scene. This is sad becuase the action scenes (directed by Ching-Ying Lam) are remarkable. A lot of familiar faces pop up uncredited such as future Sammo Hung Stunt team Members Peter Chan Lung, Philip Ko and Mars can be seen in the back ground. If there was a budget, Al Adamson must have spent it on flying these guys out to California. Besides the cheap feel to the movie, it's not that bad. I enjoyed very much. Alan Tang only got the lead becuase he's the only one that can speak english fluently, Ching-Ying Lam didn't know how to speak english and the others spoke very little. After watching Alan Tang in action, you'll be wanting to watch his older, H.K. work. He's one bad dude. Recommended for historical purposes. B+

Director Al Adamson brings us this half hearted effort "Dynamite Brothers" which falls well short of his other blaxploitation films Black Samurai and Death Demensions. The problem with the Brothers is they are both supporting actors trying to play the lead without a lot of personality or charisma between them. Timothy Brown as (Stud) is terrible and sleepy Alan Tang (Larry) is worse as the two Defiant Ones are handcuffed together on a mission to find Larry's brother. The addition of Aldo Ray as the corrupt cop (Burke) and evil bad guy (Wei Chin) played by James Hung almost save the movie as do the two ladies the foxy as all get out Suzy Ewing as Burkes girlfriend (Laura) and pretty Carol Speed as (Mary). The film almost dies in the middle with nothing really happening and picks up a bit at the end, but not enough for a recommendation.

I agree with the other reviewer who wrote that there's a good movie buried here, but with Al Adamson at the helm, it was never going to appear on screen. His incompetency as a filmmaker is astounding. How can you make so many mistakes? For example, you have a good set of kung-fu actors who know how to stage a fight, but you'd never know it watching East Meets Watts or Dynamite Brothers or whatever you want to call it. The fight scenes are horribly shot. Add to that a plot that makes absolutely no sense, ridiculous dialogue, stilted delivery, and a lack of any technical acumen, and you've got one very poor movie. I think one of my favorite bits in the movie might have been the character named Stud Brown - how awesome is that!

One of the things that amazed me as I watched East Meets Watts was how in God's name did Adamson convince Aldo Ray and James Hong to be in this pile of dung? Both are very accomplished actors who deserved way better than this.

Dynamite Brothers (1974)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

A Chinese man (Alan Tang) sneaks into America to locate his missing brother and ends up meeting a black man (Timothy Brown) who decides to help him. The two head to Los Angeles where they run into various drug dealers as well as a crooked cop (Aldo Ray) who is in with them.

You know, I love watching bad movies and there's really no one worse than Al Adamson. With that said, I really do love Adamson as a filmmaker because no matter how awful his movies are you can at least spot them from a mile away. As with most of the director's films, this one here is pretty darn bad in regards to quality but at the same time you can't help but be mildly entertained just because of how much craziness one person can pack into a single movie.

Adamson was certainly the type of director that would just throw everything on the screen and hope that it would work in the end. By doing this, movies such as this one are technically very poorly made and the storyline itself makes very little to no sense. However, you've got crazy stuff happening throughout the picture from car chases to bar fights to one of the dumbest scenes ever using a snake as a deadly weapon. The bad guys are downright silly to say the least and you're certainly never threatened by them.

Then there's the cast. Brown is okay in his part of the duo but Tang is pretty boring and never brings any energy to the picture. Carol Speed, best remembered for her role in ABBY, is good as a deaf woman and Don Oliver is rather memorable as a character known as The Smiling Man. Ray, a good actor in his own right, is clearly just picking up a paycheck here as there are a few times where it's obvious he forgot his lines and is looking off screen for some help. We also have James Hong in a small role.

DYNAMITE BROTHERS mixes elements of THE DEFIANT ONES with every other blaxploitation and martial arts film from this period. Heck, Ray even gets a brief scene in a mirror that appears to be mimicking the Marlon Brando "contender" speech from ON THE WATERFRONT. Still, this Adamson picture is very poorly made and gets boring after a while but as you can see, there's still a lot of crazy stuff going on.

This is a very cheap 1973 actioner which pits a black man (Brown) with an Asian man (Tang) who is searching for his brother in LA. The two spend a period cuffed together and dealing with racist morons before they eventually meet up with the main villain. Tang, an Asian martial arts star, has no real personality and the fight scenes have obvious sound effects added on which doesn't help. Other stunts in the movie look obviously fake and are almost amusing. The film was originally titled "Stud Brown" (after Brown's character) and was billed as a blaxploitation film but that was misleading as Tang has more screen time and deals with most of the action. Ray,a former big name star, plays a corrupt cop. He appeared in scores of cheap features throughout the 70s but at least here, he has a half decent character and actually gets to emote a little. As expected, there are some amusing hairstyles, sideburns, sunglasses, funky instrumental music and slang like "That's where it's at baby!" The video box tries to convince that the 1998 big budget actioner Rush Hour was derived from this film but that's like comparing a penny to a quarter.