Shootfighter: Fight to the Death

"You-disgraced-the-art-of-shoot-fighting" This opening quote sets the tone for this lively beat-em-up starring the ever-lovable Bolo Yeung as Shingo.

The plot revolves around two buddies named Ruben and Nick played by Zabka and Michael Bernardo respectively. Yeung plays their mentor. There is the prerequisite montage where he teaches them to "shootfight" and also they play basketball with young black children and Shingo smiles in an oddly fatherly way. Before the shootfighting tournament, there is a fight in a grocery store a la "Cobra" (1986) where Bolo shows off both his fighting and his broken English skills.

You may remember Zabka as Johnny from "The Karate Kid" where he infamously swept his leg at Macchio. Apparently he couldn't get enough karate-chopping action, so he hooked up with director Patrick Allen to give birth to Allen's one and only cinematic baby.

Ruben and Nick get embroiled in an underground "Shootfighting" ring. They eventually have to shootfight each other...to the death, but not before battling an array of wacky baddies in the ring, such as "Boa", who acts like a snake (including the hisses) and Mongoose, who adopts a mongoose fighting style, whatever that means. Some fights have a surprising amount of gore (i.e. limbs and fingers being broken off in a bloody mess), and this provides unintentional laughter and it sustains the viewer's interest until the end.

Martin Kove plays the evil mastermind, inexplicably named "Mr. Lee", who is behind all the shootfighting, and in his villainous rage, slices a pineapple with a samurai sword.

What is "Shootfighting" you ask? Well, that question is never quite answered satisfactorily, but after doing some research we were able to determine (by reading the back of the VHS box) that it is a "forbidden sport so brutal it's banned from the civilized world".

Prepare to get uncivilized with this classic.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty & Brett

For more insanity, check out:comeuppancereviews.com

Greetings And Salutations, and welcome to my review of Shootfighter; here's the breakdown of my ratings:

Story: 0.75 Direction: 1.25 Pace: 1.50 Acting: 1.25 Enjoyment: 1.50

TOTAL: 6.25 out of 10.00

Once in a while, there comes a surprise in the Martial Arts movie genre. An original story. Shootfighter is not that surprise. The only astonishing thing about the story is that it required three writers to borrow the usual elements from other fight flicks.

We have a villain, Mr Lee, who makes an enemy out of Master Shingo when he kills one of his pupils and friend in the Shootfighting ring. Mr Lee believes shootfighting should ask for the ultimate sacrifice. Unluckily for him, nobody else believes people should die for the sport, so he is exiled from the country. It's not long before he opens the gates to his own Shootfighting arena in Mexico, where a fighter's death is commonplace. Enter Rubin (the angry one) and Nick (the normal one), martial arts experts looking to make a quick buck to pay off the shark's loan on their dojo. Being the champions they are, it doesn't take long for them to enter the arena of death. Except, they don't know the principal fights are fatal. Oh, and guess what - their Sensai is none other than Master Shingo. But hey, it's a good job that most audiences don't watch Martial Arts movies for the riveting storyline.

The fighting isn't the best you'll see in the genre. However, a few different styles are on offer, which will please most. Luckily for the viewer, director Patrick Alan does a respectable job filming the fight sequences. Every fight holds an element of tension and excitement, which is what you need, especially when the weapons come into play.

The reason I watched Shootfighter was purely for Bolo Yeung. The physic on this man is intimidating. But when he gets his game-face on, he's downright scary. His fighting style also comes across as one of the strongest. It was a shame that he was not in the film for long. Out of the two main characters, it's Michael Bernardo, as Nick, who comes across as the stronger fighter of the duo. However, his acting skills aren't as sharp as William Zabka's. Though it's Maryam D'Abo I felt sorry for her as, like Yeung, she has little to do in the film, which is a sin as she's a good actress.

All-in-all, Shootfighter is a passable fight flick to pass an hour and a half of your time enjoyably. The fights are well choreographed and engaging enough for genre fans and newbies alike to savour. Well worth a watch or two.

Please feel free to visit my Holding Out For A Hero list to see where I ranked Shootfighter.

Take Care & Stay Well.

Two young karate heads (Michael Bernardo and THE KARATE KID villain William Zabka) travel to Mexico and become seduced by the world of shootfighting, a deadly bloodsport type tournament. Hoping for a quick profit, our dudes stay to duke it out with a bunch of other fighters. Profit, however, is the least of the tournament organizer Mr. Lee's (Martin Kove) motives. Seems the boy's sensei Shingo (Bolo Yeung, in a rare good guy role) disgraced Lee in the past, leaving him with an arm forever in a brace. Seeing as how these are the prize pupils, Lee hopes to get the sensei to come to Mexico, setting the stage for and unscheduled rematch.

This was riding that post-BLOODSPORT wave (hell, they got Bolo) but perks it up a bit with some graphic violence (throat slashings, brain bashing, and even a heart ripped out). It was one of the few direct-to- video action titles back in the day to come out in R-rated and unrated offerings. The fight scenes are nothing new and the two leads (Bernardo looking like a muscle-bound Mickey Dolenz) are annoying. But you have to respect a film that casts Bolo as a docile sensei. There is even a bit where he shoots basketball with a young kid. You can't beat that type of anti-typecasting. Maryam d'Abo is the love interest and Eddie Albert also appears as a manager/gambler type (which he also did in FIST FIGHTER). The two karate kids and the sensei returned a few years later in SHOOTFIGHTER 2 (1996).

I bought this one hoping for a fighting movie with Bolo Yeung as the main character. I was wrong about that. Bolo is more of a supporting character in the movie, and he only has one real fight. That was a disappointment to me, although the two main characters in the movie are OK. When it comes to the fight scenes, they're far from the best that I've seen. But, I've seen a lot worse too (try the totally ridiculous "Gladiator Cop", for example). The whole movie looks a bit cheap. The fight scenes are also very brutal, I guess they're the most brutal scenes I've seen I a martial arts movie. I have no problem with that, but I didn't really see the point in it. If you're not a hardcore action/martial arts-fan, you won't find any entertainment in this movie.

This is one of those movies which is for karate, tae kwon do, kung fu and kick boxing fans, and of course, practitioners. This low budget martial arts movie, which is, as most of them very simple when it comes to the story, characters, directing and other stuff. There is simply no real complex stuff, no real dilemma between characters and no development. It's a typical good VS evil story with the haunting past element. A fighter Nick (Michael Bernardo) returns to his good friend Ruben (William Zabka), and upon their reunion they decide to sign in on the underground fighting tournament, held by Mr. Lee (Martin Kove). Nick founds out that the fights are brutal and sometimes to the death. But, Ruben is persistent and wants to fight. So, Nick asks for help from Ruben's teacher Shingo (Bolo Yeung), to save Ruben's life.

So, the movie is actually nothing special. Pretty bad when it comes to some stuff… For example, actors can't act. Well, most of them are martial artists. The real actors are maybe Edward Albert, Richard Eden and Maryam D'Abo (and I still don't understand how did she get here?). Edward Albert and Richard Eden are not bad actors, but they really appeared in much of the low budget films. Martin Kove is also not a bad actor, but his villain Mr. Lee is just evil and that's it. He is evil and he looks kind of deadly. Nothing more. Though Kove posses some kind of charisma. Michael Bernardo didn't do much with his character, he just under played it. William Zabka was not that bad, I think he was decent. Though his character is somewhat irritating. Just wouldn't listen and he is too prideful. And not in an interesting, complex way… he is just a jerk. Zabka did not move from these kind of films, he remained well known for being martial artist on the film, or rather a bully, just like in "Karate Kid". And for the last… I saved Bolo Yeung. What can I say? This man cannot act… and… he doesn't have to. This man has such a powerful appearance on the film, such a powerful charisma and character that he simply doesn't need to act. He played himself basically, but this time… he was the good guy. Go, Bolo, go! He is the main man.

The other things in the movie are nothing special, OK, the most important – fighting scenes. They were good, plausible. Well done filmed. Though, there are some that were ridiculous. And I think that music score is pretty interesting, especially in training montage. I recommend this film to all martial arts movie fans.