No Retreat, No Surrender 3: Blood Brothers

STAR RATING: ***** The Works **** Just Misses the Mark *** That Little Bit In Between ** Lagging Behind * The Pits

Will (Loren Avedon) returns to be with his CIA brother Casey (Keith Vitali) at their father's 65th birthday party. However, when the old man is murdered by the evil Franco (Rion Hunter) they are both re-united in a quest for revenge...

When the movie opens, we see a foiled bank hold-up where American Imperialism self-righteously prevails when we see that the gangs agenda appears to be against American-imposed wars abroad. From there, we're left to gawp at just how much charisma Avedon actually had and how sad it was that he never moved on to bigger and better things. His delivery's a little ropey, but other than that, he's a spot on action star. Hunter in the bad guy role also has a genuine presence to him that is typical of DTV action fudd of the time that this movie was released.

From here, we see what is essentially a very weak film. It's predictable, clichéd, simplistic and lazy. But, for fans of the past two films, who get a kick out of the hammy over-acting, corny 80s soundtracks and the cleverly choreographed martial arts sequences, it may just pass muster all the same, but it is an undeniably wise final edition to the series. **

I've seen this movie before, but most recently over-dubbed in Spanish (I do not speak the language). It is honestly one of the funniest movies I've ever seen when you don't understand a word. Then again, this was on at about 2am, so I may have been deliriously tired, but inspired enough to write this review at 4am. The acting is beyond horrible - but the scenes with the white haired terrorist were so over the top that I laughed until I cried. Besides being the silliest looking bad guy, he appears to be playing right to the camera. This is worth it just for the laughs, though there are brief segments of reasonably talented martial arts moves - only to be ruined by any attempt at acting.

NRNS3 has some of the best Hong Kong Style action from a western based movie we'd up to this point (1990). Both Keith and Loren step up in terms of their ability to deliver great action but they were never really good actors. The script doesn't help them out much though, it's full of clichés, one liners and dialogue that feels like it was written by a non English speaking person. But all of that plays second fiddle to the real star of the movie. The Action/martial arts choreography. Insanely this has some of the best fight choreography outside of the Hong Kong action movie world (up to the point in 1990). Kicks, blocks, punches, twists, backflips and basically everything you can imagine is incorporated into the fight sequences. The final fight between the two brothers and the main bad guy Marko is pretty awesome (if you can ignore the stunt guy in the blatantly awful white wig that is). It's one I have revisited a few times because it really is that good. I do think if they had focused a little bit more on giving the main characters believable dialogue (and possibly a few more acting lessons) they could have had a stone cold classic on their hands but a lot of it feels rushed and just an excuse to get to the next fight sequence. Also... the soundtrack is fairly bad. It genuinely brings the rating down a star because it feels so generic and the synths date it terribly.

But gawd damn there's some fun to be had with this movie. If you were to watch it as part of a bad movie night you may be surprised by just how hard it goes with the action. If not for that it would have easily made into an episode of BOTW by redlettermedia on Youtube.

Anyway, yes, if you go in expecting awful acting and great action you'll definitely be satisfied.

I wasn't expecting much from No Retreat NoSurrender 3: the DVD I watched was a bare bones pan and scan effort (meaning that the distributor either couldn't be arsed or thought the film unworthy of much attention), and the director and 'stars' were unknowns to this fan of fight-fests. However, despite some awful acting and an unimaginative story, Blood Brothers actually proved to be quite good fun. Not groundbreaking in any way, shape or form, you understand, but solidly entertaining stuff nonetheless, particularly if you enjoy silly action trash from the 90s (it comes packed with nasty hairstyles, a naff soundtrack, and plenty of hard-bodied babes).

Loren Avedon and Keith Vitali play Will and Casey Alexander, two brothers who fail to see eye to eye; Casey is a womanising CIA operative, whilst Will is a selfish Karate instructor with a strong moral sense (but no fashion sense—check out his denim and leather blouson jacket, chinos, and aviator shades combo!). But when their father is murdered by a group of terrorists, led by white-mullet-ed baddie Franco (Rion Hunter), they eventually learn to work together in order to bring the killers to justice.

Casey uses his connections in 'the company' to locate the whereabouts of those responsible for his old man's demise, and then convinces Maria, his ex-girlfriend (and also an ex-employee of Franco's), to help him make contact with them; Will, on the other hand, is a little more impetuous and hot foots it to Florida on his own (after taking a peek at his brother's Top Secret file on the case), changes his name to Jessie, and gets a job with the bad guys as a 'heavy'.

Inevitably, Will's true identity is discovered and big brother Casey must come to the rescue.

Of course, it's not the quality of the story that matters in a film like this—it's the action. And with bone-crunching stunts, and loads of fast and furious martial arts, fans of the genre should not be disappointed. What Avedon and Vitali lack in acting skills, they more than make up for with their ability to kick ass.

The fighting is certainly impressive stuff: acrobatic, fast, and very painful looking, with bodies crashing through glass, falling from great heights, and generally being treated in a manner that would cause mere mortals like me to spend many months in hospital (or, quite likely, an eternity six feet under). The use of some unconvincing stunt-doubles, particularly in the film's closing moments, kinda spoils things a tad (Hunter's stand-in wears a VERY bad wig), but, on the whole, as low-budget actioners go, this one delivers the goods where it matters most.

6.5, rounded up to 7 for IMDb

This was to me the best movie in it's 5 part series you can say. Two brothers constantly at each others throats until their father dies, which eventually brings them together. Ron Hunter displayed some very good martial arts techniques. The acting was not that good at all, but then would you rather have good acting and bad fight scenes (Matrix Reloaded, Matrix Revolution, Cradle to the Grave) or bad acting good fight scenes ( Blood Moon, Super Fighter, and Drive). If you are not an acting snob then please by all means give this a shot. If acting plays a big part to you then I would say don't really bother, but if you like good fight scenes this is a definite looker.