Le cercle de feu III

Don Wilson kicks the s**t out of some cardboard character b-movie villains (Russian mob, American mob, garden variety street thugs) and delivers some stultifying dialogue with the brain-dead child playing his son (ominously with the same last name) and Natalie Barish, who plays a Ranger. (A Sloane Ranger maybe but that's all she could ever be.) Ah well, the Pacific Northwest settings are nice. And the fights are good. If ya like that sort of thing.

I stumbled upon the 1994 martial arts action movie "Lion Strike" (aka "Ring of Fire 3: Lion Strike") here in 2021. Granted, I've never actually seen this movie, I do remember watching the original first "Ring of Fire" back in my late teenage years a couple of times, so of course I opted to watch this 1994 movie.

Well, this definitely was some campy and cheesy mid-1990s martial arts movies. Let's just be bluntly honest here. And I mean, the choreography and execution of the martial arts scenes was rigid and often painfully forced to look at. The martial arts just wasn't all that natural and fluid in its movement and momentum, and that took away from the movie.

The rooftop scene with the helicopter was just downright brutally painful to watch and witness. And it was just ludicrous that something like that found its way into a movie.

And then there was a fairly bland and overly generic storyline, even for a mid-1990s action movie, then the storyline told in "Lion Strike" was just generic.

Sure, I've never considered Don Wilson to be a particularly outstanding action star, but his movies are watchable at least. And he was joined by Bobbie Phillips in this movie, which was certainly a nice addition to the movie.

For a martial arts action movie then "Lion Strike" just didn't really provide me with much of any particular enjoyment or entertainment. It was watchable, but that was about it, so don't go expecting a grand movie.

My rating of "Lion Strike" lands on a less than mediocre four out of ten stars.

It's like they put all of the biggest cliché's together and made a movie out of it. Every thing is wrong about this film: stereotypical portrayals of Russian villains, the mafia and ghetto thugs (and kick-boxing champions). Unbelievable coincidences like the fact that Dr. Wu has exactly the same bag as the burglars (so of course the bags are mixed up). And in the same scene Dr. Wu is first threatened with a gun, kicks the gun out of the mobster's hands and then starts to fight with the other mobsters, while no one thinks of pulling a gun and simply shoot the good ol' Dr.

Painstaking efforts at acting, especially in the scenes that are meant to be sentimental and/or romantic. And cliché up on cliché... The fighting scenes are of the most boring kind; if this guy is a kick-boxing champion, then kick-boxing must be very lame...

This is actually the best of the Ring of Fire series. If you're like me and you love straight-forward '90s action/martial arts flicks, you'll enjoy this one. Don't expect a complex story with loads of character development. What you get here is a simple plot with a likeable protagonist and some solid action sequences. This reminded me of some of the early Steven Seagal films. If you're a fan of that kind of thing, give this one a shot.

"Lion Strike" aka "Ring of Fire III" begins with a friendly sparring match between Don "The Dragon" Wilson and another guy on the roof of his hospital ("what kind of doctor are you?"), which is interrupted by the escape attempt of an elderly mobster patient via helicopter. Wilson manages to stop the attempt and kill all the bad guys, but his friend also gets severely shot. Then this entire sequence is completely forgotten and never referenced again. I've rarely seen a more random and incoherent way to open a movie. If you get past the first 10 minutes, this is a fairly OK low-budget actioner. Wilson is in pretty good form, Bobbie Phillips (is it just me or does she look a bit like Angelina Jolie?) makes a charming and compatible sidekick for him (but gets only one real chance to show her moves), there are some spectacular stunts and some pretty woodsy/snowy locations. A film you can take or leave. ** out of 4.