User reviews

This is reportedly Bolo's first film as a good guy after over 100 outings as the baddest dude of the bad dudes. But don't waste your time here. Besides the movie's overall suckitude (suckiness? Suckiosity?), Bolo's only in two brief scenes, doing very little in a scant few minutes. Don't be fooled by the billing. A bunch of the anonymous henchmen get more screen time than Bolo did.

I hadn't heard of Jalal Merhi before I saw this. Now I find myself collecting his movies - and for laughs!

Everything is so wrong in this movie. The acting is crude all around and the dialogue is extremely childish and silly in most parts - the director/writer Ron Hulme apparently had no skills in either of his roles.

Jalal is the star of the movie, a short kung-fu guy who sounds just like Apu from The Simpsons. His silly accent really distracts the viewer from everything else - like his model girlfriend who's a feet taller than him and the no doubt the worst actress I've ever seen on film.

The film is unintentionally funny through out and it's not boring at all - especially if watched between friends who really dig bad movies. I've seen many martial arts movies and this one really stands out because of the laughs it generates.

I laughed quite a bit at this film, but once the novelty wore off I was just in shock. Why? Mainly because the script is so bad that it's funny. The lead star Jalal was a boring actor and everyone else was just as bad. If you're thinking of getting this film because Bolo is in it, I wouldn't, cause he's dubbed and he's only in it for about 4 minutes with a crap part. The best thing about this film is that there are some good martial arts, but the plot feels like it was made up as they went along, and the editing is just ridiculous sometimes. However, if you like bad B-movie martial arts films, then this isn't so bad at all.

The film is without doubt a totally bad martial arts film wannabe. It fails miserably in its attempt. The "star", Jalil Merhi would probably be stoned to death in his native middle east if they ever show this junk there.

The plot is simple, Merhi's brother dies of drugs and he wants revenge. He tells his wealthy businessman father and his fiancee that he can't take over the family business or go through with the wedding because he wants to train in the far east. Talk about ridiculous, the bride to be is 6 foot 2 inch, Supermodel Monika Schnarre. She stands at least a solid foot and a half taller than Merhi. His father is played by Jaime Farr, Corporal Klinger from M*A*S*H. I guess those residual checks are no longer coming in. The acting is without doubt totally lousy. Collectively amateurish beyond belief, even from Jaime Farr who's antics as Max Klinger keeps me tuning in to reruns of M*A*S*H. But the worst is Merhi, his acting makes Jean Claude Van Dahm look like Sir Lawrence Olivier by comparison. The direction, the lighting, the cinematography are all laughably bad. It is as if the director was incapable of taking his camera off a tripod. Any kung fu film and blaxploitation film afficionado who sees this will probably wanna pluck their eyes out.

In 1991, jeweler and competitive martial artist Jalal Merhi introduced himself to the film world with no less than a starring action vehicle. Merhi's fascination with kung fu - different from the karate and kickboxing standard in films of the time - helps set this one apart from the ton of other flicks released around this time, but the questionable acting and fluctuating quality of the fighting nullifies this uniqueness. Nevertheless, after watching the film with very low expectations, I'm surprised that I enjoy it enough to offer it a respectable rating.

The story: After his brother overdoses on a lethal new drug and the dealer remains untouchable, Lyle Camille (Merhi) abandons both the family business and his fiancée to train in martial arts so he may exact vengeance on the responsible entities.

The worst aspect of the movie is the dramatic content. The movie is largely populated either by non-actors and non-native English speakers, resulting in some genuine trainwreck moments of acting - most scenes involving lead villain Lazar Rockwood qualify as such. The saturation of questionable dramatics is contagious, infecting even veteran Jamie Farr, whose character inexplicably develops an accent over the course of his scenes. More amusing is the vague aura of strangeness of the screenplay, which features scenes like Lyle introducing himself to his master (Bolo Yeung) by approaching him while striking forms. Clearly, this isn't the kind of movie you're supposed to take too seriously.

Despite his faults, Jalal is physically in top form here: he'd have better fight scenes in the future, but the impressive moves his pulls off are definitely his most impressive ever, with some very graceful katas and lots of high jump kicks. And while the fight scenes definitely have their low points, the quantity and ferocity of the action is surprising. During the middle act, a tournament takes place, and even though most of the matches are presented in montage form, their choreography and the physicality of the performers is admirable. Merhi stuffs his cast with little-known but legitimate martial artists, among them UFC alumnus Harold Howard and pro wrestling personality Sonny Onoo, and it pays off in a respectable action display...with the exception of the awful ending fight in the back of a garbage truck.

This is definitely not everyman's martial arts movie, but anybody who's followed the careers of other B-movie dragons will know that the first solo vehicles tend to be shaky. Jalal Merhi makes the absolute most of his limited experience, and that makes FEARLESS TIGER / BLACK PEARLS decent. Fans should give it a look by default.

Fearless Tiger was a complete surprise to me - a previously unheralded bad movie with scenes so jaw-droppingly bad it had me rewinding several scenes just to immediately enjoy them all over again. There's almost no let up here to the amount of joy Jalal Merhi fires at the audience.

A bad guy who looks like someone inflated Robert Plant and then burst him with a fork is taking a new drug called Nirvana to the streets of America (via Hong Kong). Jalal's brother gets hooked and overdoses on the stuff, causing Jalal to go to Hong Kong and get trained up to kick everyone's head in. Sounds simple? It is. But:

Jalal's girlfriend in the film is much, much taller than him, and cannot act to boot. Therefore, every time she appeared on the screen I was in fits of laughter. Just watched her roll her eyes in a "Oh, that Jalal" way. She's bad, but nothing can prepare you for the police chief. His initial scene, where he struts about like a chicken and sputters out his lines, is so bad I swear you'll be rewinding it over and over again. Brilliant!

Add to this the crazy action scenes (I nearly burst a gut at the gang battle near the start, where a bad guy is too busy gloating at his enemies to notice the car he then plows into with his motorbike), the toilet set round the neck move, or the death of one of the villains, who has both his feet poking out the sunroof of a car at the time. You've also got the fight in the back of a garbage truck, a bad guy with the tightest white guy afro ever, and the training scenes with Bolo, which has Bolo, Jalal, and some chick apparently involved in some sort of crazy dance off (or so it appears to the viewer anyway).

Instant classic! See it now!

.......But oh so much fun! Yes indeed, step right up folks for here we have a real stinker; Witness in disbelief a lead actor (who happens to be none other than Joseph Merhi's brother!) who can barely speak the English language(!), some pretty lousy fight sequences throughout (especially surprising considering that the legendary kicking maestro Jean Frennette is on board here!), Bolo Yeung dancing...badly(!), and some of the very worst acting performances this side of an average children's nativity play! Yes indeed, this is a truly amateurish mess if ever I've seen one; But you know what? Such gross incompetence in every area only serves to make this all the more endearing; Truly, this took some staggering ineptitude to make by all those concerned. Yay, I hereby do award this travesty my highest recommendation for fellow bad movie lovers.

Haha it would appear I am the only one that liked this movie, but then again I have always been a sucker for cheap martial arts action movies. One thing I will say with Jalal Merhi type movies, is when watching you really have to get your mind in that state. If your expecting a good martial arts movie like Van damme, or Jackie chan you will for surely be disappointed. However for a cheap low budget movie (with bad acting) I didn't mind it. Jalal might have bad acting, but his martial arts skills (atleast to me) are worth watching for. Point is, I have seen worse and I have seen a lot better. But black pearls was on TV a few weeks ago and I actually enjoyed the movie. The other 2 friends of mine that watched it with me hated it :P But I have yet to find a bad Jalal Merhi movie other then G.O.D or whatever that crap was called. I liked Tiger Claws 1 2 and 3 and I loved Operation Golden Pheonix.

This film is so bad, that I'm sure it must have been planned that way all along. The plot is no worse than a typical martial arts action film, but the writing is hack. No performer, writer or director could have read this script without seeing the quality dearth. So like others who have posted, I enjoy this film for what it so clearly is--a tireless parody of trite action movies, a biting satire of the martial arts genre.

The fight scenes are reasonably well choreographed, though not flashy. Most of the fighters in the film appear to have martial arts training, and the director does not resort to cheap tricks--like changing speeds or cropping shots--to make things strikes appear impressive.

This is the worst movie of Jalal Merhi. He can't act he isn't great with martial arts. The story of the movie was too simple. The fights were not good. The only good thing in this movie was the music. I bought this movie becaus bolo yeung was in it. But Bolo didn't do anything. He didn't fight the only thing he did was talking and dancing.

1/10