THE LAST KUMITE is a movie designed for a very specific demographic some of you may be familiar with. It’s a throwback to ‘90s tournament fighting movies, its cast is heavily populated with venerated icons of the genre, and they even managed to get a score by Paul Hertzog (BLOODSPORT, KICKBOXER), his first since 1991’s BREATHING FIRE. Best of all it features two new songs by the king of montage rock, Stan Bush (if you’re not familiar he did multiple songs on KICKBOXER and BLOODSPORT and “The Touch” from TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE).
Knowing all that, and that it was partly funded with Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns, you could reasonably expect it to be directed by some young fanboy, but in fact it’s from someone who’s been in the trenches of legit DTV martial arts movies since the ‘90s. Ross W. Clarkson got his start doing cinematography for Ringo Lam (he’s worked with him on five movies) and he did Dolph Lundgren’s THE MECHANIK, Isaac Florentine’s UNDISPUTED II and III and NINJA I and II, and Michael Jai White’s NEVER BACK DOWN: NO SURRENDER. So he knows what he’s doing.
Michael Rivers (Mathis Landwehr, stunt player in V FOR VENDETTA and SPEED RACER) is a widower, single father of Bree (Kira Kortenbach), owner of a small dojo, and new champion of a sanctioned martial arts competition. A bigshot named Ron Hall (Matthias Hues, NO RETREAT NO SURRENDER 2, FIST FIGHTER, CAGE, I COME IN PEACE, KICKBOXER 2, BLACKBELT, MISSION OF JUSTICE, GREEN STREET HOOLIGANS 2, BLACK ROSE, SHOWDOWN IN MANILA) approaches him at the after party, buys him a drink and tries to recruit him for what he straight up calls a kumite. Michael politely declines, doesn’t take his fancy black business card, and by the time he gets home they’ve already kidnapped his daughter.
So he finds himself in Bulgaria (I think they just call it “Eastern Europe”) along with a bunch of other fighters, some representing different styles, even a masked luchador. Many of them have also been forced into it to save their loved ones, others are just assholes. As in many underground tournament movies it’s a little muddy about how much it’s a fight to the death – you don’t have to kill your opponent to advance, but it’s encouraged, for the entertainment of the rich pricks and gamblers watching. (By the way I was able to guess by the goatees that some of the bloodthirsty spectators were Kickstarter investors. That’s a pretty cool cameo opportunity.)
There’s some time to train before the competition begins. Michael befriends a couple of the other fighters, Damon Spears (Kurt McKinney, star of NO RETREAT NO SURRENDER!) and Lea Martin (Monia Moula, stunt double for Ana de Armas in NO TIME TO DIE), forced out of retirement to save their wife and sister, respectively. Damon immediately finds a way to get into town and go to the police, but the cop he talks to (Abdel Qissi, Attila from LIONHEART) is either on the payroll or too scared to do anything, so that’s off the table.
Hall is very proud of his current champion, Dracko (Mike Derudder), a cocky overmuscled younger dude who struts around and smirks at everybody. He’s known for crippling or killing his opponents, and the conventional wisdom is that he’s unbeatable, but a servant at the mansion who has reason to be disgruntled tips off Michael that there’s a guy called Master Loren who knows how to defeat him.
Michael assumes the guy humbly sweeping the floor is a janitor, but we know that’s gotta be Master Loren because he’s played by Billy Blanks (BLOODFIST, CHINA O’BRIEN II, THE LAST BOYSCOUT, TALONS OF THE EAGLE, TC 2000, BACK IN ACTION). I can’t help but love that our hero trains outside by some ruins as motherfuckin Billy Blanks gives him inspiration. And after he’s done that for a while Loren tells him it’s time to meet Dracko’s sensei, and he leads him over to a place where none other than Cynthia Rothrock (YES, MADAM!, RIGHTING WRONGS, CHINA O’BRIEN I and II, MARTIAL LAW I and II, FAST GETAWAY I and II, LADY DRAGON 1 and 2, TIGER CLAWS I, II, and III, UNDEFEATABLE, GUARDIAN ANGEL, MERCENARIES, THE MARTIAL ARTS KID) is waiting in a dramatic pose. We hear that she found Dracko in a pit of dead bodies when he was a kid and trained him but he turned even more evil or whatever. Now he must be stopped.
Landwehr is German, so we have a new addition to the Van Damme/Bernhardt/Gruner accent lineage. He’s been working as a stuntman since the early 2000s, now trying to graduate to action star with this, the upcoming LION FIST and another one they’re trying to make called BERLIN NINJA. He’s in his 40s, but that’s young enough for a generational theme with these icons of ‘90s western martial arts movies passing their knowledge on to him. Meanwhile, Dracko has two great villains of the genre in his corner – in addition to Hues as the mastermind we have his henchman Wolf, played by Tong Po himself, Michel Qissi (BREAKIN’, BLOODSPORT, KICKBOXER, LIONHEART, KICKBOXER 2). Both of these guys are scary old men giving each other sinister looks and nods, and Hues walks around with a cane that he sure seems to be holding more like a weapon than an assistive device, and is always adorned with two or more younger-than-him women.
The recipe calls for some fighters who aren’t as friendly so you don’t feel bad about them losing. The scariest looking one is Yulong, played by David “Bolo Jr.” Yeung. The son of the original BLOODSPORT villain is new to movies, but doesn’t look like it (and he’s also filmed a co-starring role in the upcoming THE CIRCUIT 4, directed by Jalal Merhi).
This guy David Kurzhal looked so familiar, I couldn’t figure out where I knew him from and when I looked him up I realized he’s an action/martial arts Youtuber known as “Viking Samurai” who I knew about because he once praised Seagalogy in one of his videos. He’s really into Seagal and has interviewed a bunch of people to debunk the famous Gene-Labell-made-him-shit-his-pants legend, which I find interesting, though he also seems to have a video calling him “a great man” so I don’t think I agree with him on everything. But whatever Kurzhal’s merits as an online commentator I think he’s legit in this, with a strong screen presence and a good fight scene. I definitely wouldn’t have guessed he was a Youtuber.
The action is well shot and performed, and not entirely a throwback, but updated to styles that have evolved since movies like this started. The fight choreographer and stunt coordinator is the same guy who plays Michael’s most challenging training partner, Lightning (Mike Möller, PLAN B, ULTIMATE JUSTICE, THE EXPENDABLES 4). Though I think it’s a little light on the inventing-weird-training-gimmicks side of the montage discipline, it’s high on showing all kinds of practice fights, spinning kicks and cool looking katas in front of sunsets. And yes, he gets to train to a new Stan Bush song.
The original songs are called “No Surrender” and “Running the Gauntlet,” and they’re almost too good to be true. The first words of “No Surrender” are “Getting ready for the fight of your life / The lion roars, the cobra strikes / Law of the jungle.” He goes on to mention steel, ice, fire, warriors, hero, honor and glory, lightning, and a dozen or more inspirational cliche phrases (no turning back, it’s all on the line, now or never, live or die, etc.). Also there’s a guitar solo. It’s beautiful.
If any uninitiated eyes somehow fall upon THE LAST KUMITE I wouldn’t expect them to be converted. And for the fans who would seek it out there are a few weaknesses I could point to – I originally mentioned the length, but it has pointed out to me that the runtime I originally mentioned (from Wikipedia) must be incorrect, so I apologize for the confusion. Possibly only an hour 45, which I guess explains why, as I originally wrote, “It worked for me at that length.”
So the more relevant complaint is that it never really goes beyond the warm nostalgia of the obvious. Written by Clarkson and Sean David Lowe, the story is intentionally made of familiar tropes and cliches of the genre. That’s what makes it so appealing, but I would note that the best of these throw in more eccentric character details or unexpected tangents than this, and that’s what gives them their personality. I admire the classicism here, but wish there was some unpredictable factor.
Also, man did I miss film grain during the footage of the city at the beginning. But the digital looks way better in Bulgaria and it’s got good production value to it.
What more than makes up for any of those issues is the movie’s unwavering sincerity. There’s not a single moment that seems ironic or winky or an in-joke. Even what you might call “fan service” doesn’t play like “Do you see this? Do you see what we’re doing?” but more like of course they’re doing that, that’s what movies are supposed to be. And yeah, it kind of is, isn’t it? I’m sold.
So we’ve got a pretty appealing (if generic) hero, two great senseis, a trio of strong villains. Hall and Wolf take care of the decadent evil while Dracko is more like a wrestling heel, yelling and taunting. I think his best feature as a villain is that he just looks like a guy you immediately want to hate, it would qualify as a punchable face except you know he would fuckin clobber you if you did. There’s lots of good martial arts on display and though it’s mostly left to the younger generation, Clarkson and Lowe were very thoughtful about treating the elder icons as real members of the cast, not just cameos, and giving them all a chance to be put over. I was particularly surprised and impressed by McKinney’s role as a former hot shot who knows his limitations but won’t give up. As you know NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER is one of my favorite movies (you can get my commentary track for it on Patreon if you’re interested) but I’ve really only seen him as that young goofball. It’s really cool to see the actor and adult he’s grown into since.
Martin is also really cool – that’s an easy trick to improve your movie, cast veteran stuntwomen as badass supporting characters. That’s a free tip, go ahead and use it.
So with the above caveats in mind I am happy to recommend THE LAST KUMITE to the sort of person who would be interested in watching THE LAST KUMITE. You know who you are. A champion who rises from the ashes of the phoenix, eyes of steel, fists of power, thunder of courage or whatever.
* * *
ATTENTION ACADEMIES – FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION FOR BEST ORIGINAL SONG AND ALL OTHER CATEGORIES INCLUDING BEST PICTURE:
June 18th, 2024 at 7:58 am
I almost picked this up the other day but decided against it. The reviews were not encouraging. In my old age, I’ve found that generic action is not as much of a draw as it used to be. You can’t just serve up all the same old ingredients. You gotta mix ’em up in an interesting way. And you especially can’t just run through the motions of the shit they used to do 30 years ago, but at six times the budget, with real actors, and on actual film. I’ve gotten to the point where the second I see that cheap digital look, my brain shuts off. “That’s not a movie,” it tells me. “That’s a Reel.”
But then I clicked on that song and now I’m thinking maybe I fucked up. I might have to circle back.